2823: RingCentral: The Human Touch in AI-Powered Customer Service

[00:00:00] Welcome back to Tech Talks Daily everyone, a quick question to start off today's show.

[00:00:07] Have you ever found yourself dreading the prospect of reaching out to a customer service

[00:00:11] hotline?

[00:00:12] You know what I'm talking about, anticipating that all too familiar dance of automated systems,

[00:00:18] long wait times and that hellish, seemingly inevitable game of past the parcel with your

[00:00:24] call. Well, today on the show we're going to be diving deep into a solution that promises

[00:00:28] not only to challenge that experience but also to transform this narrative.

[00:00:33] Because joining me today is John Finch from Ring Central.

[00:00:38] And he's going to be joining us to explore the groundbreaking world of Ring CX, which

[00:00:43] essentially is Ring Central's AI-powered

[00:00:46] native intelligent contact centre. Before we get todays guests will know, I need

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[00:01:51] But now it's time to get on with the show

[00:01:53] and invite today's guest on.

[00:01:54] So buckle up and hold on tight as I beam your ears

[00:01:58] all the way to the Bay Area

[00:02:00] where John is waiting to join us today.

[00:02:03] So a massive warm welcome to the show, John.

[00:02:06] Can you tell everyone listening a little about who you are and what you do?

[00:02:10] Yes.

[00:02:11] Well, thanks for having me.

[00:02:13] It's great to be here.

[00:02:14] My name is John Finch.

[00:02:15] I am Vice President of Product Marketing for Customer Engagement here at Ring Central.

[00:02:21] I have recently rejoined Ring Central, so sort of a boomerang coming back after being

[00:02:27] gone for about three years. And prior to that, I was here at Ring Central in a very similar role

[00:02:34] customer engagement for about four years since 2017. So super excited to be back and really

[00:02:41] focusing on everything that we're doing, my customer engagement and

[00:02:45] contacts in our perspective, especially as it has to do with artificial intelligence and

[00:02:49] all the great things happening in the space today. Also, it's a pleasure to have you on the show.

[00:02:54] I think we had Keira Makagon, Chief Innovation Officer from Ring Central on the show last year.

[00:03:00] Have you bumped into Keira since you've retained? Of course, yes. Lots of interaction with Kira and under her leadership.

[00:03:09] So definitely lots of interactions with her since I've returned and even prior to my return.

[00:03:15] Well, just to set the stage for our conversation today, I think we've all, and I say,

[00:03:20] all, I say, everyone listening anywhere in the world, we've all had a bad all frustrating customer service experience at some point.

[00:03:26] So I'm curious, what challenges are you saying in customer service today?

[00:03:31] Are there any notable trends that you're coming across in this industry?

[00:03:34] Yeah, there's a lot.

[00:03:37] It's sort of it's changed a lot.

[00:03:38] And I would say it's changed a lot in the last two years or less.

[00:03:44] I think, you know, number one, you know, there's always a research that's out there.

[00:03:49] There's a report that really talks about customer engagement and customer satisfaction.

[00:03:55] We do know that customer satisfaction across the board, about 97% of those that were surveyed

[00:04:00] in this particular research report said that they still have very poor customer interactions and only 3% said they had good.

[00:04:09] And I think if you looked overall at customer satisfaction, especially as we went through

[00:04:13] the pandemic and people were having challenges with getting systems set up where they could

[00:04:19] have remote agents and remote individuals answering basic questions for customer service, you

[00:04:25] know, from any industry across the board.

[00:04:27] It was challenging, but those that sort of won were those that had digital customer

[00:04:33] interaction capabilities or other customer interaction capabilities like chatbots on

[00:04:37] the website or other kind of messaging sorts of applications that they implemented prior

[00:04:43] to the pandemic were the ones that were able to still kind of hold up their brand identity from a service perspective. But

[00:04:48] we saw that shift really happened in 2020-2021 as things kind of came along. But

[00:04:54] the other piece that sort of upended this really is AI. And since the proliferation of

[00:05:01] artificial intelligence and the big launch back at the beginning of last

[00:05:05] year and the beer before with open AI and what that was going to do for the world really

[00:05:11] kind of put things on its end.

[00:05:14] Even though artificial intelligence has sort of always been a part of the customer experience

[00:05:20] sort of technology stack in different facets like quality management and QA most certainly

[00:05:26] in call routing components that existed in some of the larger more expensive systems

[00:05:32] at the enterprise level that most only in that large companies could really afford.

[00:05:38] Most people couldn't, depending upon the size of their business, their big budgets really

[00:05:42] has proliferated and AI has become something that's more tangible for folks.

