Ambitious Interfaces

AI technology does not align with unique customer-centered values

Imagine a chatbot that customizes its responses considering your suburb, age, profession, gender, marital status, social connections, goals, sexual orientation, financial position, nationality, race, religion, dietary preferences, personal challenges, and even the mood that has been influencing your choice of clothing lately.

Definitely. A Gartner survey published in July last year found that 64% of customers would prefer that companies didn’t use AI for customer service.

The reasoning is logical— AI is made to complement human intelligence in learning, problem-solving and decision-making; and the majority does not understand how that is done.

If superintelligent AI will potentially surpass human intelligence in various fields, customer service is not one of them. The overall customer experience, molded by diverse customer touchpoints in relation to specific customer journeys, still need to resonate brands, products and services (not technical enforcement of policies, if companies really want to expand their customer base).

It takes years of experience speaking with different people through various channels to know how to attend to and exceed expectations without excess. Do I need to mention, for example, those websites containing a university degree worth of texts intended to sell a simple solution just because of SEO? Or better, the never-ending video campaigns about a single subject because prospects are tired of those very websites containing a university degree worth of texts intended to sell a simple solution just because of SEO?

There is a high level of emotional agility required to navigate the web nowadays. However, human beings naturally thrive in complex situations.

Reference: https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2024-07-09-gartner-survey-finds-64-percent-of-customers-would-prefer-that-companies-didnt-use-ai-for-customer-service