Matt Dyson, general manager at Likewize Support, discusses how AI is transforming technology customer care

As our reliance on technology continues to grow, so does our need for quick and seamless solutions for when our tech inevitably goes wrong. We all know consumer technology is now more complicated than ever, and at a time where dependence on our devices is rapidly increasing, getting the most from those devices, while finding a quick solution when our device has an issue, is crucial.

Modern businesses know that providing seamless customer care leads to customer loyalty alongside a healthier bottom line. In fact, 89% of customers claim they will purchase from a brand again if they had a great experience, according to Salesforce research.

Customer care doesn’t only need to be managed via call centres

Within customer care, it is assumed consumers wish to speak to a representative immediately, but more often than not, simply providing consumers with the tools to fix issues themselves can prove to be a better solution.

Let’s face it, many consumers wouldn’t consider themselves “tech savvy”, due to having limited knowledge of what their devices can do and how to tackle problems when they arise. The problem is not the consumers’ tech expertise, but instead the brands failing to provide the necessary information to help them. This leads to millions of avoidable calls to contact centres as well as unnecessary returns and repair requests. These requests put a tremendous strain on call centres throughout the world, where customers are asked to hold the line as staff try to catch up in the background – not something any brand wants to see or prolong.

While various companies have already incorporated chatbots and tutorial videos within their customer care journey to drive self serve providing excellent customer care needs to be more deeply integrated and properly equip consumers with better tools to fix their daily tech problems.

Achieving customer satisfaction through proactive education

Through proactive education customer care will naturally lend itself as a way to create greater consumer satisfaction. By educating your customers about the ever evolving tech devices they own, we can remove a great deal of initial frustration when those small annoying things go wrong. Again, this is about encouraging customers to self-serve – a critical pillar of effective customer support.

Of course, the inevitable unexpected customer questions may arise, and we might not always have ready-to-go answers, but we can forward plan and predict the most likely questions. The more we can look to answer some of these questions through AI, the more we can deflect time spent on the phone. A win-win for businesses and their customers — saving time, energy and money.

A vast knowledge base powered by AI helps solve 80% of queries

We offer advanced solutions, such as our AI knowledge base which aims to answer customer questions within seconds, either by contact centre agents or through online self-serve platforms. On top of this, our troubleshooting app runs over 189 tests in just under four minutes to truly ascertain if the problem even exists (in many cases it actually does not). Through this service, we have found that consumers can resolve over 80% of their issues for themselves, if given access to our high-quality knowledge base which is powered by AI. On top of this, 75% of customers who say their device is damaged and needs repairing are often mistaken and their issue can be easily resolved without the need of a technician.

We also use AI to process natural language in relation to all customer queries. The sheer magnitude of questions customers hold is tremendous and by using AI, brands can gain a deeper understanding of customer needs and future intentions. This insight in return helps to make diagnostics and our knowledge base more effective as we can cover of a wider breadth of topics and identify problems earlier in the process.

AI in customer care helps improve customer satisfaction

Innovate tech solutions like AI, ultimately make customers save time, money and effort by helping them fix their issues in the moment. We’ve reduced customer contacts for some clients by a staggering 90% and improved customer satisfaction by 107% within the first six weeks (C Sat). This simultaneously allows the reduction of cost-to-serve for the company, including enabling customer care teams to focus on more complex needs and providing customers with the capability to execute as much as possible themselves.

Linking this back to the issue of increasing staff shortages in call centres, coupled with the mounting cost for businesses; repairs, returns and call centre customer service costs can be easily avoided if companies invest in newer and smarter technologies to help manage the end-to-end device support.

While technology may be the enabler, at the very heart of implementing such solutions is a customer experience philosophy that we know drives success. Let’s remember, AI can be a powerful partner in tech education and preservation.

Written by Matt Dyson, general manager at Likewize Support