As conversational AI has improved, it has revolutionized the customer experience. It offers many essential benefits to businesses, from increasing customer satisfaction to decreasing costs. However, there are some pitfalls that businesses must take into account before transitioning to conversational AI solutions. Using the right technology will help avoid those possible pitfalls and allow for a smoother customer experience.
Key Benefits of Conversational AI
Conversational AI brings many benefits to the table. With more businesses than ever taking advantage of those solutions and opportunities, businesses that fail to take them into account may lag behind, unable to provide the same standard of customer experience that their competitors can deliver.
1. 24/7 Customer Service
With conversational AI, businesses can provide customer service around the clock without having to schedule employees for the hours when they are least likely to receive queries and requests. As a result, customers have access to those solutions when it’s most convenient for them, rather than having to make sure that they call in during business hours.
Customers who can access customer support when they need it are more likely to have strong feelings of appreciation for a brand. Furthermore, they’re more likely to get problems solved in a timely manner, which means they can continue to appreciate the benefits of the brands they choose to interact with.
2. Cost Savings
Conversational AI is significantly less expensive than many other options available for customer experience solutions, including hiring human staff members to take care of all those vital steps. Conversational AI solutions generally will not completely replace human customer service agents. However, since there are some advanced queries and needs that may require that human element, the technology can substantially reduce the number of human employees you need in the office.
3. Increased Employee Satisfaction
Using conversational AI, including chatbots, to handle common customer issues can go a long way toward improving employee satisfaction. Not only do employees get to avoid the repetitive queries and simple solutions that often take up too much time in their days, they can spend more time and energy focusing on the complex customer issues that require that additional human touch.
Satisfied employees are more likely to stick with the company long-term. Furthermore, they experience lower levels of burnout and frustration, so they can provide more energy to customers.
4. Quick Scaling of AI Solutions
Scaling customer experience solutions is essential as your business grows and changes. When you have more business coming in, it naturally leads to increased demand for customer service.
Human representatives take time to hire, train, and prepare for all the challenges they face throughout the day. Using AI chatbots, on the other hand, makes it easier to scale your customer experience solutions. That means faster changes and a better overall provision for your customers.
5. Personalization
Modern AI solutions are able to provide a high level of customization to all customers. It can take into account their past interactions with your company, including past purchases, and provide suggestions, recommendations, and solutions based on those past interactions. As a result, customers can get exactly the solutions they’re looking for from your company.
As AI and data collection technology increases, businesses can provide increasing levels of customization. Customers are no longer grouped into segments; instead, they have their own unique profiles and solutions based on their unique purchasing decisions and needs.
Potential Pitfalls of Conversational AI
When choosing conversational AI as part of your business’s customer experience, you also need to carefully consider the pitfalls and how you can avoid them.
1. Lack of Human Qualities
Conversational AI has advanced considerably over the past several years. Many chatbot interactions are now very close to interactions with a human. However, AI still lacks some essential human qualities, including the ability to empathize.
For many customers, the connection with customer service is emotional. They have a problem, and it may need an immediate fix. Your chatbot can only provide the solutions that have been programmed into it ahead of time (lack of creativity) and cannot understand the customer’s emotions around the situation (lack of empathy).
Using the right conversational AI solution and combining it with input from human customer service representatives who can offer their own unique take or override preset responses in the system can substantially improve customer outcomes and overall customer satisfaction.
At AtlasRTX, our conversational AI technology is integrated across several platforms, including personal assistants, chatbots, and more. It can also connect with your customer management platforms. As a result, it has more information about customers, their needs, and their goals, which means it can provide solutions tailored to the needs of individual customers.
2. Customer Frustration
In many cases, conversational AI can decrease customer frustrations. It cuts out wait times, allows customers to get fast answers to their problems, and makes users feel as though their needs and concerns are heard and respected.
However, it can also create its own frustrations. Some customers feel that chatbots are too mechanical and do not have the essential human element they’re looking for in their customer service interactions. Others struggle with delays in getting resolutions as they struggle to use the right keywords or provide the right information to get the solutions they need.
There are several things businesses may need to do to reduce customer frustration.
- Review chatbot programming and protocols regularly, and fix any potential problems.
- Look at the customer-side experience and ensure that it goes as smoothly as possible, even with unusual challenges.
- Integrate conversational AI solutions with human customer service agents who can make sure that customers get the full support they need.
Using the right platform is also critical for ensuring a smooth, frustration-free customer experience. Look for a platform like the one offered by AtlasRTX, where you’ll find increased integrations and automation solutions that will help smooth out possible roadblocks and provide a better experience for customers.
3. Security Issues
Cybersecurity has become an increasing challenge in all areas of business. Any time you add a new technology solution, especially one that is integrated with your other platforms, you introduce new risks. Your customer resource management platforms may contain a great deal of private customer information, and you want to make sure that you aren’t risking that data.
Using secure AI solutions, including those that already have security built into the platform, is essential to ensuring that you are able to protect your customers and your business.
If your chatbot is breached, it could provide hackers with access to data that your customers do not want to have shared–and that can have a devastating impact on your business. Making sure that your platform is secure, and that you don’t allow access to anyone, including employees, who does not actively need that access, is essential.
4. Difficulty in Navigating Complex Situations
AI is ideal for managing routine, mundane queries and needs. It can handle your most common customer service questions and the issues customers are most likely to have, or offer recommendations for customers who fit most segments and molds.
However, there will always be customers and cases that do not fit that need. When customers have complex situations that require outside-the-box thinking or additional support, conversational AI may not be able to provide it. Those customers may not have the same level of appreciation for your company.
That’s where integrating human customer service solutions with your existing AI customer experience platforms is essential. When you incorporate that vital human element, you’re able to ensure that all customers get the support and resolutions they need, regardless of the circumstances in front of them.
5. Misplaced User Trust
Accuracy is essential in customer experience interactions. Most of the time, the data provided by your conversational AI will be as accurate as possible. However, if it’s not programmed correctly or if data is missing, it could provide users with inaccurate information and solutions.
Unfortunately, many users may not do the additional research necessary to check on those requirements and recommendations, which means that they may act based on inaccurate data.
Sometimes, that can mean losses for your users: a product that does not fit their needs as perfectly as they might have assumed, for example. In other cases, it may mean losses for your company as you act to rectify a mistake made by your platform.
Choosing the right conversational AI solution is critical for avoiding this potential pitfall. With a platform like the one offered by AtlasRTX, you can feel confident that your customers are getting accurate information, recommendations, and solutions, and that can, in turn, make you more confident about those outcomes.
Learn More About Conversational AI’s Impact on Your Business
Conversational AI can have an immense positive impact on your business. By choosing the ideal conversational AI for your business’s needs, you’ll find that you are better positioned to avoid the potential pitfalls and reap the benefits, including increased customer satisfaction and appreciation from your brand. Are you ready to learn more? Contact us today to discuss our conversational AI solutions and how they can integrate with your existing customer experience technology to boost customer engagement.
