Considering AI for your Contact Centre? You’d Better Check the Provider Actually Has Some.

A recent survey conducted by MMC Ventures of almost 3,000 “AI Startups” found that 40 percent had no evidence of any machine-learning tech to the company’s value proposition.

VC investment in Artificial Intelligence (AI) has increased 15x in five years, so it’s perhaps understandable that two in five are embellishing their tech and capabilities to attract VC funding. But it begs the question as to how these providers are actually servicing any serious clients, because a few command lines of IFs, WHENs and THENs no matter how well written is not, and never will be, AI.

Can AI be Harmful?

You may have also heard some of the horror stories of bots going rogue. Probably the most infamous case of a bot “breaking bad” was Microsoft’s chatbot named “Tay” which was designed to converse based on what it learned from Twitter. It morphed into a foul-mouthed figurehead, announcing that “Hitler was right” and “feminists should die” after only one day live.

Now, this is a pretty extreme example and it wasn’t necessarily the technology itself at fault here, it was more the lack of focus and control that the creator had over what “Tay” was learning and who could influence it.

Is it Worth it Now?

Here’s the simple fact: In 2019 AI just isn’t that good yet, and any company trying to claim you can simply plug in an AI SaaS tool and improve efficiency by whatever percent, is fibbing.

There, we said it.

AI can work very effectively and predictably when it’s paired with a focused strategy, propercontrol measures and deep integrations with your existing software. It also needs the capability to seamlessly defer to a human agent when it runs out of answers, and the reality is that this level of predictability and seamless experience cannot yet be purchased off-the-shelf.

AI remains a revolutionary opportunity for contact centre operators to supercharge efficiency, improve customer satisfaction, enhance agent happiness and reduce operating costs. So, if you’re thinking about migrating your contact centre to the cloud and jumping on the AI wagon just be sure to ask the provider whether they actually have any AI and, if so, how they propose to control it!

So is there a place for AI?

Disclaimer. SmartAgent does AI, but we also fully understand its limitations.

We’re an Advanced Amazon Technology Partner and official Amazon Connect partner, specialising inthe seamless migration of enterprise contact centres to the cloud, and we’ve deployed contact centre automation for numerous enterprise clients including JD, Pretty Little Thing, First Group and American Golf.

Our proprietary technology complements and enhances the Amazon Connect platform: We focus on automating your high volume, low value contact with our bots regularly achieving 30-40% deflection, and our SmartAgent Application makes your human agents significantly more productive by consolidating all contact channels and customer information into a single streamlined agent interface.