The importance of customer service cannot be overstated. It is one of the most powerful capabilities available to organizations to help them drive purchases, encourage loyalty, and shape brand perception by connecting directly with customer sentiment. Its success is measured in part by how well it fulfills consumer expectations – and those expectations are changing. How can organizations better meet the needs of customers, while also empowering dissatisfied customer service agents, and delivering top- and bottom-line benefits?

Klarna CEO confirms it, and even journalists are stepping aside to let AI run the ship. “I’ve had a gnawing feeling lately about AI. Although the prophecies that chatbots would take our jobs have so far been false, the underlying technology’s evolution is making me believe it may soon automate much of my work, and perhaps yours too.” What’s next?

AI expands beyond chat. Generative AI is now capable of taking calls, conducting research, and simulating personalities, pushing its utility far past simple chatbot interactions.

Today’s consumers have a need for speed. Nearly half of customers expect businesses to respond to their inquiries faster than four hours, and 12% demand a response within 15 minutes. With 80% of consumers stating that speed is one of the most essential elements of a positive customer experience, brands are looking for ways to accelerate customer service responses.

This has put increased pressure on customer support teams to deliver fast, efficient, personalized service. As a result, many companies are implementing artificial intelligence (AI)-powered solutions, such as AI-voice chatbots, to streamline their operations. But while these AI tools can handle many tasks, they’re not a replacement for human agents. When used correctly, AI-voice chatbots can enhance human customer support rather than replace it, creating a powerful partnership that benefits businesses and their customers.

Genesys, a global cloud leader in AI-Powered Experience Orchestration, has released its latest research report, “The State of Customer Experience,” revealing critical insights into consumer expectations and the evolving priorities of customer experience (CX) leaders worldwide. Notably, nearly two-thirds (64%) of consumers surveyed believe AI will improve the quality and speed of customer experience over the next two to three years. The good news is that organizations are focusing on the integration of AI into their CX strategies to close the gaps between the experiences they’re delivering today, and the services consumers want.

Effective lead time management is a critical factor in securing supply chain efficiency and cost control, since lead time represents the total time required for a product or material to move through the supply chain, as measured from the time of ordering to the time of delivery.

Lead time typically encompasses various supply chain stages, including order processing, manufacturing, transportation, and delivery. It can be scrutinised at a high level, by looking at overall supply chain lead time, or with more granularity by zooming in to elements such as supplier lead time and customer-order lead time.

The era of AI-first Customer Service is here, and it will lead to happier customers and more strategic customer service teams. It’s already clear that AI will reshape society, just as major technology breakthroughs have done in the past. Technology doesn’t go backwards. The car created shopping malls, suburbia, and McDonald’s. The internet created instant communication, real-time shared events, on-demand everything, for anyone, anywhere on earth. We’re not going back to riding horses, nor printing out photos to post to our family across the world. AI is as big an invention as the internet, and possibly as big a change as the industrial revolution. We’re only 18 months into a 10+ year cycle.

Almost everyone knows that retaining customers and turning them into loyal buyers is far more profitable for a business than constantly acquiring new clients. If you’ve managed to convert a mere viewer into a paying client, make sure to continue engaging with them. You can do it through various channels, but in this post, we will focus specifically on WhatsApp. We’ll explore why this messenger app is great for building long-lasting relationships with your clients and how to boost your WhatsApp retention rates.

Imagine leaving your angriest customers to spar with an automated script in your website’s chat window. Now picture your support team reading “Where is my order?” for the hundredth time and glancing at the clock, only to find six hours left in the workday. Who do you think is more frustrated? Luckily, you won’t have to answer that, because these are completely avoidable problems. Once you learn the important distinctions between chatbot software and live chat software, you’ll understand how to use them both more effectively and lower blood pressures across the board.