For over a decade, the number of agents and average call handling times grew year over year. This is about to change. AI has evolved significantly over the past few years, making self-service voice and digital channels as good as or better than a live agent. According to Frost & Sullivan’s latest CX customer survey, almost half the respondents deployed conversational AI to some degree, while another 37% plan to invest in the solution over the next two years. Aside from the fact that bots do not call in sick, AI agents can handle more complex queries and are beginning to sound increasingly human-like.
Frost & Sullivan’s latest CX Customer Survey reveals that:
- Self-service is ranked as the top solution that Generative AI will improve.
- 57% of respondents find that virtual agent transactions increased in the past year.
- 60% of companies are very satisfied with virtual agents
This allows businesses to shift from using terms like “call containment” or “call deflection,” which have negative connotations to customers, to “seamless digital interactions,” where customers can obtain the answers they need quickly and easily.
While digital interactions are on the verge of surpassing live agent interactions in the next year or two, businesses must continue to invest in solutions that improve agent performance and drive employee engagement because in 2024:
- 46% reported increasing seats in 2024
- 84% found that average call handling times have increased or stayed the same
While virtual agents will handle many questions in the coming years, the ones that reach an agent are either very complex or emotionally charged. This requires attaining agent-assist capabilities that extract the most valuable information from various data sources during the interaction to expedite resolution and foster a positive interaction that builds brand loyalty. It also requires investments in AI-infused training solutions that provide targeted learning modules as needed.
As AI technologies evolve and agent skills change, optimizing the balance of digital and live agents becomes increasingly complex. Cisco Webex announced some exciting new features at WebexOne in Q4 2024 that address these two core elements of contact centers, which need to be reevaluated in this new digital era.
Webex Customer Experience Solutions’ Successful Launch
Cisco Webex achieved double-digit year-over-year growth in cloud contact center seats as installed customers adopted the solution, and a significant number of new customers joined. Conversations with Cisco Webex customers, partners, and executives indicate that this success is a result of the company’s:
- AI-first approach with a keen understanding of use cases.
- commitment to placing agent engagement at the forefront of CX capabilities.
- long history of enabling secure and reliable communications.
AI-First Approach with a Focus on User Habits and Behavior
Cisco Webex uncovered the hidden challenges of AI adoption by closely examining user habits and behavior. The company found that all customers want productivity outcomes; they are ready and aligned for transformation and wish to embrace new technology. However, they are not achieving the desired outcomes.
Humans are creatures of habit, so muscle memory needs to be changed for them to adopt new solutions. Our survey found that about ¾ of contact centers say customer unwillingness to adapt to new channels is the top two factors preventing them from achieving their CX objectives. Webex by Cisco introduced AI in a way that changed habits over time, reducing friction and increasing usage from an average of 2.5 times a week to 12.4 times a week. The company plans to continue iterating by listening, learning, and making changes to improve the adoption of all AI-infused products.
Introducing A Virtual Agent That Sounds and Acts Like a Live Agent
The COVID-19 pandemic forced customers across generations to use self-service tools, creating an opportunity for virtual agents to shine. Virtual agents have evolved and are handling more calls more effectively. Webex AI Agent really stands out – it enables human-like interactions with the self-service tool across voice and digital channels. This tool overcomes some key challenges customers face when using bots. A third of contact centers find their customers are frustrated with the following when using their virtual agent channel:
- Inability to resolve issues quickly
- Technical difficulty
- Inability for the bot to understand the customer and poor error recovery
Not only did the AI agent sound natural, but it was able to handle three imperative obstacles effortlessly:
- When the speaker changed directions and asked an irrelevant question, the AI agent could switch gears and find the information requested without asking additional questions to help it reroute.
- There were clear guardrails, so when the customer asked a question that the AI agent was not set up to answer, it didn’t go rogue and answer the question with incorrect or unauthorized data. This is crucial for businesses today – security and privacy are critical to maintaining customer trust and brand loyalty.
- First-call resolution is often the most important KPI for contact centers. Cisco achieves intelligent, real-time fulfillment resolution with workflow automation and its strength in integrations. Webex Connect (CPaaS) makes delivering first-call resolutions easier due to its back-end system integrations.
