A CX solutions provider partnered with Zogby Analytics to survey over 240 business decision-makers about the state of CX. These business decision-makers–consisting of CEO, business owners, organization leaders, and CXOs–in companies with 250 or more employees–get an idea of what they think are the biggest challenges facing CX centers.
What are business leaders thinking?
Call volumes have become more frequent
Customer interactions are increasingly taking place over non-voice digital channels, while more than two-thirds of the respondents expect digital interactions to exceed 40% by 2024. Furthermore, another 53% said that agents now need to support various interaction channels. Surprisingly, only 5% of the respondents’ organizations support voice-only channels.
Call sessions have become longer
Over 43% of respondents said that agent interactions have become longer and more complex. This is because bots and self-service technologies have become an integral component of CX. Automated technology can be used to handle easy questions and issues, and agents can now handle more complex issues that cannot be resolved with self-service technology.
Empathy will be a critical skill to learn
When they were asked about the changing role of CX agents, 53% of respondents said that the agents would have to learn about emotional intelligence and empathy. This means listening to agents and trying to solve the issue rather than just rushing to the next call, corroborating with the idea that calls have become longer and more complex.
AI deployment is increasing
AI deployment continues to rise, with over three out of four respondents using AI in their contact centers, while another 25% plan to make the deployment in the next year or so. Moreover, 73% of business decision-makers currently use AI in their contact centers, while only 18% have no plans for AI. Moreover, conversational AI for customer self-service is expected to grow by over 75% of North America.
What does this mean for CX?
In the future, we can expect CX technology, such as automation and AI to play a bigger role in maintaining CX quality, with over 81% of customer interactions expected to be handled by self-service tools. Furthermore, there will also be a change in customer training and skill set with a growing focus on empathy and the ability to understand problems and resolve them rather than shifting through large call volumes, indicating that the industry is going in a different direction.