The use of AI in the contact center has been an integral part of the customer support industry for quite a long time now. The customer service domain is evolving rapidly with the involvement of AI in the workflow. Businesses must implement strategies and maintain a systematic pattern to keep up with the change. An article by McKinsey & Company states, “Over 80% of business leaders have invested in AI technology.” AI is the future of the contact center industry, and therefore, businesses are investing in this technology to empower their customer support team with the best of the technologies.
Now, the question is, “Do all the major contact center challenges get resolved by incorporating AI?” Of course not! You need to know the difference between various AI technologies and how to use them.
A Brief Introduction to AI
Artificial Intelligence (AI) consists of various advanced technologies designed to simulate human intelligence into artificial intelligence or machines. This group of technologies includes – machine learning, robotics, natural language processing, computer vision, and Gen-AI. Different technologies are designated to perform other tasks, including problem-solving, data analysis, automation, and decision-making in various departments.
Here, we will cover Gen-AI and its usage in the customer support domain.
Generative AI means using large language models (LLMs) and deep learning techniques to autonomously create high-quality content in various forms, such as images, text, code, audio, etc. Some common examples of Gen-AI are Microsoft’s Co-pilot, Google’s Gemini, and OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
10 Uses Of Generative AI in Customer Service
Answering Simple Questions Through Self-Service
In today’s fast-paced world, more than 60% of customers prefer self-service to solve simple issues. They want to solve basic queries independently without any agent’s intervention. Customers prefer self-service because they don’t want to wait so long to connect with a customer support executive to get answers to a simple issue.
Therefore, contact centers use online portals, FAQs, and AI-powered chatbots that use Natural Language Processing (NLP), predictive analysis, and sentiment analysis to understand customer queries better and offer optimum resolution hassle-freely. These solutions allow customers to navigate the platform, use different keywords, and access relevant documents to resolve their queries.
Automating After-Call Work
A contact center agent’s work is not limited to on-call interactions. They also have to perform numerous post-call tasks, such as uploading interaction summaries and adding wrap-up codes.
Generative-AI solution automates the post-call process and saves time from each interaction, reducing operational costs. Having solutions like NV desk automates the process of interaction review, tweaking, and creating a wrap-up and interaction summary on behalf of the agent. The data gathered during the interaction helps other team members who further indulge in the conversation.
Elevating Scalability and Efficiency
One major challenge the contact center support team faced before Gen-AI was involved in the workflow was managing and evaluating such extensive data. The chances of manual error were high, data security concerns were present, and the process was too time-consuming.
However, after Generative AI was introduced into customer service, data analysis became swift and automated. Furthermore, Gen-AI improved scalability by providing round-the-clock support, managing surges in demand, and maintaining high service quality.
Providing 24/7 Multilingual Support
Gen-AI has revolutionized the working of contact centers in multiple ways. Offering multilingual support was another major transformation before Generative AI contact centers used to hire customer support agents who were experts in language translation. It was a costly and time-consuming option, creating dependency on an individual.
With the advancement of Gen-AI, offering 24/7 multilingual support has become easier for contact centers. An effective AI-powered chat translator analyses, translates and responds accurately to customers across different languages. By incorporating Gen-AI for chat translation, businesses save costs and reduce human intervention.
Highlighting Agent Coaching Opportunities
Sometimes, managers who manage a large team of agents find it challenging to train each member. As a result, work quality decreases, and the agent attrition rate increases.
Incorporating generative AI improved work quality and reduced the attrition rate. Manage the automated agent performance summary for each customer interaction. This summary includes coaching opportunities and positive recognition plans.
Redefining Sentiment Analysis on Customer Feedback
During interactions, customers often feel unheard or misunderstood by the customer support agent. It happens because agents find it difficult to understand customers’ emotional status appropriately whenever they interact. Therefore, to bridge that gap of connection, Gen-AI came into the picture.
Generative AI plays a crucial role in understanding customer sentiments. It detects the tone of the conversation and helps agents analyze whether the customer’s tone is positive, negative, or neutral. Agents can determine the emotional state of customers and respond accordingly.
Generating Knowledge Base
Before the involvement of Generative-AI in the contact center, agents used to find relevant knowledge-based articles on their own through multiple screen shuffles and scrolls during the interaction while putting customers online. It increases the average handling time, reduces the FCR rate, and frustrates customers.
With Gen-AI, the process becomes much easier and smoother. Gen-AI’s algorithm automatically understands customer conversations and internal documents and generates a comprehensive knowledge base that assists agents in solving queries much faster. Furthermore, it helps find knowledge base gaps by identifying that no knowledge article is available for a specific issue. Based on that, agents or the respective team can create a relevant knowledge base.
Customizing Recommendations
Sending customized recommendations is an effective way to boost sales. It also makes customers feel that the brand understands their needs and choices. Gen-AI helps send relevant recommendations to customers.
After analyzing user data, such as past interactions, browsing, and purchase history, Gen-AI generates and sends customized suggestions. This analysis helps understand customer preferences, based on which real-time customized recommendations are shared.
Automating Surveys
Taking customer feedback and working on it to improve their experience is crucial for business growth. After each interaction, gathering customer feedback through the survey helps to know the customers’ experience, whether positive, negative, or neutral.
Generative AI makes the feedback process easier by designing and deploying surveys to know how the customer felt during the conversation. Was it helpful or disappointing? AI helps businesses make data-driven decisions and focus on areas of improvement.
Solving Issues Through Predictive Analysis
Analyzing historical data manually to understand previous customer interactions and predict customers’ behavior wasn’t a cakewalk for agents and supervisors. The chances of error and misunderstanding were high.
Gen-AI eliminated such manual efforts and made the process easier. It automatically analyzes historical data to predict customers’ preferences and behaviors, understand their requirements, and offer assistance accordingly.
Conclusion
Incorporating Generative-AI in the contact center workflow has brought a significant transformation by providing relevant, quick, and data-driven solutions. From personalized to real-time solutions, Gen-AI reshaped the future of the customer service industry. Businesses are adopting this technology worldwide because of exceptional changes in customer experience. It made the interactions more contextual, empathetic, and intelligent.
Including Generative AI in your existing workflow is seamless if you choose a top contact center solution provider, like NovelVox, for integration services. Our experts recommend the best solutions based on your business needs and help you take your business to the next level.
