AI for business: What the latest developments in artificial intelligence could mean for your contact center

Recent breakthroughs in artificial intelligence (AI) have been well-publicized and discussed at length on websites and social media. Who has heard of ChatGPT? That's right—everyone!

The generative AI used in ChatGPT and other tools can do everything from writing poems about public figures to producing original artwork on demand. It may even write the next chart-topping country music song. But is there substance behind the hype? And how can generative AI be used in a business environment?

These recent developments in artificial intelligence have plenty of substance and business uses. In fact, use of AI for business initiatives has never looked so promising. More than just a poetry-generator, generative AI can also perform tasks such as suggesting new drug compounds to test, identifying new products, and measurably improving customer service experiences.

Continue reading to learn more about AI and how to leverage the latest advances in your contact center to streamline operations and deliver uniquely humanized customer experiences (CX).

What is generative AI?

Let's begin by defining "generative AI," the technology behind tools such as ChatGPT. Generative AI is an umbrella term used to describe any form of artificial intelligence that can generate content−such as essays and images−on its own. This capability distinguishes it from traditional AI, which is primarily focused on identifying patterns and making predictions.

Currently, the form of generative AI receiving the most attention is GPT (generative pretrained transformer), which is a large language model that leverages machine learning. Machine learning algorithms become smarter with the consumption of more and more data. In fact, large language models that have been trained on billions or trillions of data records allow GPT models to mimic inputs when providing outputs, making the content it produces seem authentic rather than created by a not very smart robot.

Although it's been around for decades, the latest attention to generative AI has been driven by the simplification of the user interface. Users can easily create content, for example, by uploading an image or providing a command such as, "Write a 500-word summary of ‘War and Peace.’"

As good as these AI models have become, however, it's important to note that they are not infallible. They can produce content that sounds 100% authoritative but is 100% wrong. This is especially true when the model has been trained on inaccurate or biased data. This point highlights the importance of training AI tools on organization-specific information when using AI for business purposes.

Examples of generative AI in the business world

Recognizing the great potential of generative AI, many businesses are already incorporating it into their products and operations. Let's look at a few noteworthy examples.

Canva

Canva is a leading design application used by 135 million people across the globe every month. Its intuitive user interface and functionality enable people to easily create their own graphics, ranging from t-shirts to business presentations to Pinterest pins, no design skill required.

In March 2023, Canva rolled out AI-powered text and image generation capabilities throughout its product with very little disruption to the UI users have come to know and value. Now, for example, when Canva users want to generate an image from scratch, they see an option to "describe the image you want and we'll create it for you." I made the image below by typing, “Customer service agent wearing a cape.” It’s not perfect, but you can see the potential.

ChatGPT

ChatGPT, a natural language processing (NLP) application developed by OpenAI, is practically a household word these days. When I asked the ChatGPT app to explain ChatGPT in simple terms, it told me this: "Absolutely!" "ChatGPT is like a super smart computer program that can understand and generate human-like text. It's trained on a ton of information from books, websites, and other texts, so it knows a lot about many different topics. You can ask it questions, have conversations with it, get help with your homework, or just chat about anything you like. It tries its best to come up with helpful and sensible responses based on what it has learned, but remember, it's not a real person – it's a really advanced computer program!"

It's fun to play around with ChatGPT, but it's much more than a novelty. Businesses are using the underlying technology for tasks such as generating software code, providing customer service, and creating unique, personalized marketing content. Leveraging already developed AI for business purposes like these can significantly shorten the timeline for implementing new innovations.

Slack

Slack, which bills itself as a productivity platform, is used by 65 of the Fortune 100 companies and has over 10 million daily users. Its collaboration capabilities make it uniquely suited to today's hybrid workforce.

Coincidentally, the OpenAI team that developed ChatGPT used Slack during their project. Because Slack is easily customized, the team modified it for their purposes, including integrating Slack with ChatGPT. This modified version of the application, known as ChatGPT app for Slack, is available to all Slack users and provides enhanced capabilities such as conversation summaries, writing assistance, answering questions, and retrieving information.

It's fascinating to see how other businesses and industries are incorporating generative AI into products, services, and business processes, but let's now discuss the most important application of these breakthroughs in artificial intelligence - customer service.

