How to use AI for better customer experiences
Among the many companies exploring the uses of artificial intelligence, there is one surprisingly unique group; companies that actually transform customer experiences using AI. How do they do it? Let us learn.
For many companies, especially for the ones that perceived customer experience to be a marketing responsibility, the COVID-19 pandemic has unfolded the moments of truth. As more and more consumers started purchasing goods and services online, digital channels have become the hotspots of customer experience. Few businesses that understood the role of artificial intelligence in customer experience, took up the transformation responsibility and turned adversity into advantage.
Customer experience transformation using AI and its results
A leading e-commerce company in the US started out with a simple philosophy of modernizing the complete customer journey experience. With a focus to deliver a sequence of interactions to the customers that end on a positive note and unite the purpose of the company, the executives took a decision to adopt AI at scale. A multidisciplinary team including the Chief Data Officer (CDO)representing the analytics team, CTO representing the engineering, and CMO concentrating on marketing, began a journey of customer experience transformation leveraging artificial intelligence.
- In 6 months, the results were worth looking at. The company had:
- Enabled complete automation of marketing workflows based on key indicators from analytics
- Identified the most important customer journeys that helped retain 40% of existing users
- Reduced sales overheads on customer support by 35% using automation
- Drove 20% new users from new categories of the target audience
Such early economic wins are delivering momentum for the continuous transformation of customer experience using artificial intelligence. With the lessons learned from such success stories, artificial intelligence can be adopted to improve customer experience easier. The immediate challenge for companies will be how to structure the customer experience transformation, as well as figuring out the important uses of artificial intelligence across the pillars of customer experience. We have identified, across all industries, that customer experience transformation is usually based on 3 key pillars: personalization, customer service, and marketing-sales alignment.
Improving marketing personalization using AI
Using AI, companies can execute behavioral psychology initiatives that scan the data from multiple sources to assign a priority score to the leads and existing users. Machine learning algorithms can be used by companies to create personalized categories of customer segments in the form of data sets that can be further organized on any marketing automation platform for advertising. For instance, one OTTplatform tailored broadcasting playlists based on customer’s watching habits that discovered at least100 new data sets for the target audience.
In the case of marketing personalization, customer experience can be transformed using AI in multiple ways. Some important ways, in both the B2C and B2B industries, however, remain the same. Artificial intelligence can be used to tweak micro-elements of content to personalize a host of communications with a customer. In another case, AI is also helping companies retarget and remarket to bounced users on multiple digital channels with consistent messaging, Such customer experience transformations using artificial intelligence usually analyses user behavior to target only qualified leads that convert easily. Finally, marketing personalization, powered by artificial intelligence, has also been noticed in contextual notifications for users based on real-time events.
Enhance customer service using AI
Customers today don’t hesitate to flaunt their power. Customers are demanding seamless service, right now, without much intervention. In such times, traditional customer support isn’t working. And customer service is a major part of the customer experience scoresheet, automated resolution of customer tickets is the only way out.
To that end, artificial intelligence is playing a key role in automating many customer touchpoints that decrease time to resolution and increase customer satisfaction as a result. A few companies, for example, are making use of AI-based chatbots to respond to customer queries. Over time and across industries, AI-based virtual assistants are also serving the need for customer experience transformation. Here are a few use cases every company can deliver to enhance customer service using AI:
- Augmenting and automating messaging on chatbots
- Sorting and routing support inquiries
- Reducing average ticket handling time with response content templates
- Automating customer surveys after product/service delivery
- Virtual assistant integrations such as Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant
Marketing sales alignment using AI
In the new normal, it is imperative for companies to be proactive and nimble when it comes to anticipating customer expectations and delivering on their needs and desires. It’s mostly about bridging the gap between marketing and sales. Apparently, now is the time for companies to invest in data, advanced analytics, and digital platforms to bring a cohesive alignment between their marketing and sales functions. However, the alignment can only be made possible with the help of an AI-based recommendation engine that will collect marketing data, analyze, and uncover novel opportunities for sales. Let’s look at how one company brought synchrony between its marketing and sales and transformed its customer experience using AI
One European airline, for instance, developed an AI-based proprietary platform to predict customer’s flying needs based on occasions across the globe. The platform pushed predictive analytics from near real-time events taking place in its target geographies. Some of the most successful use cases that the recommendations delivered were holidays, destination marriages, and corporate bookings. By acting based on these insights, the airline’s company was better able to predict customer segments and offer dynamic pricing that resulted in increased conversion. Ultimately, the company could transform the customer experiences using AI to an extent that it delivered a 300% rise in customer satisfaction scores.
Companies can’t stand out in the crowd by setting customer experience initiatives and forgetting them. Customer expectations are evolving with each passing day and ultra-modern intelligence can only monitor comprehensive marketing trends to advise better. More than ever before, this is the time for companies to adopt AI and respond quickly to all the 3 key pillars of customer experience discussed in this article.
