AI and automation are considered crucial in the workspace, and contact centers are no exception. As many as 80% of contact center and IT sector leaders believe that AI capabilities will soon become essential, and 41% think that companies failing to embrace these capabilities will lag, revealed the latest survey by 8x8.
The 2023 State of Conversational AI in the Contact Center report shows that leaders in contact center and IT sectors see conversational artificial intelligence (AI) as the future of contact centers. The report also sheds light on their strategies for implementing conversational AI, particularly through automation.
“As we can see from the findings of the ‘State of Conversational AI in the Contact Center’ report, it’s important to understand the needs and requirements of organizations, including how they actually use the different technologies available to them. We are committed to working closely with our customers to deliver AI-driven tools and resources, such as 8x8 Intelligent Customer Assistant, to help drive their digital transformation and business success initiatives,” said Hunter Middleton, Chief Product Officer at 8x8, Inc.
Conversational AI and its impact
Conversational AI is clearly on the path to success, as 87% of respondents are convinced that conversational AI and chatbots contribute to heightened productivity. Moreover, 76% believe these capabilities are ushering in a revolution in business communications, while 72% expect them to boost company profitability, increase revenue, and reduce business risks.
Additionally, conversational AI is a valuable addition to human interaction, rather than a replacement. Among organizations leveraging conversational AI in their contact centers, the primary goals are enhancing customer service capabilities (62%), streamlining internal processes (42%), boosting customer satisfaction (36%), and minimizing customer wait times. Surprisingly, only 6% of adopters use it to reduce employee and agent numbers.
Putting automation to good use
Prioritizing investment in contact center automation is a major focus for organizations, as almost all (99%) intend to allocate more funds to enhance their operations in the coming year. Notably, much of this investment will be directed towards adopting or expanding automation. It's worth noting that in the United States, a higher percentage of respondents (27%) deemed automation as exceptionally important, whereas in the UK and Canada, this sentiment was shared by 8% and 16% of respondents, respectively.
Furthermore, contact center and IT leaders are turning to AI and automation to address critical challenges like handling higher support volumes, staffing difficulties, and the imperative to be more cost-effective. Notably, 52% of organizations have invested in conversational AI for their contact centers. Among those who have embraced these capabilities, 92% say that it has led to quicker resolution of customer issues, reduced the workload for agents by 87%, and cut down the overall costs of contact center operations by 53%. Interestingly, 94% of respondents in the UK have prioritized voice chatbots as a top-two AI-based capability for their contact center and customer support operations, in contrast to 68% in the US.
Is AI to be trusted?
Trust remains a significant challenge despite the growing adoption of generative AI in contact centers. While nearly one-third of organizations currently use generative AI, and many are experimenting with it, research reveals that organizations still have trouble fully trusting this technology. Specifically, 64% of respondents express high trust in generative AI's ability to answer customer questions. However, this trust slowly disappears, as only 24% have full confidence in the technology to directly interact with customers, and only 23% trust generative AI to guide their contact center agents.
In other news, 8x8 has recently named Bruno Bertini its new Chief Marketing Officer (CMO), who aims to increase market recognition and expedite the company's demand generation and growth initiatives.
