McKay Borbon | Content Marketing Manager
Automation can seem scary—and impersonal. Especially for customer service, where human interaction is central to the experience. But using conversational AI for customer service can actually allow you to offer personalized support at scale.
When done right, AI automation lowers response times, boosts CSAT, allows agents to do more strategic work, lowers operational costs, and provides a more consistent and enhanced customer experience.
If you’re reading this, you are likely already aware of the many benefits of leveraging AI in customer experience. You are also probably considering using AI to improve customer service at your company.
Even if you’re just starting to look into how to use AI to improve the customer experience, keep reading! By 2025, 95% of customer service interactions will be powered by AI. So if you want to keep up with the competition, now is the time to start familiarizing yourself with the best AI integration practices.
As with any business solution, the right steps need to happen to ensure you get the results you’re looking for.
Review these key steps to ensure you’re set up for success.
Before starting the implementation process, take a deep look at your policies and ensure they are meeting your customers’ needs. The more customer-centric your policies are, the happier your customers will be. Remember, customer service is an extension of your brand so your response-flows and policies should reflect that.
Integrating artificial intelligence in customer service is a process, and having a third-party partner can ensure that you stay on the best track. The right company will guide you through the planning and implementation; providing expertise on how to best optimize AI for your business.
For best results, you will also want a partner that can align their AI solution with your brand to ensure customers receive responses that follow your policies and brand tone.
It doesn’t make sense to put your AI in charge of unique tickets or resolve problems that haven't happened before. AI is best-suited for high-volume repetitive tickets like shipping and returns questions, password resets, and tracking help.
So be sure to understand when and when not to use AI. Double-check that you have airtight standard processes in place. Because if you put AI where it doesn’t belong, it could create more work and errors for your agents to clean up.
Customers want a smooth experience, from hopping on your site to buy new shoes to ticket resolution. Your AI should interface well with your customers and your platform. Any automation should feel personalized. Customer experience should remain number one throughout the process.
AI is meant to augment human agents. Your support team should know why you've chosen to implement AI, know all about the AI system and its basic functionality, the purpose behind it, why it is being utilized, and how their roles might change for the better.
Even though your AI Agent isn’t a human, it will be delivering human-like experiences and be a member of your team! Help bring your new agent to life by giving them a name. Their name can reflect your brand or just be a name that you like. Have fun with it and get your human agents involved in the naming process!
The right AI partner and technology will enable you to easily test strategies, processes, and promotions. For optimal success, pinpoint your focus and create clear procedures and responses. This nuance includes naming conventions; establishing distinct terms for different actions and promotions will increase veracity for both your AI Agent and human agents.
Just like humans, AI won’t be perfect, especially if you don't maximize its capabilities over time. You'll want to continually test the system, evaluate how consumers respond, and make adjustments along the way. Ask for feedback from both agents and customers.
AI is not a set-it-and-forget-it solution. You have to be invested in your automation, just like you’re invested in your employees.
The benefits of AI in customer service are high: improved customer satisfaction, greater consistency, and reduced costs. Be sure you implement with a clear plan to ensure you reap all the rewards. For the best success, find an AI partner who will walk with you every step of the way.
For even more tips on how to integrate AI into your customer service and an outline of steps to get you started, download the AI Readiness Playbook. 👇
Additional Resources:
AI in Customer Service | AI Ecommerce Platform | AI Email Automation | Artificial Intelligence in Customer Service | Customer Service and Support Automation | Customer Service Platform | Customer Service and Automation | Ecommerce Customer Service Automation | Ecommerce Customer Service Outsourcing | Future of Customer Service
Topics: Blog, Customer Service, Artificial Intelligence
McKay Borbon | Content Marketing Manager
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