A Deloitte study has revealed the impact of generative AI (GenAI) in the customer service and experience sector, with one in six contact centers currently deploying GenAI capabilities.
With a focus on contact center trends and service leader priorities, the report outlined a group of the most effective and efficient organizations – dubbing them “service innovators.”
Selected from 600 senior contact center leaders across the U.S., Australia, Canada, Japan, and the U.K., these innovators outperformed their contemporaries in the use of Generative AI to maximize efficiency.
Additionally, service innovators also excelled in areas such as connecting experiences across channels, and effectively deploying self-service tools.
In discussing the findings of the 2024 Global Contact Center Survey, Tim McDougal – Service Excellence Lead at Deloitte Digital – emphasized the importance of adopting GenAI to improve efficiency and customer service:
Improving efficiency has never been more important for Contact Center leaders.
“Service innovators stand to gain the most in this evolving landscape. While customer service remains near the top of leaders’ priorities, the organizations who are best positioned to succeed will likely be those who embrace the power of generative AI, collaborate across the business, and those who can provide value enterprise-wide.”
When it comes to ‘embracing the power of generative AI’, the research paints a pretty clear picture: don’t get left behind.
Of those surveyed by Deloitte, organizations that are currently utilizing GenAI are 35 percent less likely to have issues with agents being overwhelmed by information during calls.
In fact, early adopters of GenAI are predicted to benefit far more from the revolutionary technology than those who adopt it in the future – as outlined in the graphic below:
Interestingly, the research claims that service innovators are eight times as likely to have deployed GenAI when compared to organizations with less advanced service capabilities.
The advantages that GenAI adoption bring to an organization was discussed by Jaden Herrin, Contact Center Leader at Deloitte Digital, who commented:
“When paired with other performance enablers, Generative AI can help strengthen contact center performance. Those who have adopted the technology are seeing improvements across the board, including in productivity and increased customer satisfaction.”
But, while the research outlines a correlation between GenAI deployment and service innovators, what exactly differentiates a service innovator and how can organizations achieve this status?
Service Innovators
Deloitte defines service innovators as organizations that are at the cutting edge of their industry and set the standards for others to follow by implementing the “most sophisticated capabilities in their service delivery, quality assurance automation, personalization, and employee retention.”
As part of the research, Deloitte analyzed the organizations’ 2023 service strategies, and found that service innovators hit 57 percent more of their targets than other survey respondents.
Moreover, service innovators also significantly outperformed the other organizations in customer satisfaction (4.6x higher) and employee satisfaction (2.5x higher).
In terms of specifics, the report outlined the following key areas in which service innovators are exceeding:
Omnichannel Orchestration
- Eighty percent of companies have implemented a channel steering strategy, directing customers to the most suitable channel for their inquiries deliberately.
- One out of every three companies have adopted omnichannel integration tools, leading to a nine percent reduction in the cost per assisted contact.
Advanced Analytics and Streamlining Collaboration
- Twenty-six percent of companies have a well-defined cross-functional strategy to improve self-service capabilities.
- Currently, twenty percent are investing in enhancing self-service capabilities, with an additional thirty percent planning to invest by the end of 2024.
- Service innovators are 2.7 times more inclined to invest in analytics compared to those with less advanced capabilities.
Despite championing the customer service benefits of GenAI and encouraging organizations to embrace the tech or risk being left behind, Jaden Herrin was keen to point out the continued importance of the human contact center agent:
While GenAI can help boost efficiency, contact centers understand that their most critical interactions will still require human-to-human communication. Excellence isn’t optional and companies who are seeing the greatest success are the ones effectively melding technology and talent.
