CX Insights
AI powered CX: productivity gains and nicer customer
AI is set to help the CX field, but how much? A new academic study in the Quarterly Journal of Economics set out to quantify the benefit to businesses and had a few notable takeaways:
- The researchers found that humans that used AI assistants saw a 15% boost in productivity with more gains going to the less experienced team members.
- The key productivity gains came from “moderately rare problems” - the kinds that can be tricky for an agent to get right.
- AI assisting human agents also positively impacted how customers treated the agents - customers were more polite and less likely to ask to speak with a manager.
AI tools can improve and standardize communication from agents, allowing team members to get trained faster, while also smoothing over interactions. Now, we have the data to understand how and why they bring about a better customer experience.
Research finds: Leadership knows CX is a profit center
The 2025 CX Landscape report from Nextiva and Dimension research surveyed CX decision makers about the state of the industry. They had a lot of great findings, but here are some of the most compelling data points:
- 94% have seen ROI from their major investments in CX in the past five years
- 79% said leadership considers CX to be a revenue driver
- 89% report their executive leadership understands the impact of CX on profit margins
Things are getting better as leaders understand the wider value of CX on the business. If this is the case with your company’s leadership, now is the time to expand investments in resources and new initiatives to keep up with the competition.
If that’s unfortunately not the case at your organization, it’s time to more clearly align CX initiatives to the organization’s goals and take steps to quantify your team’s impact.
Customers demand better tech: Slow, siloed systems hurt CX
A new study reveals that 77% of consumers want businesses to invest in improving customer interactions, yet 69% feel companies prioritize profit-driven tech over enhancements to the customer experience. Key frustrations include long wait times, repetitive requests, and outdated, siloed systems that slow down agents and impede the level of service they can provide.
Bad CX has consequences. Almost half of consumers warn others about poor service, and 37% switch brands.
Investing in modernization isn’t just good for CX - it’s critical for revenue retention and brand reputation.
Interview Insights
These days, it’s not often you find someone with a decade of experience rising the ranks through the same organization, so I was particularly excited to speak with Max Wallace, the CX Director for Tommy John. We dug into:
- Be realistic about what KPIs you can reach with existing and new resources
- Frame headcount discussions around tradeoffs
- Phase in more self-service resources
- Find ways to use AI to reduce agent workload, such as from tab switching, to expedite service
The key takeaways span beyond the apparel industry: For loyalty, he stresses flexibility in policies and empowering agents with autonomy.
And his leadership philosophy? Stay close to customer conversations and listen to frontline teams.
Check out the full interview for all the great insights.
AI Insights
3 quick headlines this week:
1) Bret Taylor, the CEO of Sierra and chairman of OpenAI, says AI Agents will “come to encompass your entire customer experience” because it’s orders of magnitude cheaper than the labor costs of today
2) The food delivery platform Zomato has launched an AI-powered customer support platform
3) Qme, an Egyptian SaaS startup, has raised $3 million in seed funding to bring AI-powered customer service and appointment booking to the Middle East and North Africa region.
Golden Nuggets
Avaya Axes Support For Under 200 Seat Contact Centers
How return policies impact the post-purchase experience
Plain pulls in $15M to aggregate B2B customer services chats into one platform
