2021 has been an incredible year for CX vendors/solution providers – it is a record year with 25% average revenue growth and exceptional progress by disruptive innovators. twimbit analysed the major players in the CX industry and observed 5 key trends:
#1 Massive shift to cloud
The pandemic accelerated the migration of CX technology to cloud. It helps companies skip lengthy development cycles, remove siloes, enables remote working, improves flexibility and scalability. Cloud adoption rate is rising – Verint reported a 40% increase in annual cloud revenue, while Genesys Cloud and Multicloud has seen a 60% year-over-year increase to $825 million. Cloud also acts as an enabler for AI and digital transformation, as it facilitates the integration of processes and encourages collaboration and innovation.
#2 Increasing demand for self-service and conversational AI
CX vendors are progressively innovating and developing AI engines to analyse customer sentiment and identify opportunities for self-service automation. One of the examples is NICE’s Enlighten AI, a capability which pinpoints automation opportunities by analysing conversations. NICE’s advanced capabilities has seen a fivefold increase in its AI bookings.
Solution providers have also released voice-enabled features (e.g. life-like virtual voice-over by Five9) to elevate the customer experience. This automated capability gives businesses the freedom to tailor their IVR prompts whenever needed, saving time and cost.
#3 Acquisitions gather momentum
CX solution providers strengthen their digital portfolio through acquisitions. A number of the acquisitions provide vendors with conversation and messaging capabilities (e.g. twilio-Zipwhip acquisition and Vonage-jumper.ai’s buyout). Others include capabilities ranging from journey orchestration to workforce management.
Acquisition is also a strategy taken by vendors to increase their global presence and customer base. 8×8 acquired Fuze for $250 million – a move focusing on attracting more enterprise customers and expanding its global footprint, especially in Europe.
#4 Better focus on agent experience
Agents play an integral role in customer experience – most of the time they are customers’ first point of contact. Vendors like Verint and Amazon Connect are integrating Real Time Agent Assist (RTAA) capabilities to better guide agents on the next-best actions therefore allowing positive interaction outcomes. Intelligent Virtual Assistants (IVAs) are also a significant progress that leverages AI to support agents during their interactions with customers.
Also, as more agents continue working from home even after lockdown restrictions eased, solution providers are coming out with their own e-learning platforms for efficient agent and supervisor training. Genesys Beyond CX is a program formatted like a tv show which aims to teach agents empathy through best practices and quizzes.
#5 Integrating Unified Communications and Contact Centre
With the growing emphasis on both agent/employee experiences and customer centricity, solution providers are blending the worlds between unified communications and contact centre. The integration of both UC and CC will provide organisations with a more holistic view – taking advantage of unified reporting and analytics capabilities.
UC capabilities will also present a better agent and back-office experience, allowing agents to see each other’s availability and reach out to subject-matter experts for help when needed. An example of vendors making moves to integrated UC + CC would be Talkdesk, with its introduction of Talkdesk Phone built on its contact center platform.
With the solid foundation laid in the past year, we will be seeing more innovations and milestones achieved in 2022. Steady revenue growth and further targeted acquisitions are expected, with exciting technologies – especially AI – to be even more widely explored for better CX and EX.