Happy Friday! ‘This week in CX’ brings you the latest roundup of industry news.
This week, we’re looking at the latest research reports in IT Service Management trends, influencer marketing, and first-party data. There’s also new comment about Google’s plans to introduce generative AI into its advertising business.
Key news
- OpenAI has just over a week to comply with European data protection laws following a temporary ban in Italy and a slew of investigations in other EU countries. If it fails, it could face hefty fines, be forced to delete data, or even be banned. But experts said that it will be next to impossible for OpenAI to comply with the rules. That’s because of the way data used to train its AI models has been collected: by hoovering up content off the internet.
- SaaSGenius contacted 10 of the UK’s leading utility companies to ask “I have a question about my latest bill amount and was wondering if you could help?” The average score for customer service in the utility industry is 40.38/100. Shell Energy is one of 3 utility companies studied to offer 4 methods of customer service, including live chat, telephone, email and Twitter. Remarkably, Shell Energy was the only utility company to respond to an email query within 24 hours. In fact, the energy provider responded to the email query in 27 minutes.
- Digital payments are fast overtaking physical cash. Only 9% of payments would be made in physical currency by 2028, it’s been predicted. Speaking at the Innovate Finance Global Summit on Monday, deputy governor of the Bank of England, Sir Jon Cunliffe, warned that cash would become “less usable”. Cunliffe said that an electronic version of sterling, which would anchor stablecoins cryptocurrency, was currently being explored.
- German photographer Boris Eldagsen won the creative open category at last week’s Sony World Photography Award. However, he turned it down as he admitted it was generated by AI. Eldagsen claims he entered the photo to test the competition and to drive a conversation about the future of photography. AI generated images have been a huge topic of debate over the last year. Let us know what you think about this!
Commentary share: Google’s new AI ads
Google plans to introduce generative AI into its advertising business over the coming months to create “novel” advertisements. Advertisers can supply “creative” content such as imagery, video and text relating to a particular ad campaign. Then the AI will mix this material to generate ads based on the target audience, along with sales targets, the report said.
“Google’s rush towards AI is a major indication that this is where the ad industry is heading – but the success of generative AI will depend on how companies use it. The biggest gains will be achieved by those who use these powerful tools (alongside a customer data platform) to better automate personalisation and deliver tailored experiences to customers in real-time. However, with great power comes great responsibility. Any organisations adopting AI and machine learning to power their personalisation efforts must ensure that their AI/ML models are trained on high-quality data and are aligned with their customers’ preferences and values, as well as acquired with user-consent. The quality of what customers put in is what they will get out.”
–Sam Richardson, Customer Engagement Consultant at Twilio
What should be the next KPIs when it comes to automation, ITSM and AI?
Freshworks have this week released their annual Freshservice Benchmark Report. It creates a benchmark index for Key Performance Indicators, and encourages organisations to measure their KPIs and benchmark against this index. The report analysed over 118 million internal IT Service Management (ITSM) tickets across nearly 7,500 organisations.
The report resulted in some interesting findings. Here are the top trends that are shaping the industry and impacting businesses across the globe:
#1: Automation can slash resolution times
Businesses are looking at using AI-driven automation to help eliminate the mundane tasks employees do, so they can focus on higher-order work. This helps keep productivity moving and keep employees motivated.The data shows that automation helps companies solve 80% of tickets in the first interaction for tasks like the above. Automation doesn’t just help by resolving most tickets in the first interaction. IT teams also see a ~23% dip in resolution time.
#2: Effortless ITSM with game-changing bots
Most of us use a collaborative chat app at work every day. Imagine an automated bot on this channel that can help you get things done instantly—requests, approvals, and status updates, all from the same app. True to their nature of getting things done, bots, when used in IT Service Management, help companies achieve excellent results. According to the report, when a customer first raises a ticket, bots have halved the time it takes to give a first response. Once the first response has been registered, bots help IT teams provide quick resolutions to recurring IT requests, thereby cutting down resolution times by 57%.
#3: AI-powered service
AI can drive conversational support using virtual agents. They can handle requests instantly—it’ll be like just another chat on the messaging channel.