Employee Engagement is Crucial for Future CX Success
While we all instinctively know that happy agents generate happy customers, the data below proves the correlation.
Frost & Sullivan often emphasizes the importance of continually reevaluating performance metrics to ensure that agent performance is measured against achievable and effective goals. These may change as customer behavior changes. For example, the average handle time key performance indicator (KPI) may need to be set longer as more complex calls reach an agent. A suite of KPIs, rather than just one KPI, is necessary to measure performance and productivity effectively.
Jay Patel, SVP & GM, Cisco Webex, points out an important nuance: “Being more efficient doesn’t necessarily solve the problem. Getting to an agent quickly who can’t resolve a customer’s problem is not a measure of efficiency, but the queue KPI looks successful. If an agent handles 15 calls in an hour but is not helping to build relationships in the long run, it may not be a suitable measurement.” This is why upskilling agents is one of the top business priorities in 2025.
The chart also shows that brand loyalty was the top corporate-level objective for CX IT decision-makers for the first time in over a decade, as indicated by the results of these surveys.
Vinod Muthukrishnan, VP & COO of Webex Customer Experience Solutions, shared an important insight: “You’ll never be able to predict what channel a customer will want to use at that moment.” This is true – analytics cannot predict everything. As the number of customer choices grows, forecasting becomes even more complex. He also said, “The idea of having the greatest contact center experience has never happened.” However, businesses need to understand that using analytics to anticipate customers’ needs, being empathetic, and resolving issues quickly can create a memorable experience and foster brand loyalty. Consumers want businesses to offer very personalized products and services. Muthukrishan’s comment, “CX is not a point in time – it’s not about one interaction, but the customer journey in perpetuity,” is essential for businesses to consider through digital transformation.
Security and Reliability are Top Critical Decision-Making Factors
Security and reliability are also critical decision-making factors that Cisco is known for, associated with among IT buyers. These factors should be part of every conversation – security features are more important than ever, given the increasing uncertainty around the world and the growing impact of AI.
According to Frost & Sullivan’s Contact Center End User Survey, the top five critical decision-making factors when businesses select contact center solutions include:
- Customer care (43%)
- Security features (40%)
- Reliability (36%)
- Best features and functionality/technology roadmap (30%)
- Vendor implementation and support services (28%)
In addition, the top three challenges IT departments face with contact center solutions include:
- Handling security concerns (32%)
- Handling privacy concerns (29%)
- Ensuring network stability/reliability (28%)
Ensuring employee experience (EX) is crucial to delivering excellent CX. The survey also shows that two-thirds of businesses make upskilling agents and attracting and retaining talent a top business priority. Also, 65% say they will invest in AI to improve EX and CX.
Conclusion
How do you achieve an optimal balance of virtual and live agents? In the human vs. robot scenario, the goal should be for humans and AI to work together, supporting each other to improve customer satisfaction and brand loyalty outcomes.
Companies should look beyond balance sheets to measure the effectiveness of AI. They must examine the improvements in CSAT scores, agent retention, agent satisfaction (as measured by NPS scores), reduction in notetaking time, CSAT scores for virtual agents, the number of automated processes, and customer retention (or brand loyalty) to measure the success of AI implementation.
Contact center organizations are at different stages of digital transformation, and many have implemented systems that cannot be easily replaced. This is why solutions providers that offer a pathway to seamlessly integrate with existing infrastructure while adding innovative capabilities are better positioned to deliver successful AI implementations.
Contact center leaders recommend that the best approach to digital transformation is to start small, gain traction with top and influential agents and supervisors, resolve any issues, and then expand to the rest of the team.
Most importantly, businesses want to partner with solution providers they trust, ones that will help them resolve their challenges. When they trust the partner, they are satisfied with an innovative roadmap of the needed features. Diving deep into how users behave and helping them adjust to using new features is an effective way to build trust. Gaining a detailed understanding of user needs, processes, and how people will adopt solutions and features to develop use cases that solve real problems in the contact center (and in the workplace with UCaaS) is crucial to excelling in CX.
This effort on the front side develops an AI strategy that blends digital and live agents to deliver positive, memorable experiences that improve brand loyalty.
