Artificial intelligence automation is the most popular trend in the modern software industry. Thanks to the countless AI-driven models and unique services they provide, potential integration is hard to ignore.
Customer service automation is one of AI adoption’s most suitable and beneficial fields. However, before learning how to automate customer services successfully using AI, we should also learn more about its role and key benefits for this type of service.
Role of AI in Customer Service Automation
As mentioned above, AI automation services can offer countless potential use cases. However, this doesn’t mean they can bring value to specific tasks or industries. Thus, the first step to automate customer service with AI is to consider what services would benefit the most from such software services.
In other words, we have to sort out and prioritize the most suitable options. Long story short, the best AI automation services for customer support are based on:
- The Natural Language Processing (NLP) capabilities of modern AI models can distinguish and understand the request without limitations or predefined rules and conditions.
- Excellent and efficient data processing allows artificial intelligence to handle large data arrays and sort and analyze them.
- High flexibility that makes AI compatible with most software systems and allows businesses to adjust integrated models to perform various tasks.
Remember that modern artificial intelligence, regardless of how complex and advanced it is, must still be monitored to prevent possible mistakes, hallucinations, and other potential issues that might occur during its exploitation.
Still, when considering AI in customer service automation, you should pay attention to the foregoing features of such models. Thus, you can define the most fitting customer services, as well as choose the best artificial intelligence models, judging from your goals and required features.
Such understanding will ensure you are using the full potential of new-age technology, not just blindly buying the buzzwords.
Key Ways to Automate Your Customer Service
Your next step is to choose the most appropriate approach to AI integration for automated customer support services. Depending on your goals and business needs, you might choose one from the list:
- Implement AI-powered chatbots
- Automated ticketing & workflow optimization
- Leverage AI agent assistants
- Set up AI-powered Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems
Frankly, you can embody each of the foregoing solutions, yet to achieve success, you should be gradual and consider each integration way as a standalone software development project. Besides, it is better to utilize separate AI solutions or custom models for each customer service automation.
Such an approach will require more time and resources than using the same artificial intelligence for all tasks. Nevertheless, it will make the system more stress-resistant, manageable and achieve better results based on model compatibility with assignments.
AI-Powered Chatbots
These AI-based services are beneficial for direct customer support. Many examples of robotized support chatbots exist, yet all of them have predefined scenarios and behavior patterns.
On the contrary, you can make your support services more enjoyable and useful by using generative and conversational chatbots with NLP features under the hood. Such chatbots can perform more natural conversations with clients and offer more functional services by covering even undefined cases or errors, boosting customer satisfaction.
Still, we don’t suggest completely replacing customer support specialists with an AI chatbot. Instead, you should consider it a supplemental tool that covers basic communication and common issue resolution, while employees can be redirected to more complex or urgent requests.
Automated Ticketing and Workflow Optimization
Data processing can benefit operations management. One obvious option is to automate ticketing by integrating AI into task management systems like Jira or its alternatives.
Using prompt engineering and creating behaviour or data processing algorithms lets you completely streamline task status updates, ticket creation and resolution, etc.
As a result, you can significantly optimize workflow and automate many tasks that usually require human involvement and time.
Leverage AI Agent Assistants
Such solutions are the most general and flexible. Based on your needs and expectations, such integrations can cover many operations.
Still, regarding customer support, AI agents are usually used as personal assistants for clients while choosing services or products, or as more autonomous versions of AI-driven chatbots.
Alternatively, they can offer assistance and support to the customer support agents by providing valuable information, suggesting solutions, etc.
AI-Powered Interactive Voice Response Systems
Finally, you can streamline voice conversations by automating request processing and response generation. This functionality is more complex than AI-driven chabots because it requires additional resources and integrations. For instance, you will need a speech-to-text and vice versa transcription to understand voice commands and perform them, as well as give voice responses.
Nevertheless, such functionality can be highly beneficial in some particular cases. So, if your business needs match such software solutions, consider implementing them.
Best Practices for AI Customer Service Automation
So, what are the best practices for AI customer service automation? Simply put, it is possible to define four pretty obvious core advice that can still help to achieve a successful AI integration and services automation:
- Identify areas for automation
- Choose the right AI solution
- Integrate AI with existing system
- Train and optimize AI system
Identifying Automation Areas
First, you must define your automation areas as clearly as possible. Not knowing what exactly you want to achieve with AI integration, you can’t succeed.
As we said before, knowing your goals allows you to choose the most appropriate software solutions and integration approach. Otherwise, you might struggle with making the correct choices or even fail the whole project, not satisfying your expectations.
Choose the Right AI Solution
After learning your needs and automation areas, the next step is finding the most efficient way to satisfy them.
Once again, there is a vast variety of ready-made artificial intelligence models that can be used to benefit your business. However, you still should perform your own research to find the most suited and efficient AI capable of delivering the expected results.
Making the correct choice is much easier when you have detailed plans and goals to achieve. Otherwise, discovering a proper, ready-made software is like finding a needle in a haystack.
Integrate AI with Existing Systems
After choosing the right artificial intelligence for your customer service automation, you should integrate it into your business systems.
Some companies might struggle. While integrating AI models into standalone systems is a relatively standard procedure, the same integration into Software-as-a-Service or other ready-made platforms is much more challenging.
Integrating an AI directly into a third-party system will likely be impossible. Still, there are ways to utilize artificial intelligence outside the subscription-based platforms, using coding, APIs, and various scripts. However, such out-of-the-box solutions will require the involvement of experienced software developers.
Train and Optimize AI System
Finally, after integrating artificial intelligence, all that remains is to train the model to perform the required tasks. Once again, the best way to ensure its success is simply to cooperate with dedicated software developers on demand, who are familiar with such technologies and can prove their experience.
After training an AI, you should ensure the quality and accuracy of its responses. After that, you can start using it daily. Still, don’t forget to monitor its performance and responses just to make sure it is not hallucinating or making mistakes.