Spending on Intelligent Assistants

Interesting piece,  note the list of companies sharing their experiences with an intelligence assistance strategy.

Intelligent Assistants Answer the Challenge of Omnichannel CX Editor's Pick!   by Dan Miller in CustomerThink

These days, customer care professionals are besieged by tech-infused buzzwords and buzzphrases. The proliferation of smartphones drove demand for a “Mobile Strategy,” to which the word “Social” was quickly appended. Then it became a global challenge to assimilate “Big Data & Analytics” in order to ingest the zettabytes of data and metadata surrounding customers activities, preferences and intents.  .... 

Then came an onslaught of solutions and platforms that introduced “Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning” as a cure for common CX problems. In brief, they promised rapid recognition customer intent. Quick on their heels came integration of Deep Neural Networking and Cognitive Computing. Aside from bringing more buzzwords into the CX fray, their advent got both Contact Center and Customer Experience professionals wondering whether they needed to staff up with computational linguists and knowledge management aficionados. ... " 

" ... Spokespeople from The U.S. Army USAA, ING Bank, Domino’s, FedEx, Telefonica, Hyatt Hotels, Coca-Cola and dozens of others have shared the wisdom they gained from the experience of designing and implementing an Intelligent Assistance strategy in their organizations. The unsurprising, overall finding is that these firms proved that increased automation rates correlated with increased levels of both customer satisfaction (usually measured in Net Promotor Scores) and employee satisfaction (measured in retention rates).

The technological miracle that is underway amounts to nothing short of “redefining self-service.” It used to be synonymous with “automated handling” and “call avoidance” (for expensive agents, at least). Now it means customer control and lower effort expended, in short “serving one’s self.” .... "