“AI is the new electricity. Electricity revolutionised all industries and changed our way of life, and AI is doing the same. It’s reaching into every industry and discipline…”
Andrew Ng, Founder of deeplearning.ai, Co-Chairman and Co-Founder of Coursera, and Adjunct Professor at Stanford University.
“AI is the most profound technology humanity is working on. More profound than fire, electricity, or anything that we have done in the past.”
Sudar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet, Google’s parent company.
2024 will be another good year for the cloud. According to a Gartner report, global spending on public cloud services is forecasted to grow by 20.4% to $678.8 billion. That’s up from $563.6 billion in 2023.
Coincident with this growth, artificial intelligence will continue to escalate in demand, and it will continue to shape the cloud landscape, most especially in customer experience.
It’s more than cost, time, and efficiency. The cloud is now a catalyst for innovation, agility, and success across diverse industries – much of it spurred by AI.
Consider NICE, a CXaaS company specialising in improving customer experience. NICE has shifted its entire focus to AI-based tools. Why? Because they see the obvious. AI is here. And at an astonishing rate, it will be even more capable and intelligent. NICE and dozens of other cloud solutions firms are augmenting their product portfolios with AI. Those companies that harness it and provide useful and meaningful solutions for customers will attain remarkable market dominance.
With NICE, AI has augmented its tools for tasks like social listening, digital CRM analytics, intelligent call routing, understanding caller intent, and analytics in quality monitoring. These AI-driven tools help reduce average handle time, increase first-contact resolution and enhance overall customer satisfaction.
2024 will be a robust year for cloud companies. AI’s impact will continue to influence how companies and their customers interact. It all comes down to improving customer experience.
Companies in the Customer Experience as a Service (CXaaS) space are at the forefront of this AI integration.
These companies employ AI to transform contact centers, enhancing customer interactions through advanced AI tools.
Integrating AI in these platforms is not just about automating tasks; it’s about creating a more intuitive, responsive, and personalised customer service experience.
The surge in AI-powered virtual assistants has provided a view of the future, revolutionising customer interaction and offering automated yet personalised responses.
CXaaS companies that have already deployed advanced AI capabilities include:
- Zoom: Known for its video conferencing solutions, Zoom has been integrating AI features to enhance the user experience, which can be applied in contact centre scenarios.
- CallCabinet: known for its complete product offering to capture data, track voice calls, and ensure high security and compliance requirements, it utilises AI algorithms to analyse call data. This can include sentiment analysis, speech analytics, and keyword detection, which help understand customer interactions more deeply and improve the overall customer experience.
- Simplify360: Specializes in AI-driven customer support and marketing, using chatbots with Natural Language Processing (NLP) and machine learning for personalized, efficient service across multiple channels.
- NICE: Capabilities include full journey orchestration with advanced analytics, automation, machine learning and predictive algorithms for enhancing customer interactions and operational efficiency
- RingCentral: This platform provides AI-driven insights and analytics for contact centres, helping to improve customer interaction and operational efficiency.
Key developments and trends in AI features. Now till 2029.
- Emotion detection and sentiment analysis will become highly accurate. AI will be able to detect subtle voice inflections and word choices to determine how customers truly feel with over 90 percent accuracy. This will enable companies to deliver ultra-personalized service and support.
- Predictive analytics will anticipate customer needs. By crunching massive datasets, AI will foresee problems and predict optimal solutions for customers, sometimes before the customer is even aware of the issue. This proactive care will wow customers.
- Chatbots and virtual assistants will handle increasingly complex queries. With advanced natural language processing capabilities, virtual agents will resolve up to 70 percent of customer support tickets with no human involvement required. This will slash costs while also providing 24/7 assistance.
- Full omnichannel integration will anticipate needs. AI will combine data from all channels (voice, chat, email, etc.) to discern customer intents, emotions, and expectations. It will then direct outreach to the ideal channel for each situation. This contextual care will build strong loyalty.
- Hyper-personalization will feel like working with a friend. With full customer insights, CX platforms will enable authentic personalized small talk, thoughtful gestures like discounts, and spot-on anticipatory problem-solving, making customers feel genuinely cared for. This human-like treatment will elicit intense customer loyalty.
By 2029, AI may handle nearly all routine inquiries, freeing humans to focus solely on complex issues.
We’re Not in Kansas Anymore
In 2024, the landscape of cloud computing will continue to be reshaped by AI. Not just as a technological trend but as a customer-centric revolution, redefining how businesses interact with and serve their customers. Its ease of access, provided by leading CXaaS providers, will dramatically impact the intelligence of digital interactions.
Unlike the advent of electricity, AI is evolving much faster and becoming more powerful without our intervention. Who knows what the AI-powered customer experience will look like in 10 years? The focus today remains on balancing innovation with security and compliance.
The future looks incredible. AI is here to stay. Stay tuned.
