The contact center is no longer just a hub for customer service; it’s becoming the heartbeat of customer experience strategy. As we approach 2025, rapid advancements in technology and shifting consumer expectations are poised to reshape how contact centers operate.
We asked our team and clients to share their predictions for next year – from responsible AI, to refining the role of Quality Managers, there’s a lot to be excited about.
“I think the goal will shift towards delivering outcomes to agents before they even need to ask for it. We’ll be looking at the transcribing of conversations, delivering articles to agents and the use of AI in the back office to make conversations easier on the agent and the customer, without agents having to think about it.”
Linda Davis, Head of Operations, AllClear Travel Insurance
The spotlight will be on responsible use of AI
“Whether it’s a chatbot frustrating a customer, or generative AI misinterpreting a prompt, we’ve all seen examples shared far and wide of AI failing to meet expectations. Within the context of the contact center, this can be catastrophic for customer service and reputation.
So, I believe we’ll see a move away from the initial excitement of AI and a focus on managing the risks. Contact center leaders want transparency around AI-devised outcomes, as well as the opportunity to oversee, refine and intervene when necessary – the pressure will be on platforms to provide this level of granularity and reassurance.”
Jaime Scott, CEO, evaluagent
Customer journeys will come under increasing scrutiny
I’m predicting greater rigor around what happens prior to customers reaching a human agent. Bots are being implemented at pace, but are they meeting your customers’ needs? Does front-facing collateral empower self-service or force support from an agent?
By taking control and reassessing the steps prior to getting in touch with a contact center, I think there’ll be a seismic shift in not only customer sentiment, but also working towards more meaningful reasons for contact.
Chris Garbett, Solutions Engineer, evaluagent
AI agents will be on the rise
“Thanks to generative AI and multimodality, AI agents (whether chatbots or voicebots) are undoubtedly rising in popularity to cope with increasing customer demand without increasing headcount. However, contact centers are fast realizing they need to follow the same quality management and improvement processes with virtual agents as they do their human counterparts.
“AI agents will play a key role in contact center teams, modelled on the best experiences being delivered by human agents, and with performance tracked and compared between the two to find further opportunities to optimize CX.”
Nadine Edmondson, Director of GTM, evaluagent
Quality assurance will become more preventative
“I think we’ll see a move away from kind of reactive quality assurance and towards a more proactive assurance and governance strategy. AI as a means to surface knowledge is interesting. AI could help our players have a natural conversation with the public knowledge base, potentially finding their own answers before they even reach out to support.”
Jonathan Phillips, Quality Governance Specialist, Ubisoft
AI deployment will become more strategic
“AI will continue to be a hot topic, but the rush to deploy it will simmer down. The smart organizations will spend more time learning and listening to what their customers and colleagues need, then assessing whether there are ways AI could help achieve outcomes.”
James Marscheider, CCO, evaluagent
QA teams will become Insight teams
“QA teams will evolve into hybrid teams carrying out QA and business analysis side-by-side. They’ll become the customer hub that feeds insights into all other areas of the business, marking the beginning of contact centers becoming viewed as profit centers, rather than cost centers. 2025 will be a great year for quality management!”
Rob Wilkinson, CX Solutions Consultant, evaluagent
Source: https://www.evaluagent.com/knowledge-hub/contact-center-predictions-2025/
