Conversational AI for Contact Centers: The Complete Guide

Evolving customer expectations, combined with rising talent shortages in the contact center has led to a massive increase in the number of companies adopting AI-powered tools.

Artificial Intelligence, in its many forms, can help companies streamline customer service tasks, deliver more personalized service, and essentially accomplish more with less. In fact, studies show 90% of contact centers report measurable improvements in resolution speeds when using AI tools.

While there are various types of AI that can benefit the contact center, conversational AI is one of the most impactful options for modern contact centers. Conversational tools can enhance self-service strategies, improve call routing and management, and give businesses access to valuable insights.

Here, we’ll introduce you to all the benefits of conversational AI for contact centers, the challenges you’ll need to overcome, and our best practices for success.

What is Conversational AI for Contact Centers?

Conversational AI is a type of AI technology that allows machines to interact with human beings in a natural, convenient way. Conversational solutions can mimic and simulate human conversation, leveraging Natural Language Processing and Natural Language Understanding algorithms.

Some conversational AI tools also adopt machine learning and deep learning practices which allow them to automatically become more efficient and effective over time, learning from each conversation.

In the contact center, conversational AI offers companies a powerful tool they can use to boost employee efficiency, increase customer satisfaction, and streamline processes.

The most common types of conversational AI tools found in the contact center include:

Chatbots and Virtual Assistants

Chatbots, powered by conversational AI, can enhance experiences for both customers and employees in the contact center. Unlike previous rule-based chatbots, which could only generate pre-determined responses to specific questions, AI chatbots can understand human language, understand the intent behind questions, and generate intuitive responses to queries.

Many companies already use chatbots and virtual assistants to deliver 24/7 self-service experiences to customers. Message-based bots and assistants built into calling apps can answer questions, walk customers through troubleshooting tasks, and even complete specific actions, like processing a payment.

These bots can also deliver guidance and support to employees. For instance, a virtual assistant in a CCaaS platform can provide agents with instant access to customer data during a call, surface data from other applications to help them resolve queries faster, or offer real-time coaching.

Intelligent IVR Systems

Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems are some of the most important tools in any contact center. They allow customers to access self-service experiences and navigate through contact center menus to find the ideal agent or team member to address their needs.

IVR systems with conversational AI capabilities eliminate the need for customers to press numbers on their keypads to take the next step in their journey. Instead, these tools can understand the words spoken by a customer, and rapidly deliver intuitive responses. They can either immediately resolve problems for customers or use automated speech recognition to pass customers to a relevant agent.

This helps companies streamline call routing, improve customer satisfaction rates, and reduce the number of clients that abandon calls due to complex navigation processes.

Analytical and Monitoring Tools

Analytical, reporting, and monitoring systems equipped with conversational AI capabilities can gather deep insights from every conversation. Some AI tools can leverage sentiment analysis algorithms, providing insights into the emotions of your customers as they move through their journey with your organization. They can even alert supervisors when customers are frustrated or upset.

AI analytical and monitoring tools can also detect common phrases and topics mentioned in conversations, helping you to create more comprehensive self-help resources. They can help you learn more about the various stages of the customer journey and make intelligent decisions to support growth.

Conversational AI tools can even monitor conversations for potential risks, letting companies know when agents fail to obtain consent to record a call, or mention a sensitive topic. This can help to reduce the risk of fines caused by noncompliance with industry standards.

The Benefits of Conversational AI for Contact Centers

Implemented correctly, the benefits of conversational AI for contact centers can be outstanding. The right tools empower companies to enhance omnichannel service experiences for their customers, improve team efficiency and productivity, and reduce costs.

Increased Customer Acquisition and Revenue

One of the biggest benefits of conversational AI for contact centers is that it helps organizations to acquire and convert more customers. Conversational AI tools can proactively reach out to customers and let them know about new products or services.

For instance, an outbound IVR system can use conversational AI to pitch products to customers, or a messaging app could suggest personalized products to customers on a website, based on their purchasing history and browsing behavior. These tools can also provide customers with access to the tools they need to make better purchasing decisions, answering questions about products and solutions in real time.

Plus, since conversational AI offers business leaders insights into everything from common customer challenges to goals and sentiment, it can help companies to build better marketing, sales, and customer service campaigns. Some AI tools can even identify opportunities for cross-selling and upselling and inform sales teams of the best time to suggest a product to a customer.

Improved Customer Satisfaction

Another major benefit of conversational AI in the contact center is that it can significantly improve customer satisfaction. The MIT Technology Review found that AI tools can boost customer satisfaction rates by 80%. After all, with conversational AI, companies can:

• Deliver fast 24/7 service: Conversational AI chatbots and virtual assistants allow companies to support customers and address issues quickly and effectively. They can help customers overcome issues at any time, regardless of their location.
• Provide personalized support: Conversational AI tools can provide agents with insights into a customer’s preferences and history, drawing data from a CRM platform. Bots can also adapt to different customer needs, communicating in a range of languages.
• Enable proactive service: With conversational AI, companies can implement proactive service strategies, automatically reaching out to customers with new offers or letting them know about technical issues and faults, reducing the risk of customer churn.

Plus, with all the data gathered from conversational AI bots, businesses obtain the insights they need to maintain high customer satisfaction rates and earn the loyalty of their target audience.

