1 Challenge

• “I want to compete with larger firms in my industry, grow my customer base, and prepare my business for the future.”

2 Questions

• “Can my small business level the playing field by improving customer experiences?”
• “How can AI help me meet my CX goals?”

3 Benefits

• AI can help you understand your customers better
• AI can help you build trust, loyalty and long-term advocacy
• AI can help you automate repetitive tasks so you can focus on what really matters – the customer

In 2018, PWC found that 63% of consumers were willing to share more information with a company if it gave them a great Customer Experience (CX).

Research by Walker also predicted that by the end of 2020, CX will overtake price and product as the key brand differentiator.

In today’s crowded buyer’s market, most customers don’t care about product features or prices. To put it more precisely, product features and prices are not all they care about. They also care about great customer support. And most importantly, they care about great customer experiences (CX). An increasing number of customers are willing to pay more for a product or service, if the company can give them a good CX. If they can’t (or don’t), customers are rapidly switch to their competitors. In fact, Microsoft found that a staggering two-thirds (58%) of consumers are willing to sever a relationship with a business due to poor customer service.

Do these facts worry you? They should…and they shouldn’t!

CX broadly defines the quality of all interactions between companies and their customers. In today’s business landscape, it is a vital factor for earning customers’ trust and loyalty, for gaining repeat business, and for gaining new business.

Thus, your ability to deliver great Customer Experience can be the competitive differentiator you need to:

• Win more customers
• Build strong relationships
• Get ahead of your competition
• Compete effectively with larger firms
• Grow your business and prepare it for the future

Luckily, it’s not impossible to build a 5-star CX strategy. All you need is the right technology: Artificial Intelligence (AI)!

Here are 3 ways AI can make a huge impact on your business and help you achieve your CX objectives.

AI can help you understand your customers better

With AI technologies deployed strategically at key customer touchpoints, you can learn more about your customers, anticipate their needs, and address their pain points, all of which can improve CX. With AI and predictive analytics, you can identify customer trends, build customer profiles and personas, and identify the right target audience for your offerings. AI -powered marketing support can also help boost your sales.

AI data can also help you design personalised offerings for customers. For example, with conversational AI chatbots, you can quickly access a customer’s information (say, their contact details and prior interaction history) to engage in deeper, more complex conversations, and deliver tailored support that addresses their specific need or query. Another way to offer AI-enabled personalisation is through tailored promotions delivered to the right customer at just the right time. In short, AI can help you move from a traditional “segmented” thinking to thinking about an “audience of one” to better connect with and convert more customers.

AI can help you build trust, loyalty and long-term advocacy

AI can help you build data-driven customer marketing campaigns that can positively change customer behaviours that benefit both your brand and the customers themselves. AI can analyse data and develop insights from aggregated data sources. It can also provide rich contextual cues for this data and make predictions about a customer’s next move. Use these insights to build tailored marketing, sales or support strategies for each customer.

AI also makes hyper-segmentation possible so you can create precise segments of customers who share specific attributes and behaviours. You can then create and optimise dynamic content for delivery across their preferred channels, which opens the door to customer satisfaction and delightful customer experiences.

If you have already been thinking about implementing a loyalty marketing campaign but don’t have the resources to do it on your own, AI can help. With AI and machine learning disciplines and tools, you can expand your view of the customer, get to know them better, and nurture a true one-to-one relationship with them at scale.

AI can help you automate repetitive tasks so you can focus on what really matters – the customer

AI-powered automation tools can mimic beyond human capabilities for a wide range of tasks. McKinsey estimates that at least 18% of activities can be automated with this technology. Automate repeatable, predictable tasks such as data collection, processing or extraction, ticket creation, etc. to speed up your processes and augment your current capabilities. Ironically, automation and “machine thinking” can also help you deepen the human aspect of your business. By taking manual tasks off your plate, AI enables you to deliver more “human” service to your customers and provide the experiences they are looking for.

AI can also help your small business reduce its human resource requirements, save money and reduce errors. Most importantly, it gives you more time to innovate, improve your time-to-market and ultimately, move your strategic focus to the most important part of your company – your customer.

A final word

For many small businesses, the thought of AI can be overwhelming. But when you think about its potential benefits, you will realise that the little time, effort and money you need to invest to bring AI into your company will be totally worth it. Whether you realise it or not, the path to memorable customer experiences starts with a combination of human judgement and technology. You already have plenty of the former. Now it’s time to bring in the latter. So if CX is on your radar, it’s time to embrace AI – today!

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