Customer Service Automation: Pros, Cons, & Best Practice with Pipedrive

Table of contents:

• What is Automated Customer Service?
• Pros of Automated Customer Service
• Cons of Automated Customer Service
• Customer Service Automation Strategies
• How to Automate Customer Service with Pipedrive
• How can Automaly Help You with Customer Service Automation in Pipedrive?
• Summary

Today’s customers expect brands to be accessible and equipped with fast solutions for their problems. Anything short puts your business at risk of losing 59% of customers to poor customer service.

In response to the rising demand for better products, services, and customer experiences, 66% of businesses have automated at least one business function. This approach is not just about automating processes that take up too much of your team’s time. It’s also about integrating software that streamlines and optimizes how you serve your customers. 

This blog post discusses customer service automation, its benefits and disadvantages, and how to automate the customer service department with Pipedrive.

What is Automated Customer Service?

Automated customer service is a business approach that uses software to handle customer requests and concerns. The software may include self-service tools, bots, virtual assistants, and more. It is usually tied to a company’s existing customer support software and CRM systems. 

Here’s an example of customer service automation: When customers need help, they contact your customer support team. The software then assigns a ticket to the appropriate team member who can handle the customer’s issue. The automated customer service software lets the customer know the status of their ticket and the team member assigned to it.

Pros of Automated Customer Service

Today’s businesses face unique challenges that require thoughtful solutions and strategic thinking. The modern customer has grown accustomed to stress-free experiences and frictionless services from the businesses they patronize. If you are not equipped with streamlined customer service, you risk losing customers. 

Don’t believe it? 94% of customers are willing to recommend a business with good customer service. But only 13% will be willing to recommend companies with “very poor” service. What does this mean for your business?

Customer service automation enables you to optimize resources, streamline processes, and provide excellent customer support. But that’s not all. 

Here are more benefits of customer service automation that no business should overlook:

Saves Time and Money

Automated customer support solution helps businesses streamline processes and reduce costs associated with manual efforts. For instance, rather than having your customer support team on edge with numerous customer calls, you can create an automated ticketing system that books and categorizes every customer’s complaint.

These tickets can then be assigned to the most qualified team members. This frees up your support team’s time to focus on providing more valuable services. 

Streamlines Communication and Collaboration

Customer service automation solutions allow your team to easily access information from their customer’s most recent interactions. This saves even more time because your team doesn’t have to manually look up this information or switch between different data sources scattered throughout the office. 

With customer service automation, you can easily share important customer information with other departments like marketing or finance.

Enhances Customer Engagement

Customer engagement starts with a great customer service experience, not forcing them to wait on hold for someone to get in touch. In case you didn’t know, customers who wait on hold for 27 minutes will likely say something bad about your business on Twitter. 

Customer service automation allows you to delight current and future customers with a seamless, efficient, and high-quality customer service experience.

You can set up an AI-powered chatbot that mimics human interactions to answer customer questions before sending their concerns to a qualified customer support team member. 

Keeping customers engaged shows you care about their experience with your products and services. After all, 28% of consumers don’t mind talking to an automated system when making their requests heard.

Reduces Customer Churn

It only takes one bad experience to sway 61% of customers to other competing businesses. While no company is immune to bad customer service, automation can help in customer retention and reduce the number of customers who stop doing business with you.

Automated chatbots and email responses assure the customer that someone is looking into their issues on the other end. These tools also provide platforms for customers to express their concerns, which enables you to understand them better. You’ll be able to pick up patterns and gain insight into what makes your customers unsatisfied with your products and services.

Builds Customer Relationships

Building long-term relationships with customers doesn’t have to be rocket science. It can start with simple steps, e.g., quick response times to customer queries. However, this cannot be achieved without manually responding to customer inquiries. 

Customer service automation provides a solution for businesses with limited staff or resources to build customer relationships by providing a more personal and rewarding experience.

Increases Efficiency

Automation helps you stay on top of all incoming inquiries by sorting them into queues according to severity. You can allocate your time between lightly pressing tasks like responding to basic questions and more serious issues that require immediate attention.

The bottom line? Automation enhances your customer service efforts and decreases the workload on your team. By cutting down on repetitive tasks and freeing up staff time, you can focus on the things that really matter. 

Cons of Automated Customer Service

While some companies have successfully adopted AI chatbots and self-service, others still cling to basic human interaction. As it turns out, automation in customer service comes with pressing downsides that you should consider before making the switch.

Automated Customer Service Can Sometimes Be Impersonal

Humans are social beings, and we crave genuine human connection. When customers interact with AI that only offers functionality, there’s a risk that they’ll feel like they’re speaking to machines that don’t care much about their challenges. 

That presents an opportunity for your business. Incorporate a human element at critical points of the interaction with your customers (e.g., onboarding your customers to a new business solution). If your customers feel like they are just another sale to add to the books, they’re less likely to return. And they’re even more likely to share their negative experiences with others.