How AI will change the nature of customer service work

Any report predicting “jobs to be replaced by AI” will tell you that top of the list of roles at risk is the customer service representative. But that's too simplistic, and I think the reality will be much more interesting and positive.

A key element currently missing from the narrative that AI is replacing customer service reps is that customer service teams are under tremendous pressure almost all the time.

Most often they have more questions than they can answer. This can cause their customers to have bad experiences and feel like the customer experience is not a priority.

Customer service challenges

We constantly talk to customer service teams, and what is not visible to people outside the industry is that customer service managers and managers really want to deliver an exceptional customer experience. They care, a lot - that's why they work in this job! But the reality is that the job is hard and the current economic climate has made it much harder. Teams are being asked to do more volume with less staff, but maintain high customer satisfaction.

"With the latest AI models, we may examine the AI ​​accurately and answer more than 50% of questions immediately"

AI is the solution to this currently impossible task. It will be a win-win for customer service teams, customers and businesses. AI will remove all repetitive questions, and for many companies, that's the majority.

With the latest AI models, we may examine the AI ​​accurately and answer over 50% of questions immediately. At Intercom, we already have examples of customers doing this. This will give the customer service teams a lot more time.

Three possible evolutions

I see this playing out in three ways:

Yes, customer service teams will shrink. It's inevitable, but it's not the project of catastrophic people. Many teams have high turnover and constantly open positions, which will reduce pressure. This will give managers more time to invest in growing their staff. Customer service work will become much more interesting and rewarding. Representatives will only deal with more complicated matters or really important customers. The work will always be about human connection, empathy, but also deep problem solving. Representatives will have more time to provide the excellent customer service they seek. New types of jobs will emerge within the customer service team. The customer experience that combines AI and representatives must be designed, orchestrated. And it needs to be analyzed and improved.

At Intercom, we've been working on this problematic space for a decade. And we are convinced that 2023 is the pivotal year where everything will change. We believe that the current new generation of AI models will quickly accelerate everyone to this new future.

Last week we launched a new product based on GPT-4, the latest AI model from Open AI (the creators of ChatGPT). It's called Fin and it makes the future above a reality today. This is the breakthrough that took years to achieve.

See for yourself! You can check it out and play with the demo, here.