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There’s no question that the use of AI in customer service is on the rise. It’s estimated that by 2026, 1 in 10 agent interactions will be automated, saving $80 billion in labor costs. Predictions on market growth vary, but one study shows an expected compound annual growth rate in AI of 37.3% from 2023 to 2030. So why all this interest?
Automated customer service is helping organizations in every industry to improve service while cutting costs, improving employee workloads, and more. This blog will reveal why more and more organizations are adopting AI by highlighting the key benefits of AI in customer service.
Customer experience (CX) is more important than ever today. Positive experiences are an expectation, and 72% of consumers say that as soon as they have a bad experience with a brand, they’ll move on. Providing outstanding CX can also have a significant impact on earnings – research shows brands with superior CX bring in 5.7 times more revenue than competitors with lagging CX.
Introducing AI to customer service improves CX because it provides immediate support. An overwhelming majority of customers agree that fast responses are important, with 83% saying that they expect to engage with someone immediately when contacting a company. A single chatbot can handle an unlimited number chats with no delay in response, providing the fast experience that customers expect.
Better still, customers who do need human support also experience lower wait times. An AI chatbot can handle up to 80% of all queries without human involvement, giving agents more time to manage queries that need a human touch. This takes us into the next benefit of AI in customer service.
AI chatbots in customer service can handle all the common queries that take up a significant portion of agent time. As a result, the ability to offload these repetitive queries means the team’s overall support capacity can be dramatically increased. Successful chatbot implementations like Tangerine Telecom have seen bots resolve up to 91% of queries without human intervention. With most queries handled by a bot, organizations can save significant money by not hiring additional agents. According to Richard Branson, COO of Tangerine:
“The bot has allowed us to not only effectively manage the increase in chat volume, but it’s also saved us a considerable amount of money by not having to hire a lot more agents.”
– Richard Branson, COO of Tangerine
One of the most essential AI chatbot benefits is the ability to easily scale for volume – and this is particularly helpful in industries that experience busy peak volumes such as:
HSS Hire experienced these kinds of busy periods and introduced Comm100 AI Chatbot to help:
“When we have busy periods, our support volumes can rocket up to the point that our agents can’t physically handle the demand. Comm100 Chatbot is vital here as it steps in to answer common questions, taking the pressure off our agents and making sure our customers still get the immediate attention they want. I honestly don’t know how we managed before our chatbot!”
– Nicola Lomas, Live Chat Manager, HSS Hire
Keep reading: HSS Hire switches to Comm100 Live Chat to achieve 30% chat to conversion
Another benefit of AI in customer service is the ability of bots to provide cost-effective, 24/7 support. We saw above that most consumers expect an immediate response, and even more (90%) rate an immediate response as important or very important.
To meet these high support standards around the clock in a way that is cost effective, a chatbot is the only situation. No matter the time of the day, a bot can respond to questions and direct the visitor to helpful information. In situations where a chatbot can’t resolve the query, customers can also leave the question with the bot and await an agent response when they are back online.
For an example of this in practice, we can look to Thompson Rivers University (TRU) who introduced Comm100 AI Chatbot to provide support outside their standard hours of 9 AM – 4 PM. TRU’s chatbot now handles 83% of their chats without agent intervention, allowing students to get support whenever they need it, on their terms.
Keep reading: Thompson Rivers University adopts Comm100 Live Chat & Chatbot across 5 departments
The final key benefit of AI in customer service is often overlooked but is crucial – the ability to improve the support agent’s experience. These roles are notoriously difficult across industries, and today’s demanding customers often create hostile work environments for agents that lead to high turnover. 40% of agents report that they are considering leaving their role.
This employee churn comes at a huge cost to employers who must spend money hiring and training new agents. Without improving retention in these positions, any investment in employees can easily go to waste when those employees leave for a less stressful workplace. Current estimates of hiring a new employee currently sit at around $4,000 USD.
Introducing an AI chatbot can help to improve agent workloads by handling the repetitive questions that often lead to agent burnout. With these low value responses taken care of by a bot, agents can instead focus on more fulfilling and interesting queries. For an example of this in action, we can look to Canadian Blood Services who introduced Comm100 AI Chatbot for this purpose:
“For us, the chatbot wasn’t launched to reduce agent headcount. It was launched so our agents can spend less time on simple queries, and more on complicated and high-value queries.”
– Denny Michaud, Customer Relations Manager, Canadian Blood Services
Keep reading: Canadian Blood Services improves customer & agent experience with Comm100 AI Chatbot
The AI chatbot benefits that we’ve looked at here are just the beginning. In the world of chatbots, there are a variety of technologies such as Task Bots and Voice Bots that highlight the benefits of AI in customer service even further.
In our full guide, The State of Automated Customer Service in 2023, we look at each of these use cases for chatbots in greater detail. Read the full guide for more industry stats, AI chatbot benefits, and examples of bots in use across industries today.
Read this complete guide to learn how AI is being used to improve customer service in 2023, alongside use cases, stats, and more benefits.
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