FeatureThe pandemic proved that the Middle East is at an inflection point with artificial intelligence adoption, and many companies have made it clear that artificial intelligence is here to stay. The past year has a catalysing moment for enterprises as the pandemic forced Middle East companies to go digital faster and use artificial intelligence not only to adapt, but to emerge stronger.
This shift has accelerated the use of artificial intelligence to help companies sell smarter, drive stronger engagement, scale customer support, and personalise commerce experiences.
In 2021, artificial intelligence-powered predictions are more important than ever. Based on historical data and adoption, artificial intelligence and automated machines are learning to provide forward-looking estimates and answers that map to specific business outcomes.
IDC found global spending on AI will double over the next four years, reaching $110 billion in 2024 up from $50 billion in 2020
Every day, these technologies are delivering more than 80 billion predictions for customers. This scale of adoption is massive, and particularly benefits those that adopt artificial intelligence as a core business strategy and means to better understand and engage customers.
IDC found that global spending on artificial intelligence will double over the next four years – reaching $110 billion in 2024 up from $50 billion in 2020.
Working invisibly behind the scenes, artificial intelligence technologies are better equipping companies to predict customer behaviours and preferences at scale, transforming the world of work as we know it.
Here are four ways that artificial intelligence-powered predictions are helping businesses to operate and support their customers more effectively.
#1 Personalised conversations
As the pandemic hit, many companies needed to drive stronger engagement as a greater percentage of customers began shopping online. For businesses of all sizes, personalised communications had never been more important to meeting their customers’ expectations and sales growth. With predictions, companies have been able to shift their focus on the right customer conversation with targeted email campaigns, increase traffic to their online platforms, and respond many times faster to trends customers are interested in.
#2 Forecast of cash flow
Where industries have experienced growing delays in customer payments and difficulty to forecast short- and long-term cash flow, artificial intelligence technologies have helped keep businesses running while being empathetic to the challenges their customers were facing. With artificial intelligence technologies, organisations have been able to more accurately predict cash flow, faster, as well as respond to customer queries quicker.
The pandemic proved the Middle East is at an inflection point with artificial intelligence adoption
#3 Keeping customers happy
In the context of lockdowns and social distancing, meal delivery services have faced huge spikes in customer requests. In this instance, artificial intelligence has assured businesses and customers alike – helping businesses to deal with rising case volumes, and helping customers track their orders or packages, report any issues with delays or damage, and get a credit or refund. As well as keeping customers happy, this has also boosted customer service scores.
#4 Empowering sales teams
The value of a good salesperson, as an informed and empathetic advisor, has only grown during the pandemic, yet the time they’re able to dedicate to gathering helpful insights is decreasing. This explains why more teams are automating repetitive tasks to enable reps to spend more time developing trusting relationships with customers and selling. With predictions, sales teams are becoming more empowered to effectively prioritise leads, determine what action to be taken on accounts, and more rapidly log sales data and customer notes.
With the best AI tools, employees do not have to be a data scientist, they can implement quickly and begin innovating fast using clicks, not code.
