By Peter Cutts, Dynamics 365 Solutions Director at Xpedition
From the feeds that we see in our timelines, to streaming services suggesting what we watch next, Artificial Intelligence (AI) benefits us all daily. Yet while many of us associate advances in AI with rapid advances in consumer-based services, AI is unlocking growth in business to business (B2B) services like never before.
With insights-driven businesses projected to ‘steal’ $1.2 trillion-per annum from less informed companies, the transformation of the marketing industry due to the advancements of AI has been huge. Top-performing companies using AI are also twice as likely as their peers to be using the technology for marketing.
From behavioural recommendation tools to automating time-heavy processes, AI is transforming the industry – but not just for prospective customers. The success rate of selling to an existing customer is 60-70%, while a new prospect is far lower down the scale at 5-20%. If that’s not enough to convince you, increasing customer retention rates by just 5% can increase your profits anywhere from 25% to a huge 95%.
With a slew of competitors waiting in the wings, it’s becoming harder to resist the benefits such as personalisation and customer service that AI offers. In B2B industries, where customer and client retention is just as important as B2C, AI can power your relationship approach like no other.
But how?
Know what your customers want, not what you think they want
AI makes things personal. Solutions like Microsoft Dynamics 365 can look at behavioural and social data, the results of previous campaigns, and give you visibility into your customers like never before. Using these insights, Dynamics 365 can refine individual customer experiences based on their previous interactions.
Forrester’s analysis of survey responses from sales technology decision-makers found: “Failing to provide customers with the experiences they seek often results in missed conversions and ultimately lower revenue.”
Do you want to keep sending out mailers to customers which aren’t personalised and lose a conversion which you could have gained with AI? You can analyse what makes them more inclined to buy, in addition to what services they’re more likely to buy and then steer them towards this purchase. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) technology which empowers this personalisation is currently considered one of the most important aspects of sales – right next to lead generation.
Don’t Miss Out Important Steps
When you’re moving through the sales funnel, it’s difficult to know what drives each prospective or current client to go to the next step. What works well for one prospect might not work for another. But marketing intelligence from AI solutions can offer recommendations to you that directly relate to the customers’ previous purchase and search history. Now it’s no longer the exclusive privilege of major corporates with huge data centres: every business can offer the same kind of customised experience using cloud-powered AI.
At each stage of the life cycle, you can encourage people to take the desired action, rather than trying to push them down a predetermined marketing route. For example, when you first welcome a customer, you can encourage them to download an app, allowing you to send them in-app notifications with special offers or suggestions.
Predict if a customer is going to leave
It’s easy to take customers for granted. Especially when they have been with you for a long time, and you’ve built a solid business relationship with them. You can easily assume that they’re loyal to you, so it’s a shock when defect to another supplier or service provider. With AI, you can potentially predict and prevent this.
AI democratises information across your whole business. It can scrutinise data about how and when emails are exchanged, the status of calls returned, patterns of visiting your website and the number of times that they contact customer service. These factors can flag an at-risk customer, which otherwise would go unnoticed. AI joins the dots together, and can give you this early warning which could be crucial in saving the relationship. Then, you can offer them a promotion or discount on a service which AI shows they are most likely to want to stay happy.
Deliver Quality Customer Service
Customer service is poised perfectly for an AI revolution. The days of customers getting agitated by being passed around between specialists in an organisation, and having to reel their complaint or query off numerous times are gone. This time-heavy process before could lead to them hanging up the phone and going elsewhere, or the worker spending ages searching a database manually.
When AI and CRM meet, they can better understand your business customers. Their case file is reviewed in real-time, and AI delivers relevant prompts to the agent so that they can provide expert assistance immediately, even if they aren’t a specialist in the particular topic. AI can also enable field agents to deliver an onsite customer service based on CRM data. Benefits include an easy-to-use interface mobile app which guides technicians through schedule changes and service work, the ability to manage resources and equipment needed to deliver the best service, and communication tools to enhance collaboration between all stakeholders.
If you don’t make use of AI now, clients and customers can easily move onto the next business which does have the software, and can offer them the benefits that you simply cannot. From manufacturing to healthcare, utilities to e-commerce, businesses shouldn’t be curious anymore – they need to be investing in it to better their business relationships.
AI automates repetitive work, helps to analyse the huge amount of data that you have, and make more informed business decisions.