How generative AI can transform the contact center

One of the most prominent use cases for any type of artificial intelligence has always been customer service. When woven into areas such as self-service, analytics, and interaction routing, AI can help more customers help themselves, streamline operations, empower leaders to make better and more timely decisions, and improve CX and customer satisfaction.

However, previous AI-powered solutions, particularly self-service chatbots, have often fallen short of their potential. When you recall that generative AI is all about creating accurate content that sounds very human, the potential transformation of narrowly focused, rule-based chatbots into intelligent, broadly capable virtual agents becomes clear. And exciting. And game changing.

But self-service is just one way this new and improved AI for business can be leveraged in the contact center.

What is AI for business?

At NICE, we believe everyone throughout the customer service journey can benefit from generative AI. When AI is infused throughout the business, everyone benefits - employees, the organization and, of course, customers.

As such, we have integrated our AI for business solution, Enlighten, throughout our software so that all key stakeholders can benefit from this smarter technology.

Enlighten was developed specifically for CX on a foundation of generative AI, domain-trained models, and millions of customer service interactions. This means, for example, that Enlighten can readily identify factors such as customer sentiment and agent use of soft skills. Further training on client-specific data and integrations with information sources such as knowledge bases ensure Enlighten solutions have the information needed to provide stakeholders with branded responses, guidance, and experiences.

Because Enlighten is such a powerful AI for business solution, it helps facilitate every step of the resolution journey, regardless of where it begins or what path it takes. Here's an example of how a journey enabled by Enlighten might look:

Lisa, a contact center manager, realizes there is an opportunity to expand the scope of the types of issues that customers can resolve through self-service, but she isn't sure what contact types she should focus on. She turns to Enlighten Actions for insights.

Enlighten Actions is purpose-built for CX leaders, enabling them to access smarter insights and make faster, more impactful decisions and changes. If you'll recall, one of the recent breakthroughs in generative AI is its conversational user interface, making it accessible to everyone. Using that type of intuitive interface, Lisa asks, "What are the top 5 opportunities for automation?" and the system provides five options, one of which is "service charges." Lisa decides that's the best contact type to add to self-service.

*Note that Lisa can also ask Enlighten Actions questions such as, "Why are the transfer rates increasing?" and "Who are my top performing agents?" and receive similarly helpful insights. For anyone who has spent hours compiling data to answer these types of questions, you can imagine how powerful this AI for business solution is!

Back to our example.

A couple of months later, Jack checks his email late one night and notices an odd service charge on his cable bill. He visits the cable company’s website to see if he can figure out what the charge is and encounters a virtual agent on the support page. Jack has had lackluster experiences with chatbots on other websites, so he's skeptical about this one, but he decides to give it a shot.

Jack is in for a treat because this virtual agent is powered by Enlighten Autopilot, built to understand customer intent and provide accurate, personalized, and humanized customer support. After verifying his identity, Jack is prompted to enter his question and types, "What is this $15 charge on July's bill?" The virtual agent immediately responds with, "That is a pro-rated charge for the premium service you signed up for on July 10th. Your future bills will have a $45 charge to reflect service for the entire month." Jack feels a little foolish about forgetting that he had signed up for the premium service, but is happy with the information he received and the overall experience.

Looks like Lisa chose the right task to automate.

Now let's look at how using AI-powered solutions can turn contact center agents into superheroes. Jack is taken care of, so we'll use a different scenario.

Enlighten Copilot is purpose-built for contact center agents and supervisors. By empowering them with in the moment guidance, proactive access to information and automation assistance, and insights about the most important things to focus on, this AI for business solution helps make the most of these valuable resources.

Artificial intelligence allows Enlighten Copilot to understand the nature of voice and digital interactions so that it can offer the right type of assistance. For example, if a customer is chatting with an agent about using loyalty points to upgrade a current hotel reservation, Enlighten Copilot may automatically offer to process the request and send a confirmation email.

And if the agent happened to show the customer a little attitude during the interaction, his or her supervisor will be alerted about the negative sentiment so that coaching can occur.

AI for business is what leading brands are using to improve CX and better leverage their talented employees, ultimately driving better business results. To learn more about harnessing the power of AI for your contact center, visit our Enlighten for CX page.

And to learn more about artificial intelligence from industry experts, watch our four-part, on-demand webinar series and become an expert on the next big thing.