Brands are integrating AI into their marketing functions, and some are able to test these tools in customer experience. Currently, analytics and market research are top AI use cases, with content, customer service and website development further down the list. Adopting AI for CX functions like constructing content and designing web sites comes with an added risk because these experiences are customer-facing. But some are taking the plunge.
This week, marketers and CX experts gathered at CX Circle New York hosted by Contentsquare with roughly 600 of the CX platform’s customers. Much of the buzz in New York was about CX innovation, and these innovations included AI adoption.
“The key themes were really around AI, personalization, omnichannel and the kind of correlation between those three,” John O’Melia, Contentsquare’s chief customer officer told MarTech. “And I feel one thing that basically stuck out to me, depending on what you are promoting and brand, your level of importance on using those technologies could be very different.”
He added: “I feel what everybody is wrestling with is the art of what’s possible, and it’s moving so quickly. What’s possible isn’t necessarily what’s right … I feel a whole lot of [marketers] are really wrestling with the line by way of creating an excellent customer experience with personalization and letting AI play a task in that. You want it to play a task, but you don’t need to overstep — and does that turn off your customers?”
Small steps toward big AI transformations in CX
AI is widely utilized by marketers for analytics, providing them with customer and market insights. Using AI to automate and drive experiences with this personalization is a crucial next step. However, the experience involves a customer and how they perceive this next level of personalization. Do they find these messages relevant and helpful? Does the level of data come across as creepy?
“We can use AI at every touchpoint in the customer journey today,” said Tarun Dadoo, vp of products and delivery at Discover. “We began with smaller use cases and we checked out creative optimization.”
Creative optimization helps serve the right messages or promotions to the right segment of shoppers, however it’s not yet a totally personalized message talking to a particular customer. Discover uses AI applications on first-party data to create customer segments that help inform marketers when planning campaigns. Those insights may drive recent, personalized web experiences.
“How will we make the experience personalized based on what information customers provide to us?” Dadoo asked. “AI brings a whole lot of productivity to that data by constructing segments and a private experience in real-time, there’s some success in that space. We’re not introducing customized offers, just creating experiences that are positive moments to that user.”
Financial services are a heavily regulated industry, so Discover keeps heavy guardrails up between first-party and third-party data, Dadoo said. Not only could a customized offer risk creeping out a customer, however it could also fuel discrimination, which comes with regulatory penalties and the risk of alienating customers.
“Personalization is a possibility, however it’s not the same as humanization,” said Tricia Wang, a social scientist and consultant. “Brands must hold the two side-by-side. Be intentional about how you employ AI…and don’t conflate personalization with humanizing a product with community, belonging and loyalty.”
Dig deeper: What is customer experience and why does it matter?
AI-driven experiences to raised serve customers and employees
Luxury beauty and home retailer L’Occitane en Provence uses digital experiences to attach and maintain customer contact. But, the company also desires to leverage its in-store experience.
The company launched a mobile app a couple of years ago, allowing customers to buy and explore during the pandemic shutdowns. Whether customers are using the app in-store or remotely, they are educating themselves about products, and so are the agents who work for L’Occitane. The app also supports distant customer service and sales. AI drives search and education experiences on the app.
“We need to bring learnings from the in-store experience to the online experience by leveraging our client app,” said Carole Silverman, L’Occitane’s Chief Commercial Officer. “The AI makes it quicker to have access to soundbites and education. If there’s downtime in the store, then go to the AI tool and reinforce [the employee’s] knowledge, deepen the knowledge on one product or ingredient … Especially when customers are more seasoned, we’d like our people to be very educated.”
The retailer has a hard and fast cadence for messaging customers after they visit a store or make a purchase order. In addition to that, L’Occitane plans to make use of AI “to discover high engagement and provide video advisors with strategy guidance on who to contact and why to contact that customer,” Silverman said.
Auto dealership Sonic Automotive has a unique CX approach as a consequence of its specific industry needs. Its customers don’t need to spend more time in a automotive dealership, they need to test drive, sign papers and leave with the automotive.
Sonic Automotive’s digital experience is targeted on supporting the car-buying experience remotely to chop down the in-store time. This frees up sales associates to shut more deals, said Steve Wittman, chief digital retail officer, Sonic Automotive.
Dealerships also look to upsell services and warranties after a automotive purchase, and it’s difficult for chatbots and apps to shut these purchases.
“Warrantee penetration [is] an ecommerce challenge,” said Wittman. “It’s easier to say ‘no’ to a bot, so we’re still figuring that out.”
Papa Johns tests promos and toppings…and AI?
With 5,500 stores worldwide (about half of them in the U.S.), Papa Johns serves a whole lot of pizzas to a whole lot of customers. The pies could be made in roughly 240,000 permutations when combining different options for toppings, crusts and sauces. This means there’s numerous data and variables to check, and Papa John’s has a sturdy testing program to be certain that CX and sales improvements are validated.
“Testing fundamentally comes right down to solving a customer problem, and that may impact digital experience, the menu team, operations and supply chain,” said Grant Gunderson, director, digital product and customer experience at Papa Johns.
For instance, if Papa Johns launched an “extra cheese” promotion and it took off, that would spark a supply shortage at stores, affecting customers, employees and suppliers, said Gunderson. Also, solving customer problems isn’t nearly watching key measurements like conversion rates and tweaking the order app. External events like a serious storm or power outage require human attention and insight to supply an answer.
Dig deeper: How Beef ‘O’ Brady’s streamlines customer experience
Gunderson pointed to 2 fundamental segments of knowledge the Papa Johns analytics team focuses on. One is customer first-party data, which incorporates order history. The second is customer behavior analytics. When testing and validating changes to user experience, the team looks to tie the behavioral data to the sales data. The team has to take a broader view and take a look at other events during the test. For instance, if a brand new kind of crust is obtainable, are those sales cannibalizing the sales of other crust types or toppings?
Customer experience may lead to raised data. Papa Johns tested and made an easy change in its ordering that put the log-in on the first screen. Some customers were ordering without the log-in for this reason friction point, not necessarily because they didn’t need to share information.
Gunderson’s team is fascinated by AI, especially how it might improve the ordering experience. They are also specializing in personalization.
“We’re keeping track of AI and plan to be testing it for next yr,” he said.
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