Amazon has embedded an automated chatbot design tool into its CCaaS solution, alongside new case management and proactive outreach solutions.
The conversational AI innovation – known as the Amazon Lex Automated Chatbot Designer – allows Amazon Connect users to build, test, and deploy chatbots within the CCaaS platform.
Seemingly, Amazon hopes to differentiate its bot solution through ease of use. By harnessing machine learning, the tool scours contact center transcripts, uncovers everyday customer requests, and develops an initial chatbot design in a couple of hours.
Many other providers have cut down chatbot development time with low-/no-code tools removing the need for dialogue designers and computational linguistic specialists with low-code tools. However, Amazon aims to go one step further and automate more of the process.
The automation uncovers common customer contact reasons, associated phrases, and the necessary information for the chatbot to resolve the query.
Thanks to these capabilities, users access an automated chatbot design through the Lex console, now embedded within the Amazon Connect platform. Developers can then make tweaks, alter the bots’ responses, test the solution, and deploy it within a single app.
By offloading the customer conversation analysis section of building chatbots and following this process, companies can accelerate the development of conversational AI. Alongside this, they may cut out errors and automate more customer conversations.
Yet, the latest Amazon announcements included the launch of further enhancements to its CCaaS platform, such as its new Amazon Connect Cases solution.
The tool automatically opens up a new case whenever the customer calls or messages the contact center with a new query. In doing so, it logs all the tasks that agents complete – across any integrated application – when handling the issue.
Such data is helpful for agents when customers make a second contact and can also enhance automated interactions as chatbots may leverage the data to deliver more personalized self-service conversations.
Also, the data may supplement predictive routing technologies, as the case data ensures that customers route through to the best available agent – with the relevant case attached.
Agents can view the case data, add to it, as well as manually create and resolve cases within the agent application. Such features “excited” Lizzy Mitchell, Head of Data & Analytics at Traeger Grills, an early adopter of Amazon Connect Cases. She said:
Agents can access case information in the same place they handle voice/chat contacts, see customer profile information, and access knowledge repositories. Best of all, cases are looked up automatically, and agents can easily see all previous contacts related to the same issue.
Finally, Amazon also released Amazon Connect outbound campaigns for voice, SMS, and email. The proactive outreach tool delivers automated marketing messages, appointment notifications, and upcoming delivery alerts to specified customer segments.
Amazon has paired the tool with a predictive dialer that automates outreach based on agent availability for proactive conversations via the voice channel. It also uses machine learning to differentiate between live customers and voicemail greetings. In doing so, it hangs up on the automated message and swiftly passes the agent onto the next customer, increasing productivity.
Also available within Amazon Connect, the dialer supports regulatory requirements such as point-of-dial checks, number of attempts per contact, time zone, time of day, and time to connect to an available agent.
Shawn Hatton, Senior Technology Delivery Manager at Accenture, a central Amazon Connect partner, added:
With outbound campaigns, the calls are placed automatically, increasing overall agent bandwidth and taking 80% less time to complete the same number of calls.
“Using Amazon Connect outbound campaigns and multi-channel campaign outreach, we have seen up to a 50% increase in the number of people agents talk to.”
Alongside the Amazon Lex Automated Chatbot Designer, Amazon Connect outbound campaigns is now generally available. Meanwhile, Amazon Connect Cases is available in preview.
The scope of these innovations highlights how quickly the Amazon Connect solution is evolving, with the vendor also recently releasing native workforce management tools for the CCaaS platform.