Reduced Operating Costs

Although conversational AI tools incur some initial costs, they can help businesses to significantly reduce expenses over time. Conversational AI tools reduce the cost to serve by deflecting common customer interactions from traditional channels, allowing employees to focus on more challenging tasks and ensuring companies can accomplish more with less.

IBM research suggests interactions with chatbots are up to 30% cheaper for contact centers to manage than agent-led interactions. Conversational AI also eliminates the need for companies to hire additional team members to offer round-the-clock support.

Plus, it can reduce the amount you spend on training and onboarding new employees by giving every staff member access to a source of constant coaching and support.

Improved Employee Satisfaction

Implementing conversational AI isn’t about replacing agents in the contact center; it’s about providing them with the resources they need to work more efficiently and effectively. AI tools can eliminate some of the mundane and repetitive tasks agents spend significant time on every day.

They can handle everything from the transcription and translation of call records to surfacing crucial information to team members during conversations, so they can address problems faster. In fact, one report found that chatbots can reduce handling times for customer queries by 77%.

Conversational AI assistants can also offer real-time guidance to employees as they navigate difficult conversations, suggesting next-best actions based on historical data.

Greater Data Management and Compliance

Conversational AI tools enable contact centers to collect valuable customer data and insights. Each interaction gives virtual assistants and bots an opportunity to gather information about customer preferences, behaviors and needs, which can guide business decisions.

The right tools can help companies to allocate resources more effectively, eliminate roadblocks in the customer service journey, and unlock new opportunities.

Additionally, since conversational AI tools can monitor conversations in real-time, they can help businesses stay compliant with industry standards, watching for potential risks and threats.

Best Practices for Using Conversational AI in Contact Centers

While conversational AI can be an incredible resource for contact centers, it needs to be implemented effectively to deliver the best return on investment. The right approach to integrating conversational AI tools into the contact center will help you access all the advantages these solutions have to offer, while mitigating unnecessary risks. Here are our best practices for success:

• Identify your use cases and goals: Examine your current contact center processes and look for the biggest areas where conversational AI can add the most value. You might decide to focus on self-service and IVR enhancement, training and supporting team members, or simply gathering more valuable data from customer interactions.
• Prioritize integrations: The best conversational AI solution should integrate seamlessly with your omnichannel contact center, gathering data and providing support across multiple channels, from phone and email to chat and social media. It should also integrate with your CRM system and other crucial tools to enable the personalization of customer service.
• Keep the human in the loop: Don’t make the mistake of allowing conversational AI to replace your human agents. Implement the technology as a support tool to augment and enhance the abilities of agents, allowing them to handle complex queries more effectively. Make sure customers can always escalate from a conversation with a bot to one with a human.
• Constantly train and improve your tools: Regular training and updates to your conversational AI solutions are crucial to unlocking their full value. Analyze customer interactions, gather feedback from clients and employees, and use the data you collect to optimize AI models. Frequently search for ways to make your tools more efficient and powerful.
• Remember privacy and compliance: Don’t take risks with your AI technology. Implement strict data governance, privacy, and protection standards. Keep customers informed when they’re interacting with AI tools and implement robust security measures to protect sensitive information.

Overcoming Common Challenges with Conversational AI

Notably, although conversational AI tools are becoming more powerful all the time, there are still challenges and issues businesses need to overcome with these solutions. Identifying the most common challenges you’re likely to face in advance will help you find ways to reduce risks.

Technology Limitations

Some AI tools can struggle with understanding and interpreting diverse customer queries and language nuances. They may make mistakes when listening to a customer with a specific accent or delivering a response to an unusually worded question.

Use state-of-the-art systems, with advanced natural language understanding (NLU) algorithms to reduce the risk of mistakes, and regularly monitor your systems for inaccuracies. Use human-in-the-loop training to help educate bots on how to handle complex queries.

Data Security and Privacy

Safeguarding customer data is crucial for any contact center. Your customers want to know that their private information is always protected. When implementing AI into your ecosystem, make sure that you’re always following strict data governance standards.

Limit the access AI systems have to personal data, and make sure you’re storing any information you collect in a secure format. If your AI solutions handle things like transactions and payments, make sure you’re using a PCI-compliant and encrypted system for payment processing.

Integration Complexity

As mentioned above, ensuring your AI solution can integrate seamlessly with all the tools you use to deliver customer service is crucial. It’s a key part of making sure you can collect holistic insights into the customer journey, and make informed, data-driven decisions.

When implementing conversational AI technology into your contact center, look for a solution that offers access to one-click integrations and APIs to connect your technology stack. Make sure you can scale your solution to work across new channels and integrate with new technologies as your company evolves.

The Power of Conversational AI for Contact Centers

Conversational AI has the potential to transform the contact center on a massive scale, improving how companies deliver customer service and support, increase revenue, and empower team members. With the right technology, you can reduce operational costs and boost productivity, while also earning higher levels of customer loyalty and minimizing churn.

The key to success is choosing the right conversational AI tools for your use cases, and implementing them effectively, with a focus on continuous improvement, flexibility, and security.

At ComputerTalk, we offer comprehensive conversational AI tools that can integrate with your existing customer service technology and adapt to suit your specific needs. From intelligent bots and IVR systems to tools that monitor discussions and analyze sentiment in real time, we can give you the resources you need to take your contact center to the next level.

Contact us today to learn more or request a demo of our AI technology.