10 things Indian businesses adopting AI solutions should know, according to Zendesk RVP

AI is revolutionising CX but blindly implementing it for all customer interactions is not advisable, warns Munnaluri. “It’s important to acknowledge that some tasks require a human touch and empathy. AI can be a starting point for such conversations but not the only solution to deliver the experiences customers look for. It’s important to identify areas where AI is not ideal, implement the right measures and test the integration to mitigate the impact of negative experiences,” he said 

Why should Indian companies adopt AI for CX?

According to Munnaluri, as many as 72 per cent of consumers in the Asia Pacific region say that a bad interaction with a business can ruin their day. Poor customer service negatively impacts retention rates. 

“Customers want to be understood. Businesses can do this by actively tracking sentiment and intent to more accurately solve customer issues, and even anticipate and fix issues before they can become bigger problems. Intent and sentiment analysis provide valuable insights to improve the customer journey, but doing this manually is time-consuming and nearly impossible to scale, making it investment-heavy. Solutions built on CX-specific data sets can solve this problem,” explains Munnaluri.

The RVP feels that a CX-specific intelligence layer can greatly enhance customer support as it almost instantly and accurately handles queries. An AI chatbot is capable of understanding colloquial language and industry-specific scenarios which enables them to offer answers to simple consumer queries as well as direct complex issues to a human agent. It is also capable of alerting human agents about consumer dissatisfaction and offers tailored responses based on browsing and purchase history. 

10 key considerations for Indian businesses:

Thoughtful application: Indian companies should understand the limitations of Artificial Intelligence, and human oversight is vital for ensuring high-quality customer experiences. 

Establishing trust: For any company, the main objective should be establishing trust in the AI solution while implementing it. This is to ensure that the AI solution doesn’t compromise on customer loyalty as AI’s accuracy and transparency are key to maintaining customer trust.

The focus should be on customer needs: Most importantly, AI solutions should be deployed by keeping the needs of customers at the centre.

Responsibly adopting AI solutions: It is well known that advanced AI-powered bots can significantly improve productivity and drive growth. These solutions offer highly personalised experiences and identify upselling and cross-selling opportunities. However, it is important to adopt a responsible approach when deploying AI solutions. 

Training AI with specific data: According to Munnaluri, AI solutions need to be trained with data specific to the business. This will ensure that the system offers the most relevant and seamless experiences to customers. 

Capitalising on CX-specific data: AI solutions should be built on large, customer experience-specific data sets as they enable faster and more accurate customer service. They also offer a better understanding of local languages and nuances. 

Striking a balance: One of the key aspects is the ability of a business to strike a balance between AI and human interactions. It is important to ensure that not all customer interactions should be handled by AI as some tasks require empathy and sensitivity, something that only humans can provide. 

Implementation challenges: Businesses ought to be aware of the challenges while implementing AI and ways to overcome them. The most common challenges include high IT expenditure, lengthy implementation timelines, the need for human oversight, etc. 

Cost savings and improved productivity: According to Munnaluri, AI-powered CX solutions can automate numerous time-consuming manual tasks, it can enhance workforce management, and offer real-time insight into productivity. 

Aligning with the bigger picture: For businesses, it is important that their AI solutions align with their broader corporate strategy. These solutions should also meet security and compliance standards. 

On challenges that Indian companies face while adopting AI solutions

While talking about the challenges faced by Indian companies, Munnaluri said that while AI-driven solutions are efficient, many solutions in the market today are slow and expensive, require heavy IT spending and lengthy implementation times. “Businesses looking to integrate AI into CX functions should also remember that AI isn’t always right. Deploying such solutions without human oversight can lead to negative outcomes, thereby increasing the risk of losing customers to competitors. And even though AI learns over time, human oversight is crucial during the initial stages of training,” he said. 

Zendesk is a San Francisco-based technology firm that specialises in software-as-a-service products related to customer support, sales, and other customer communications.