PUBLISHER: DMG Consulting LLC | PRODUCT CODE: 1080384
PUBLISHER: DMG Consulting LLC | PRODUCT CODE: 1080384
The “2022 - 2023 AI-Enabled Self-Service for the Enterprise” report (formerly the Intelligent Virtual Agent Product and Market Report) is DMG Consulting LLC's fifth publication on the intelligent virtual agent (IVA)/virtual assistant (VA) market. The Report has been renamed to reflect the growing contributions of artificial intelligence (AI) to self-service solutions, and the expanded use cases and benefits of IVAs/VAs throughout enterprises. The Report provides an in-depth analysis of the capabilities and versatility of AI-based IVAs and VAs and their contributions to enterprises and their customers. It examines the IVA/VA market, competitive landscape, technology, products, functional capabilities, pricing and customer perception of the vendors in this fast-evolving sector. The Report presents the business, servicing, technology and market trends that are driving adoption and innovation in this highly valuable technology segment. It features 4 vendors - Five9, Kore.ai, Omilia, and Verint Systems - that offer highly effective IVA/VA solutions to help companies enhance the performance of their front- and back-office functions as well as other enterprise-wide uses. This Report is intended to help companies identify and select the right IVA/VA solution - and partner - to meet their current and future needs.
Intelligent virtual agents are already demonstrating their ability to deliver timely, conversational, concierge-type automated self-service to customers. This is essential as consumers are displaying a growing preference for helping themselves, as long as the self-service solutions do a good job. At the same time, employees are benefitting from VAs, which deliver real-time guidance to contact center agents and internal self-service functionality to employees across organizations. IVAs and VAs, which use the same underlying technology and platform to enhance the customer and employee experience, are helping companies reduce the cost of sales and service.
Consumers appreciate the convenience and flexibility that a good self-service experience provides; however, their expectations for accurate, fast and easy service, delivered in their preferred channels, must also be met. Customers are delighted to interact with an intelligent self-service solution that recognizes them, knows the context of their contact history, fully handles most requests, and discerns when to transfer them to a live agent, if needed. Today's IVAs are meeting those challenges, as they are conversational and responsive to customer needs. These innovative solutions are omni-channel by design and deliver knowledgeable and proactive service, which is altering the market's dynamics and cost structure.
The most significant misconception about IVAs is that their primary purpose is to eliminate the need for live agents. This is not their value proposition. In fact, these automated tools are more likely to enhance the performance of customer-facing employees and help retain agents as enterprises face massive increases in interaction volumes. Because IVAs can handle an increasing number of customer service and sales requests and inquiries, and VAs can provide real-time guidance and next-best-action recommendations to agents, they help companies and their employees deliver an optimal service experience, cost effectively. These solutions are changing the role of agents, positioning them to become customer advocates who can solve complex problems and build relationships, while also creating new career opportunities in service organizations and contact centers.
The inclusion of AI technology in contact center and customer experience (CX) solutions is driving the most rapid pace of innovation and change ever experienced in the service sector. Although AI is still in its early days, it is already demonstrating the ability to provide a basic form of human understanding and intelligence in self-service solutions. Artificial intelligence has proven to be able to enhance the CX while improving quality, productivity and the employee experience. Two of the most essential and impactful tools in the AI-based service revolution are IVAs and VAs. The use cases for these solutions are expanding as companies roll them out to customer-facing departments and other internal functions across the enterprise.
Based on market conditions and dynamics, and supported by innovation in AI and automation, DMG predicts rapid growth and adoption of IVA and VA solutions over the next few years. Organizations have been compelled to find new approaches to address the explosive growth of omni-channel customer inquiries arriving in their contact centers and service departments. This has given rise to the self-service transformation, which customers have embraced, and increasingly prefer. The future of IVAs and intelligent automation will present unprecedented opportunities to reimagine the service experience.