Get your CX operation AI-ready

When it comes to AI, it can be hard to separate the reality from the hype, the genuine potential from the wishful thinking. It's not hard to find commentary from leaders who've been blown away by the potency of AI-driven improvements - nor from those who've been deflated when AI falls short of expectations.

The truth is, AI is only as good as the supports it stands on. Every day, advancements in AI bring new possibilities to organizations like yours. It's not just about content production efficiency and automation, either: increasingly AI has the capability to unearth previously hidden insights and narratives that drive strategic decisions.

To take full advantage, it's important for your customer experience pillars to be match fit. Here are key areas where investments now can act as multipliers for your emerging AI enhancements.

Data

Data isn't just the bread and butter of AI; it's the whole banquet. So unlocking the potential of AI starts with data. Ideally, you're already collecting customer analytics for large data sets to create a detailed picture of customer behavior, segments, and affinities. The more you can tell AI about what your customers have already done, the better it is at telling you what your customers will do next and what creative they'll respond to.

Workflow management and resource optimization is another area where data is king. Think about your digital asset management system (DAM) and your content management system (CMS): is metadata well-curated, with sturdy, logical taxonomies and clean tagging?

Data is how AI learns. Generative AI effectiveness rises and falls according to the depth and quality of the data it's trained on. We've all seen hallucinations, where AI takes a wild guess in lieu of having quality data with clear frames of reference. Properly curating the right data makes all the difference. The best time to start doing that is a long time ago. The next-best time is right now.

AI-ready processes and structures

Contrary to popular belief, AI is not just a "robot". What makes AI so powerful is its ability to go beyond simple, robotic tasks to what is called "agentic AI": that is, AI that can exercise agency to act autonomously, adapt strategies as conditions change, and continue refining as it learns more. That agency is most useful within a governance framework that complements AI's strengths and mitigates its limitations.

And that means defining the processes where agentic AI can make a difference. For all the talk about AI "replacing people", what it really does is replace processes, especially those mundane, repetitive tasks that don't leverage uniquely human capabilities. So it's up to you to identify those repeatable tasks that can be done at scale, with reduced risk of error.

The proper context of customer journeys and personas can keep AI focused, reducing hallucinations and irrelevant content. It can keep AI on-brand even in changing contexts: for instance, an app for at-home caregivers can have a casual, lighthearted tone, then shift to a more nurturing, supportive tone at times when we know the user will be most stressed and discouraged. The better you can define your customer journeys, the better you can deploy AI where it'll actually be beneficial.

There's a saying among artists: "structure is liberation". Build a strong structure and set agentic AI free within it. You'll see benefits far beyond what a bot can bring.

Computing power

This one seems self-evident: everybody understands that AI needs lots of horsepower under the hood. But while that is emphatically true, at least for now, there's a little more to it than that.

Your organization also needs a robust tech stack to connect all the data sources and inputs that power AI. Orchestrating complex, personalized customer journeys is an end-to-end effort, so data should flow freely from everywhere, from your product analytics to your customer care dashboard.

The costs of cloud services, including AI compute, are continuing to rise. You can get ahead of that increased demand on your cloud compute now by leveraging existing tools with significant AI capabilities already built-in. AI can analyze and act on data at unprecedented speed. Your tech platform should have the muscle to bring that data together instantaneously with a minimum of friction.

Human expertise

Of course the human factor might just be the most important one in the success of your AI efforts. And it matters both for what goes into your AI and what comes out. Does your team have expertise in areas like qualitative research and journey mapping? Are you able to define clear use cases for generative AI? Have you created the kind of documentation that shapes governance, like design systems, voice & tone guidelines, and content strategy?

There are some big things AI can't do: live in the real world, and exercise the original thinking that the human mind excels at. Human expertise and creativity will always be the drivers of innovation. Human intelligence is key to applying Artificial Intelligence to solve tough problems at scale in innovative ways. 

At WNDYR, we believe that technology serves processes, and processes serve people. So we've helped put people at the heart of digital transformation for companies across industries, of all sizes. That human-centered perspective that will only get more crucial as technology gets more sophisticated, and the demands for personalized customer experience get more and more intense. If you're ready to simplify, streamline, and humanize your CX operations, get in touch today. We can usher you into a future that works.