Artificial Intelligence: The Future of Customer Service

• Call routing: AI uses intelligent automation to route inbound conversations based on the caller’s native language, contact type, lifetime order value or previous contact history, thereby ensuring the best agent is always assigned to each call for maximum customer satisfaction.
• Information intake: AI is being used to manage the initial intake of customer data to determine the scope of a problem, narrow the search for a suitable product or service or capture critical customer information to initiate a support ticket or warranty claim.
• Feedback analysis: AI is used to quickly tabulate results and generate insights from customer surveys and feedback from social media posts. This data can be used to identify trends to serve consumers better.
• Customer Relationship Management (CRM): When databases get too unwieldy for humans alone to manage, AI tools can parse the data collected by entire salesforces to reveal buying patterns, trends and when to reach out to individual customers.
• Chatbots and virtual assistants: These tools can execute basic functions such as providing pricing information or directing customers to related knowledge bases. They offer assistance at the consumers’ convenience and cost less than a live agent.
• Automated messaging response: AI assures customers that their message has been received and action is being taken while removing the potential of human error and delays in the response.

AI will relieve the stress of overloaded call center employees and customer service representatives by taking over repetitive menial tasks such as information gathering, call routing and answering simple information requests, leaving agents free to handle more pressing issues, such as difficult problem solving and data mining for new insights.

Some customers, especially the elderly, may find AI impersonal and may prefer to speak with a live agent. Customers, especially those with hearing or comprehension issues, may get frustrated with Interactive Voice Response (IVR) technology and will abandon the call if it becomes too difficult to navigate the choices.

Customer service agents may fear that AI will put their jobs at risk or the technology will be used to spy on them. A few businesses believe their product is too unique for AI or that the technology is too expensive or not advanced enough.

With customers reaching out to businesses for help from all over the globe, in different languages, using a variety of wired and wireless devices, connecting across multiple carriers, at all hours of the day and night, using a mix of text, voice and video channels, reliable network performance is critical.

AI needs a fast network to be able to answer customer inquiries in real time, route calls to the proper agent without lengthy holds, reach out to other connected knowledge bases to locate the right model number or replacement part in milliseconds and enable bi-directional communications which allows AI to discern a customer’s meaning and emotions to present accurate answers based on interpreted data.