In our daily lives, artificial intelligence (AI) is almost everywhere. AI learns what movies, songs and products we will like and suggests ideas based on what we’ve already consumed. It follows our voice commands on devices like Alexa and Google Home. We all know that big tech companies use machine learning for everything, from marketing to customer analytics.
But, how do these companies use AI to provide a better customer experience? And, more importantly, how can you utilize AI for your business too? This guide can help you learn what technology is out there, and how you can use AI to improve your customers’ experience.
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What Is AI Being Used for in Business?
You may already be familiar with AI as a tool for tech industry giants like Google. The truth is, businesses everywhere are using AI to improve the customer experience. Here’s how:
Chatbots
In an age where people can find almost anything without ever talking to a real person, customer service needs to keep up. Businesses use AI-powered chatbots to handle their most common requests and questions.
Chatbots are becoming increasingly sophisticated. They learn from their past experiences and are able to do everything from discover a user’s meaning to making generalizations. Chatbots speak like humans and are able to answer most questions. They can also seamlessly pass off chats to real representatives when necessary.
When AI does pass the mic to a human being, the chatbot has already done the heavy lifting. It is programmed to extract certain information so that customers don’t have to repeat themselves and are able to receive help more quickly.
Customer Journey Analytics
Technology helps businesses understand how customers navigate between websites, social media channels and more. Customer journey machine learning gives actionable analytics. As journey mapping reveals all the ways customers interact with your brand, you see opportunities to unify your messaging across platforms for better service. You can identify common pain points and create plans for addressing these with your service team.
How Are Businesses Using AI With Customers?
When we think about how we provide personal service to our customers, we may not think about automated solutions. The truth is, machine learning can improve customer experience in many ways, and businesses are already taking advantage of it. Here’s how different industries are harnessing AI:
Retail
To enhance their service, online retailers are turning to personal shoppers. Personal shoppers ask users questions and offer them a personalized selection of products. They work much the same way as the chatbots you can find on most sites. With virtual shoppers, users can ask questions and receive personal service like they would in a brick and mortar store.
Healthcare
In the healthcare industry, AI-powered technology can read medical images. They even give a diagnosis as accurately as humans do. By introducing labeled models, researchers teach robots to classify similar images in the future. doctors and nurses are able to spend more time on one-on-one patient care with the assistance of AI-powered patient technology
Financial Services
Banks are now connecting with personal assistants like Google Home for “voice banking.” While still a new technology, these AI devices can improve customer service for banks. Users can ask simple questions such as, “What’s my balance?” or “Do I have any pending transfers?” As technology improves, voice banking has the potential to become a rich part of customer interaction.
How Is Machine Learning Changing Call Centers?
Call centers are a hub for great customer service, and AI makes them even more effective. Here are some examples of how AI can improve customer experience in call centers:
24/7 Customer Support
Most businesses don’t have the resources to operate human-powered customer support all hours of the night. Limited time can put smaller companies at a considerable disadvantage when customers want immediate answers or resources.
Machine-powered customer support can offer after-hours support with intelligent call and chat dialogues. As AI becomes more sophisticated, it can handle more complicated problems. Customers get in-the-moment support no matter the time of day.
Friendlier Customer Support
Even the best customer service agents can have off-days. There will always be times when people are unsure of how to react. What’s great about AI is that it never raises its voice and always stays positive. No matter who it is on the phone with or for how long, AI maintains professionalism and kindness.
Plus, powerful analytics can help your staff be friendlier with customers. AI can identify opportunities for staff training by recognizing customers’ tone of voice. With AI, customers get a more consistent experience.
Freeing up Agents for High-Priority Calls
Artificial intelligence cannot replace human interaction when it comes to customer experience. What it can do is reduce wait times for customers by handling small issues with smart call and text interactions. These small requests can be resolved without a human representative. Staff can deal with more significant customer issues instead.
Also, AI can gather and pass on data like customer names and problem types so that agents can hit the ground running when they interact with the customer.
Can Small Businesses Use AI to Help With Customer Experience?
As artificial intelligence advances, it’s easy and affordable for small businesses to utilize AI solutions. Morefield has partnered with Mitel to offer Google Contact Center AI providing customer experience solutions for small and medium businesses.
Here are some ways you can start harnessing the power of AI, no matter the size of your company:
Analyze Team Performance
Listening to call recordings to evaluate customer service performance is time-consuming. Your team may not have the capacity to listen to every recording. With unified communications, you’re tracking voice recordings, video calls, chatbot messages and emails.
Machine learning can spot emerging trends with customers and identify coaching moments. You’ll improve your team and individual customer service reps and prepare them for more scenarios. AI gives you performance data you can use.
Real-Time Speech Recognition
Artificial intelligence will never replace person-to-person customer service. Chatbots work well for simple questions and common problems. When customers face complicated issues, they still turn to humans for solutions. People can listen and understand issues in real-time, and they can also offer emotional support.
Yet, machine learning is catching up in a big way with real-time speech analytics (RTSA). Artificial intelligence can interpret how a speaker is feeling by tuning in to voice inflection, tone of voice, volume and more. It can pick up on how a customer feels before your service agent does.
Your customer service reps can get notifications in real-time about when a customer is satisfied or becoming angry. They can even get alerts like, “You’re talking too much,” allowing your team to adjust their approach. Your customers still receive good old-fashioned human interaction in a way that’s completely customized to them, thanks to machine learning customer experience.
Work With a Technology Expert
AI and customer experience go hand-in-hand. With all the ways artificial intelligence drives customer experience, your business can gain an edge over the competition. The next step is teaming up with a technology expert to help you get AI for your business.
Morefield Communications can set you up with a unified communications system, which empowers you to offer great customer service with chatbots, interactive voice assistants and live agent calls. Morefield partners with Mitel to power our communication platforms with Google AI technology. At Morefield, we are technology experts who can modernize your contact center.
Want to see how you can easily implement AI in your organization for a better customer experience?
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