1. A faster transition to the cloud
For nearly a decade, cloud transformation has been and will remain a mainstay in contact center forecasts even though a shift to the cloud may seem like “old news” to many of us, 41.5% of businesses employing contact center systems still employ on-premises solutions.
However, this number will unavoidably keep falling. A staggering 92% of leaders predict that by 2030, most of their contact centers will be housed on a single, cloud-based platform. At least a portion of your contact center will be in 2024, but the operative term here is the majority, and that forecast is still seven years off.
Every contact center has a separate route to the cloud. While many see cloud transformation as a “rip and replace” scenario, the majority of contact centres move their operations over time. This could be because of unamortized on-premises infrastructure, contracts, and current investments; alternatively, it could be for change management reasons.
You may now move a portion of your contact center more easily than ever. Collaborating with a contact center provider that can adapt to your needs and guide you toward the best course of action for your company is crucial in this situation.
2. Data that is both accessible and actionable will be more important than ever
The foundation of any successful contact center is data and analytics. 88% of contact center executives believe that in 2030, data will guide the most important business decisions. Many contact center directors and agents are still operating in the dark when it comes to making daily, real-time decisions.
A 2023 survey found that 47% of digital workers struggle to find information or data needed to effectively perform their jobs.This study applies to a variety of job settings, but it most clearly affects the standard contact center.
The majority of contact centres have an abundance of data at their disposal yet, it can be difficult to find relevant data points across multiple platforms. Although the data is present, it must be manually manipulated to derive useful insights because it is dispersed across various systems and is difficult to access. Most contact centres don’t have data scientists on staff, and deciphering this data frequently needs advanced knowledge.
Contact center executives find it difficult to go from reactive to proactive operations and adapt to changes in the market, client preferences, etc. when they are unable to quickly access, analyse, and act upon their data. This leads to organisational bottlenecks.
However, things don’t have to be this way. Without specialised knowledge in data science, leaders may now easily obtain and provide real-time actionable insights to effect change with the help of modern contact centre software.
3. The spread of practical AI
Even though a lot of businesses have been utilising automation and artificial intelligence in one form or another for a while, 2023 marked the mainstreaming of these technologies and the beginning of the AI era.
It is therefore not surprising that a survey discovered that, “80% of technical leaders agree that the technology has graduated out of its experimental phase and now provides meaningful business value,” and that “84% of technical leaders feel they need to implement AI into apps to maintain a competitive advantage.”
In 2024, contact center executives, in our opinion, will see past the hype to find practical uses for artificial intelligence. But what exactly does “usable AI” mean?
Useful AI is pertinent, meets a need, or resolves a particular issue. To put it simply, it’s utilising AI when appropriate. Above all, it ought to make a clear, noticeable difference right away.
Asking partners and vendors, What is the low-hanging fruit we can go after first? is a clever tactic. The response to this query is the same as the response to another query. What is a vision of the future versus what does your software do today?”
In the contact center sector, the organisations that implement rapid time-to-value, high ROI artificial intelligence (also known as “Usable AI”) will have an advantage over those that wind up in never-ending research projects.
Furthermore, AI needs to be tailored to your industry and use case, and it needs to be simple for agents and contact center directors to learn and use. There is advanced AI available that doesn’t require a doctorate in machine learning. This is how the internet took off when it was easy for people to interact with. We all use the internet without giving it much thought these days. Useful AI must be so basic that it doesn’t require upskilling
By 2024, contact centers will have the best chance to profit from usable AI when it comes to the agent experience. By 2026, 30% of representatives’ work will be partially automated. Usable AI and automation can remove time-consuming, mundane tasks so agents can concentrate on their most important task: serving customers. Examples of these tasks include using automated quick replies in text interactions, sophisticated contact wrap-up/summary capabilities, and predictive interaction guidance based on the customer journey.
To maximise its influence on the KPIs that matter customer wait time, handling time, reaction time, agent productivity, and agent satisfaction and performance. AI should be easy to use, and our attention should be directed toward the benefits it can provide by nature.
4. Greater funding for the empowerment and development of agents
There were spirited discussions years ago on whether AI would mean the end of contact center agents. Furthermore, the majority of business executives now concur that agents are here to stay, even though it is still unclear how AI will ultimately affect the agent’s function.
They will, if anything, only become more significant in their continuing and crucial role in the consumer experience in 2024 and beyond. 60% of leaders predict that in 2030, contact center agents will exclusively deal with the most delicate or private issues.
However, what kind of person makes up your typical agent? Are they prepared, equipped, and trained to handle complicated and sophisticated challenges well? If your contact center is similar to others, the response is typically a stern NO.
The good news is that more agent empowerment and development follow from the previously indicated acceptance of usable AI. Here are significant ways that, by 2024, contact centers should be leveraging AI to further enhance agent empowerment and development.
- Prompt feedback on interactions. Identify the precise exchanges in which agents meet or fail to meet customer and leadership expectations, and promptly provide feedback.
- Focused instruction and growth. With the use of AI-powered insights, you may find new trends and problems that agents need to be trained to solve so that you can offer training.
- Additional time for the creation of agents. In the past, contact centres have had difficulty finding time for training and development when things get busy, it usually gets neglected first. But with AI-powered client self-service choices and routine agent task automation, you should have more time to train your agents on agent skills, which will come in handy when handling the most challenging problems.
However, exercise caution: resist the urge to associate lower headcount with greater self-service performance. Contact centres should view this as a long-overdue chance to devote more time to agent development, even if there will be long-term changes in the labour requirements.
5. A closer collaboration between customer service and marketing
The contact centre sector has been discussing for years how to shift the way businesses view customer support from a “cost center” to a “value center.” The function has been elevated by increased customer-centricity in businesses, and we think this trend will continue in 2024 as ties between customer service and other departments, particularly marketing, become more solid.
Nowadays, a lot of businesses divide up team contacts with customers. For instance, marketing typically manages all social media activity, including posts, comments, direct messages, proactive email campaigns for upselling and cross-selling, etc., whereas customer service is typically in charge of all one-on-one interactions.
However, according to 78% of CEOs surveyed for the Contact Center of 2030, the contact center will conduct the majority of customer-facing communication in addition to providing service. This is a result of today’s leaders realising that experiences get fragmented when functional lines are created across the customer journey.
Although surveys don’t think this ownership change will occur quickly, they do think it starts with better ties between customer service and other departments. They predict that in 2024, organisations will proactively work to promote tight cooperation and partnership between functions to dismantle silos of data, systems, expertise, and culture.
Additionally, they believe that by uniting teams around shared customer engagement data and streamlining the process of gradually incorporating new channels into customer support interactions, the right contact centre software may expedite that process.
Construct the future contact center
“We’re just trying to make it to 2024,” you may be thinking, because 2030 seems like such a long way off. However, as you are aware, time flies when you’re having a good time, and the decisions you make in 2024 will decide how your contact centre performs in the ensuing ten years.
Fortunately, you are not travelling alone on this adventure. Taking action on these forecasts in 2024 is simple when you work with a partner who is committed to the long-term success of your contact center. Attain corporate objectives and never give up on changing. Make sure you have all the tools in your toolkit by keeping an eye on the contact centre market and continuing to invest in AI and other cutting-edge technologies.