5 AI Powered-Steps to Improving the Customer Experience

Automation has been changing the customer experience (CX) for years with self-service and predictive routing. Artificial intelligence (AI), however, takes it to a whole new level. To understand this, we must first weed through some of the hype. For example, AI is not going to entirely replace your workforce.

As Leslie Willcocks, a professor at the McKinsey London School of Economics, stated, “AI will take the robot out of the human.” This means that AI will free workers from mundane, mind-numbing, repetitive tasks and allow them to concentrate on the more challenging and complex customer issues where they can take pride in adding value to the customer experience.

Enhancing the Customer Experience with AI

Here are some AI-powered next steps that can improve the customer experience.

1. First, an AI-powered voice recognition engine identifies the customer’s voice using voice print technology. This is important, as customers call from different or even shared numbers. Even if the customer calls from an unknown number, they can be identified so they don’t have to go through inputting customer ID numbers and/or other information using a touchpad. They also don’t have to repeat themselves to the agent.
   
   
2. Then, a virtual agent (VA) answers the call and confirms the authentication of the user. The VA also knows why the customer is calling. How? By dipping into the company’s databases like CRM or a Context Store, the VA knows the customer has an open issue.  
   
   If the customer has been on the company website, the VA knows what they’ve been doing, such as reviewing a claim, and that they are now calling into the center. The VA recognizes that self-service has either partially assisted or failed and that the customer wants to speak to a live person.
   
   
3. The VA transfers the call and simultaneously provides the “context” of the call to the routing engine. This process allows the routing engine to pick the employee with the right skill set (including dealing with frustrated callers). In this case, the worker’s ability to empathize and handle a claim issue efficiently is vital. The worker in this case may or may not be a traditional agent.
   
   To enable faster resolution, the worker or agent is provided customer details and the reason for the call. The agent knows to immediately empathize with the customer and provide reassurance that the issue will be resolved quickly.
   
   
4. Next, the agent may determine that more information is needed. Rather than collecting it live, the agent encourages the customer to provide the virtual assistant with the necessary information. Most importantly, the agent commits to reaching out to the customer within a certain amount of time. 
   
   You’re probably wondering: Why is the customer willing to go back to the VA? Great question. The customer is told the reason for using the VA is the sensitive information, like a social security number, password, driver’s license number, etc., that will be better protected if it is not given to a live person.
   
   Sensitive information can be provided and encrypted within a VA. For example, an agent can say, “Please supply your SSN to the virtual agent and I will have everything I need to work this issue. I will call you back within 30 minutes with the results.” This frees the agent from the “robotic” portion of the interaction so he or she can concentrate on resolving the issue and the next caller that needs to talk to a “live person.”
   
   
5. After the agreed upon time, the system provides the agent with the customer’s contact information, like a phone number, and then calls back. The agent informs the customer that their issue has been resolved and makes sure he or she is satisfied with the results.

Let that workflow sink in a bit. It is designed to make the interaction easy and efficient, so customers can get back to their daily lives quickly. Remember, resolution by the path of least resistance is a powerful way to create customer loyalty.

Analyzing the Results: An Effortless Experience

The transaction is made easy because the customer does not have to go through a bunch of keystrokes on a cell phone for identification purposes. They also do not have to listen to menu choices to “choose their path.”

Additionally:

• The customer did not have to spend time explaining the issue because the company already knew what the customer wanted to talk about. All the time and effort the customer spent on the website “paid off” for them in the long run.
  
  
• The customer was routed to the right employee, who was skilled at handling frustrated customers and equipped to resolve the issue.
  
  
• The customer did not have to make any additional efforts to follow up, since the employee proactively reached out in the committed time frame.

• Improved loyalty from a satisfied customer who received personalized service. That customer is more likely to provide a positive Net Provider Score.
  
  
• Increased employee productivity/reduction in average talk time, by letting the VA do the mundane work.
  
  
• Increased employee productivity/reduction in after-call work time, by letting the VA do some of the work.
  
  
• Enhanced agent satisfaction and retention because time doesn’t need to be spent on mind-numbing, repetitive tasks.
  
  
• Lowered cost for PCI-compliant solutions to be implemented on the company WFO platform.
  
  
• Reduced calls to the CX center because of preemptive and proactive CX actions, reducing retries and callbacks on the same issue.

Kind of sounds like CX heaven, doesn’t it? Well, it is closer than you might think. Next we’ll discuss the necessary things to make this happen:

1. Real-time, two-way integration (API) into big data/back-end databases.
   
   
2. Real-time integration with CRM.
   
   
3. Real-time integration with the website.
   
   
4. Business planning to integrate AI, automation, routing, and business processes into a seamless CX workflow.
   
   
5. Adapting WFO to include VAs and intraday automation in its planning.

The Future of CX AI Technology

CX AI technology is maturing at a very rapid pace. A portion of the AI solutions in this example are available today, but may still be too expensive for mass adoption. As these technologies mature, they promise to significantly increase customer satisfaction and reduce costs. These savings are too great not to introduce AI into the CX center. 

Our recommendation is to start your research now, define your workflows, and prepare for AI in your customer experience center. The longer you hesitate, the more pressure there will be to get it done quickly. There is an old saying that the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago.

The next best time is today.