Forrester’s Harley Manning predicted that in 2020, the business case for customer experience will have pride of place in CX discourse, as CX professionals will take more strides to justify the financial benefits of investment in CX. Manning also anticipates a 25 percent growth in the number of CX executives within companies aware of the economic benefits of great customer experience.

Still nascent and pregnant with evidence, the rest of 2020 will prove the extent to which these predictions hold true. In any case, Manning’s predictions are grounded in the evolution of CX over the last decade, during which we witnessed the championing of customer experience as a key business priority.

Tracking the course of customer experience management so far, we anticipate that 2020 will witness further CX innovation with technology catalysing CX goals through artificial intelligence, chat bots, data and analytics. 

Artificial Intelligence

With increased competition in the business landscape, innovation is less a choice, and more a necessity for businesses to thrive. In 2020, Artificial intelligence (AI) is key to standing out and improving the extent of personalisation in customer experience. AI can be used to obtain customer insights, predict customer behaviour, and automate the interaction between customers and businesses. As customers increasingly crave intimate technology, the potential of AI to disrupt customer experience delivery is immense.

Gartner forecasts that in 2020, 85% of customer interaction will be managed without a human. This finds evidence in automation of processes of customer support, immediate responsiveness and swift resolution of customer issues. With AI, huge amounts of data from various sources can be analyzed and processed, including data on emotions and behavioural patterns. Salesforce exemplifies AI adoption for CX through Einstein, its set of AI technologies, which analyzes data and makes predictions about customers.

Chatbots

Chatbots stimulate and facilitate conversation and they put an end to delays in responses to customers. More companies are deploying chatbots on their websites to facilitate 24/7 customer experience delivery. Chatbots offer real-time responses, and they’re getting smarter with AI-backing. Chatbots powered by AI, machine learning and natural language processing go beyond communicating pre-programmed information. They attend to more complex conversations, learning from pools of conversation data, and maximizing the chances of customers attaining their intended goals. They are also good for giving information to customers at digital touchpoints. Companies can personalize their chatbots to match their voice/tone and overall brand persona.

Data and Analytics

Data analytics is key to the improvement of customer experience. It allows businesses to analyze their existing experiences, track customer behaviour, and figure out the gaps they need to fill to improve. With data, businesses can discover insights with which to create strategies for improving customer experience. Based on data such as customer demographics, details of past interactions with organization, purchasing habits, and call records, businesses can deliver personalized solutions to customers. Such big data is collated from backend service reports and customer feedback to analyse patterns in customer behaviour. This is a primary step towards the attainment of major business goals such as customer acquisition, sales, and return on investment.

At the end of the day, being rich in data and/or AI-powered technologies without being rich in insights makes the process of customer experience management a dead-end. In the same vein, having insights that don’t translate to actions defeats the purpose of CX. As businesses optimize these disruptive technologies to serve their customers better, it is important to holistically complete the entire cycle starting in data collection/data analysis and culminating in action management.