How to Devise an AI Adoption Strategy for Your Contact Centre

Artificial intelligence (AI). It sounds good. It often looks good. But is it truly trusted by all businesses yet?

Make no mistake, in the customer service world, AI is making headway. Recent research suggests that 23.7% of companies are already using AI for customer-related activities, while nearly half (47.2%) are planning to implement AI in 2024.

AI has the power to reshape a contact centre, but with a well-planned adoption strategy, it can succeed.

Cirrus’ AI-driven solutions give agents the tools to thrive, boost customer satisfaction, and provide business leaders with business-changing insights. In this article, we’ll explain how to create an AI strategy that genuinely transforms, rather than complicates, your contact centre.

Why AI makes a difference for your contact centre

Today’s customers expect faster, smarter, and more personalised interactions. Let’s be clear: AI isn’t just another technology upgrade—it’s becoming a strategy necessity for contact centres aiming to stay competitive.

This technology is a massive time saver, reducing the ‘elbow grease’ needed from agents to carry out repetitive, spirit-zapping tasks. There is also an opportunity to gain real-time insights, which means that the continuous upward curve of improvement that you are aiming for actually becomes a reality.

Using conversational AI on our platform, an animal welfare charity resolved more calls first time, reduced its waiting times, and enabled a remarkable 46% increase in demand for its services.

The promise of AI in contact centres is compelling, but success hinges on the right implementation. Without careful planning, even the most sophisticated AI solutions can fall short of expectations.

The three pillars of successful AI integration

Who needs a headache? You want the benefits of AI, without the spiralling cost and complications.

We understand, and that’s why Cirrus has developed a structured, three-phase approach to AI adoption that has listened to, and acted upon, these pain points.

The strategy which we have mapped out below focuses on sustainable AI transformation that keeps the disruptions to a minimum:

Phase 1: AI agent assist

The journey begins by enabling your agents with AI support. This foundation-building phase focuses on:

• Real-time assistance during customer interactions
• Quick access to relevant information and documentation
• Automated post-call summaries and action items
• Easy onboarding for new agents

Starting with agent support, you create a solid foundation for AI adoption while maintaining the critical human element in customer service. This approach allows agents to work faster and smarter without feeling replaced by technology.

Phase 2: AI customer assist

Once your team is comfortable with AI support, the next step extends the benefits directly to your customers. AI Customer Assist offers:

• Automated responses to routine inquiries
• Intelligent routing based on customer needs
• 24/7 availability for basic support
• Consistent messaging across all channels

By moving a large percentage of its manual agent tasks to automation with Cirrus, an insurance client benefitted from savings equivalent to the employment of 5-6 full-time agents.

This phase further reduces the burden on your team of agents. Your customers get what they want – quick responses to straightforward questions. This leaves your team more free to focus on more complex issues that demand more of the human brain.

Phase 3: AI-powered self-service

Sometimes, we just like to get things done ourselves. The final phase gives more freedom to customers, allowing them to update information and resolve their own issues:

• Personalised customer portals
• Proactive issue resolution
• Automated account management
• AI-driven purchase recommendations

This level of automation not only leads customers to resolutions faster, but also opens new revenue opportunities through personalised customer experiences.

Equipped with automation, our partners in higher education institutions are able to prioritise and pre-qualify student enquiries. This is speeding up resolution times and leading to greater agent productivity across both remote and office-based teams.

Strategic considerations for implementation

It’s not about marching in, flying the AI flag, and tearing down what has already been built.

AI works best when it is integrated meaningfully and methodically. Cirrus’s model supports each contact centre’s specific needs, from improving response times to boosting customer satisfaction.

Here’s how AI can be integrated without being a disruptor; making what is already working better:

Technical integration

Technology is a little like people. In order to integrate, we need to get two types of technology working together. We would never advocate diving into AI adoption. The path to integration starts with an assessment of your current infrastructure.

Together, we’ll consider compatibility with your existing system such as customer relationship management (CRM) platforms, the data management capabilities available to you, your contact centre’s processing power requirements, and integration points with your legacy software.

Cost management

If it wasn’t going to pay off, you wouldn’t be considering AI. That’s why proper AI implementation demands a clear financial framework. It’s not only the initial investment requirements – we will also map out the ongoing operational costs and expected ROI timeframes.

With Cirrus, you can take advantage of flexible pricing models to spread costs.

Team preparation

Welcoming in AI as a ‘new member of the team’ needs the buy-in of agents. Success will depend heavily on your team’s readiness.

That’s why a comprehensive AI training programme is needed; to communicate AI’s role clearly. There should also be regular feedback sessions to monitor progress and address concerns.

Compliance and ethics

AI cannot, and should not, mean taking the ‘human eye’ off the ball. The same transparency and fairness that we call for in human decisions must also be present in AI-driven contact centres.

That’s why implementation should maintain strict adherence to data privacy regulations, ethical AI usage guidelines and customer consent requirements.

Measuring success and scaling

How do you know it’s working? You want to be sure that you are receiving the benefits of AI, such as quicker customer responses, more intelligently assigned agents, and reduced costs.

That’s why it’s important to use clear metrics to track progress, such as:

• Customer satisfaction scores (how satisfied a customer is with your support)
• Response time improvements (your contact centre responding faster to queries)
• Agent productivity gains (your agents resolving a greater number of queries)
• Cost savings and ROI (reduced spend and a positive financial impact on sales)
• Customer self-service adoption rates (how many customers are using new self-service options)

With regular assessment, your AI adoption can be kept on track, meeting your immediate needs while working on those long-term gains.

Looking ahead: Future-proofing your contact centre

If we had to provide you with one bottom line on AI adoption in your contact centre? How about this – implementing AI isn’t about revolutionary change – it’s about evolutionary improvement.

Follow Cirrus’ structured approach to transform your operations while maintaining the human touch that customers value.

Learn more about what AI can do for your contact centre, or speak to the friendly team on 0333 103 3333