Why the convergence of contact centres, AI and automation and CRM matters

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Chat bot service concept. Virtual assistant and CRM software automation technology. Customer using online service with chat bot to get support (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

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• Customers want more joined-up service experience
• Human aadvisors in the contact centre need extra support
• Traditional contact centre technologies are merging with the customer engagement centre market

Traditionally, customer engagement technologies have been largely polarised – you’ve either been a CRM-led customer engagement operation with a largely siloed contact centre, a dedicated service desk-style operation, or more contact centre-focused with basic screen-pop links or advisors left to source data manually.

But today’s customer experience (CX) teams can no longer afford to remain isolated in their contact centre, service desk or CRM camps.

The pressure for brands to differentiate via their customer experience makes any CX technology decisions taken now even more important. That’s why it’s essential that organisations move quickly to align their technologies so they can provide a unified, end-to-end customer engagement experience.

How brands manage their customer data is also critical. Technologies such as AI, machine learning and natural language speech recognition are already established within the contact centre, and their data is helping to power cross-functional customer data platforms and digital experience platforms.

Implemented in the right way, AI and automation will provide new ways to free up CX resources and help brands make more informed decisions – transforming customer journeys into a source of deep insights that ultimately drive richer experiences for customers.

The good news is that some of the key technologies already being used in the contact centre world are becoming connected with other parts of the organisation. CPaaS communications platforms and cloud-based contact centre capabilities are increasingly overlapping, making it much easier for CX teams to use APIs and programmable components to build out their next generation customer engagement capabilities. This makes it much easier to add a mix of channels, and power customer journeys across multiple departments. It also opens up access to best-of-breed AI capabilities.

As the lines between contact centres, CRM and AI and automation blur, there’s a great opportunity for brands to build and deploy the kind of customer engagement sweet spot that can really help differentiate customer experience.

How the contact centre, AI and automation and CRM landscape is converging

Extending CX leadership beyond the contact centre

Instead of just focusing on traditional operational requirements, CX digital transformation projects typically have a much broader focus – extending beyond the contact centre to embrace all aspects of engagement. This requires a comprehensive view of the full customer journey, as well as the ability to collect deep granular insight into what’s actually driving the customer experience.

Three particular drivers – internal corporate evolution and the overall responsibility for CX initiatives, closer vendor integration, and increased technology convergence – are combining to help move the focus of CX beyond the contact centre to embrace the end-to-end customer journey.

Recognising CX’s expanded influence, it’s hardly surprising that many organisations are turning to executive roles with a wider brief to help drive the success of cross-departmental CX projects. Analyst firm Ventana Research suggests that by 2024, three out of four large enterprises will have executives such as a chief customer officer (CCO) or a chief experience officer (CXO) in place, with full responsibility for customer experience. These senior roles reflect the increasingly important role of CX as a differentiator and acknowledge the value that transformational CX projects can have in helping to deliver business goals such as reducing customer churn and increasing customer spend. Given the importance of these goals, CCOs and CXOs simply can’t accept or afford any damaging disconnects within their customer journeys.

Inevitably this CX-driven leadership will start to have an impact on many of the operational silos and different stakeholders, which can easily lead to disconnects within extended customer journeys. CCOs and CXOs understand the importance of different customer service perspectives, but they must be subservient to corporate customer engagement needs.

At the end of the day, customers don’t really care who’s driving CX from a corporate perspective, they just want a consistently great experience whenever and however they get in touch.

Industry shift towards vendor convergence

CRM, AI and automation and contact centre technology vendors have always acknowledged the adjacency of their respective technologies. However, the gulf between CRM software suites and traditional systems was previously seen as just too wide.

Lately, however, there have been clear signs that vendors themselves are looking to bridge the gap – not just via alliances but also through significant investment. When one global cloud leader in customer experience orchestration announced a $580 million funding round, it was significant that the round was led by the world’s largest CRM provider with support from a conversational AI specialist, among others.

The investment recognised that customer expectations continue to rise exponentially around personalised, empathetic and connected experiences, and that truly integrated digital and human experiences will require input and collaboration from multiple phases of the customer journey. Previously contact centre technology vendors felt that CRM, ITSM and enterprise vendors didn’t really understand the specific needs of the contact centre. However, there’s now a growing recognition that these disciplines are not only complementary but are all instrumental in addressing the “experience as a service” market opportunity successfully.

Technology convergence accelerating

For the past 20 years most organisations’ experience of CRM and contact centre integration has involved little more than the screen-popping of customer phone numbers to the contact centre agent desktop for basic identification purposes. Hardly advanced, but it has proved positive for both customers (who feel recognised), and advisors (who gain a headstart on their conversations). Add another question to help confirm the customer’s identity quickly, and contact centres save a lot of call time while also paving the way for great interaction.

But customer expectations are increasing, and most CX teams know that basic CTI integration really isn’t good enough to support voice, let alone the explosion of interactions across channels such as live chat, virtual assistants and knowledge-based bots. And with many simpler interactions now being handled by self-service channels, it’s certainly not enough to support the much more complex conversations that are already taking up more and more of a contact centre advisor’s time.

The convergence of more extended CX capabilities, CRM, AI and automation, and contact centre technology is set to provide brands with the technologies and data insights needed to provide a unified, end-to-end customer engagement experience. And with the growth of communications-platform-as-a-service (CPaaS) technologies, we’re now seeing traditional silos break down as brands seek to unify customer experiences.

What may prove challenging, however, is in identifying customer engagement technology specialists that can demonstrate innovation and capability across contact centre, CRM, AI and automation and CX disciplines.

To read the Taking CX Performance to the Next Level – Why the Convergence of Contact Centres, AI & Automation and CRM Matters white paper in its entirety, visit Sabio’s website.

Tim Pickard, Chief Marketing Officer, Sabio Group (Courtesy of Sabio Group)

Originally published on Business Reporter