The report data shows that with virtual agents, IT teams can deflect 46% of tickets. Meaning almost half the tickets raised can be tackled by virtual agents. Human agents can quickly respond and resolve tickets using AI to automatically identify and associate the dashboard access issue with similar incidents. With the help of AI, agents can answer queries 23% faster.
By resolving queries faster, the agent is more productive and can work through more queries.
#4: Financial services, the leader in support
In today’s economic downturn, financial hardship can strike a business at any time. A robust IT Service Management solution will ensure a softer landing during times of crisis. Financial service companies are able to keep almost all (98.4%) of their end-users happy. First, responses play a crucial role in determining the levels of customer satisfaction. They assure end-users that the IT organisation is on top of the problem. Among industries, financial services are the fastest to provide a first response—their first response time is 9.45 hours.
#5: State of Play across the globe
Businesses expanding to new markets face a tough challenge with regard to IT Service Management—the expectations and performance of some countries and regions are almost like polar opposites.
The report shows that in the US, it takes 28 hours to resolve a ticket. Customer satisfaction scores are the highest despite the long wait to get a ticket resolved.
Each country had its own strengths and weaknesses when it came to IT service management. By understanding these differences, organisations can tailor their ITSM strategies to meet the unique needs of their customers and stakeholders.
Virtual vs. human influencer engagement
Emplifi released “The 2023 State of Influencer Marketing Report,” a comprehensive look at business-critical influencer marketing trends for 2023. The study includes influencer marketing performance analytics across social platforms; a detailed analysis of Instagram’s influencer landscape with supporting data; and findings from a survey polling popular influencers across industries.
Key findings of Emplifi’s 2023 State of Influencer Marketing Report:
- 90% of influencers are active on Instagram and 66% on TikTok, but only 4% of the influencers look to Twitter or Pinterest as a platform for potential brand partnerships.
- 7% of influencer content is sponsored, peaking in the months leading up to the winter holidays. There has been a slight decrease in sponsored content year-over-year which is likely the result of marketing budget cuts.
- Comparing influencers of different audience sizes, Emplifi data shows that the larger the influencer, the less frequently they share sponsored content on Instagram.
- XL and L influencers lean heavily into short-form video content on Instagram, sharing 27% more video content on average than S and XS influencers.
- Macro influencers are embracing a video-first strategy
Data reveals that collaborating with influencers can significantly boost the effectiveness of healthcare brand campaigns, as influencers achieve approximately five times more audience engagement (likes, comments, shares, etc.) on their average posts compared to those of healthcare brands.
Close behind healthcare, accommodation brands, a subset of the hospitality industry, can greatly benefit from partnering with influencers. They have the potential to expand their social media reach by up to 18 times and achieve 4.2 times more audience engagement compared to their current performance. The beauty industry, which is well-versed in influencer marketing, is well aware of influencer impact. Influencer marketing campaigns run by beauty brands win 14-times the reach and 3.2-times the engagement compared to non-influencer campaigns.
Using first-party data improves customer experiences
Twilio’s fourth annual State of Customer Engagement Report reveals that 89% companies agree that using first-party data in marketing improves CX.
However, two years on from Apple’s IDFA changes, 53% of UK organisations still rely on third-party data. 29% report using an even mix of third-party and first-party data, 14% use mostly first-party data, and just 5% use only first-party customer data. Google has postponed its deadline for the phaseout of third-party cookies in Chrome until 2024. The research suggests that the end of cookies is as much about customer demand as it is about their use stopping.
As previously reported, consumers are running out of patience with cookies. Nearly one third of UK consumers always or often reject cookies on websites. Half of UK consumers have left a site in the past 12 months rather than accepting cookies.
71% consumers trust that the brands they do business with will only use first-party data in personalisation. This reveals a major gap between what consumers expect and current marketing practices. Organisations have a long way to go to catch up. A third of UK brands report that shifting to first-party data is a critical priority. 38% UK companies are prioritising first-party data as part of their personalisation strategy.
Thanks for tuning into CXM’s weekly roundup of industry news. Check back next Friday for the latest updates of the week!