CRM, AI, and Technology Investment: Too Much of a Good Thing?
Since its earliest days, the goal of CRM technology has always been to help companies better address customer needs. Over the decades, companies have spent trillions on software, hardware, and platforms to improve how they attract new customers, sell their products or services to them, and solve their issues after their purchases.
Along the way, radical and highly disruptive technology change has rocked the CRM world over the years. Some of these changes were organic, as long-standing vendors in the CRM industry added functionality to existing products. Some of the change was foisted upon the industry by outside forces, like when the COVID-19 pandemic forced companies to move to cloud deployment options almost overnight. A lot of the change was introduced by innovative startups that recognized a need—no matter how small—and brought something new to market to address it. Some of those startups have come and gone, swallowed up by larger players with deep pockets. Many other have stuck around and expanded on their own to become significant industry players themselves, and even appear in this year’s CRM Top 100 list.
Now in its sixth year, the CRM Top 100 issue highlights the hottest trends and technologies in the three pillars of CRM—customer service, marketing, and sales—as well as the 100 leading providers of those technologies.
Throughout CRM’s storied history, some technologies have come and gone, never really living up to their promise or failing the basic cost-benefit analysis. Social media was originally one such technology, though it seems to be making a comeback. The metaverse might be another, though this is still a matter of debate in many circles.
Artificial intelligence is certainly not on that list. AI has been grabbing a lot of the attention since OpenAI released ChatGPT in November 2022. But it’s far more than hype; AI will never qualify as a new shiny object with little real-world value. In its many forms, whether it’s generative AI, predictive AI, conversational AI, multimodal AI, or omnichannel AI, the technology is now an integral part of CRM.
So it should come as a huge surprise, then, that despite the countless dollars that companies are spending on AI, the quality of the experiences they provide to their customers continues to decline, according to two separate studies from CCW Digital and Forrester Research. The most confounding statistic is that only 7 percent of consumers feel experiences have improved over the past year, while more than half (55 percent) feel they have worsened.
Forrester’s research painted a similar picture: CX quality in the United States has fallen to its lowest point ever following a third consecutive year of decreases, it found. In fact, the average CX Index score dipped by a statistically significant 1.6 points, from 70.9 to 69.3 on a 100-point scale, in the latest report.
“Despite the advancements in AI, the essence of customer experience hinges on genuine human connection. Technology should enhance, not replace, the empathy and responsiveness that define exceptional service,” Mario Matulich, president of Customer Management Practice (CMP), the parent organization of CCW Digital, says in the article.
And Brian Cantor, managing director of CCW Digital, shares that sentiment. “In a time when AI and automation promise so much, it’s concerning that businesses are still missing the mark on delivering meaningful customer experiences. The reliance on technology without the balance of human touch has increased frustration among consumers,” he says.
What’s even more telling, Cantor makes the following point: “Eighty percent of the report that we just published would mirror some to the things we were writing about 15 years ago: issues with long wait times, unprepared agents, lack of focus, forcing customers in the wrong channel.”
Of course there are many other problems and many technologies already in the market or in the development pipeline to address them. Technology is great, and we encourage you to look at the vendors on our Top 100 list if you are considering adding something to your CRM tech stack. But keep in mind that technology is only one part of the equation. Processes are also important, but the human touch is the key. And that’s not something that technology can give you—at least not yet.
Leonard Klie is the editor of CRM magazine. He can be reached at lklie@infotoday.com.
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