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RESEARCH, ANALYSIS & TRENDS
By 2020, one-third of all B2B companies
will have employed AI to augment their
primary sales processes, Gartner said
According to Gartner, 25% of customer service and "A great VCA offers more than just information," said
support operations will integrate virtual customer Mr. Alvarez. "It should enrich the customer experience,
assistant (VCA) or chatbot technology across help the customer throughout the interaction and
engagement channels by 2020, up from less than process transactions on behalf of the customer.
two percent in 2017. "
Indeed, a 2017 Gartner survey found that 84% of
Speaking at of the Gartner Customer Experience organizations expected to increase investments
Summit in Tokyo, Gene Alvarez, managing vice
president at Gartner, said more than half of in customer experience (CX) technology in the year
organizations have already invested in VCAs for ahead.
customer service, as they realize the advantages of
automated self-service, together with the ability to Other Gartner predictions for CX leaders to know when
escalate to a human agent in complex situations. developing a customer strategy include:
"As more customers engage on digital channels, VCAs 1. By 2019, 20% of brands will abandon their
are being implemented for handling customer requests mobile apps: Many brands are finding that mobile
on websites, mobile apps, consumer messaging apps applications are not delivering the level of adoption
and social networks," Mr. Alvarez said. "This is and customer engagement they expected. Original
underpinned by improvements in natural-language return-on-investment (ROI) calculations are
processing, machine learning and intent-matching missing the mark due to the cost of support,
capabilities." maintenance, upgrades, customer care and
marketing to drive downloads. Brands are now
Organizations report a reduction of up to 70% in call, investing to build presence in consumer messaging
chat and/or email inquiries after implementing a VCA, apps, such as Facebook Messenger and WeChat,
to reach customers where they spend a high
Gartner research states, besides reportedly increasing
customer satisfaction and a 33% saving per voice percentage of their time.
engagement.
4 February 2018 - Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) in Marketing