[00:05:47] And they're looking at different ways to sort of use that

[00:05:50] across the organization to help the individuals that

[00:05:53] are providing customer service, as well as the individual

[00:05:56] customers themselves in terms of continuing

[00:05:59] that differentiated service level.

[00:06:00] So I would say it's those things.

[00:06:03] It's still a need.

[00:06:05] Customers aren't happy overall.

[00:06:07] We've seen some ships.

[00:06:08] AI is really the next best wave.

[00:06:11] And we're really trying to, you know,

[00:06:14] help people understand what AI is going to do

[00:06:16] and what it can actually choose for customers

[00:06:20] and for the individuals that are providing

[00:06:22] customer service within organizations.

[00:06:29] Before you came on the podcast today, I was doing a little research. I came across various reports and studies at Ring Central.

[00:06:33] One of the ones that stood out to me was some findings that a significant number of customers

[00:06:37] would rather engage in unpleasant tasks than actually contact customer service.

[00:06:42] How have you approached these challenges at Rig Central?

[00:06:45] It must be a story you hear a lot, though, right?

[00:06:47] Yeah, there's always the memes and the jokes about

[00:06:51] the bad customer service, right?

[00:06:52] We've seen this throughout time,

[00:06:54] and the challenges of calling into an IBR

[00:06:57] and not getting the answer you want.

[00:06:59] I mean, it's just completely frustrating.

[00:07:01] So I can see where a lot of people feel this way, right?

[00:07:05] I have, I'm sure you have, many of us have over time

[00:07:09] figured out, okay, this is super awful.

[00:07:11] I'm just gonna get zero until someone thinks

[00:07:13] that I don't care who it is.

[00:07:15] Now it's different, right?

[00:07:17] I think that, you know, it's important for organizations

[00:07:22] for technology providers like Ring Central

[00:07:24] to really be thinking about

[00:07:25] what is the experience overall.

[00:07:28] And it's not just one piece, right?

[00:07:30] It's not just the self-service component coming in the front door from the website for an

[00:07:35] individual to be able to solve their own problem.

[00:07:38] It's not just calling into an IVR and getting to an agent ultimately and then escalating

[00:07:43] because you're not getting the answer you want.

[00:07:45] It's not about you answering a post-call survey because you're angry at the experience that

[00:07:51] you just had.

[00:07:52] So you're giving them feedback.

[00:07:53] It really is about getting in, having a great experience, getting the information you need.

[00:07:58] If you're a self-service person like myself, you want to just get the answer.

[00:08:03] You're going to YouTube it.

[00:08:04] You're going to try to find out what it is.

[00:08:06] If you can't, you're going to go to the website, you're going to talk to the chat bot digitally

[00:08:10] or you're going to call in and do voice virtual assistant sort of experience.

[00:08:15] If that's a good experience and get to the answer you want, you're super satisfied.

[00:08:19] And now you're done and you moved on and got lots of stuff to do in your life and you don't

[00:08:22] want to spend 45 minutes on a phone call on a Saturday afternoon because your bike doesn't work or your internet's down

[00:08:29] or something like that or your phone bill is screwed up. So I think at the end of the day,

[00:08:33] people want that experience. But if there is a way to think about it end to end and have that

[00:08:41] great experience overall so that if it's a complex interaction, for example,

[00:08:45] when you start out in that virtual assistant world and then you go to an agent, getting

[00:08:50] all that information all the way through that journey is super important.

[00:08:55] You don't want to repeat yourself.

[00:08:57] You don't want to start over once you get to a live agent.

[00:09:00] You want to have that seamless experience.

[00:09:02] And I think setting that up in today's world of technology and innovations that we've had that we're speaking about with AI and just general.

[00:09:13] Organizational shifts towards customer service towards the customer it really is going to change and we're seeing that across the board and and and that sort of the dream i've had i've been in the space.

[00:09:24] that across the board. And that's sort of the dream I've had. I've been in this space

[00:09:30] for a long time. And it's one of those things where we've had conversations over the course of like, hey, are we seeing all the innovation we're ever going to see in the context center? And

[00:09:34] sometimes you're like, yeah, this is it. And then the next year comes along. And here is the next

[00:09:38] best thing. So that evolution will continue. And as interest grows as consumers have more access to better technology in their personal lives the expectations of what they're accessing brands to get service and then their ability to.

[00:09:55] Be brand loyal or lack there are will be predicated on these experiences.

[00:10:07] experiences. Another thing that I came across was Ring Central, also recently unveiled Ring CX to address somewhat of a gap in the market. But anyone listening to Mr. Ann Aatsby, are

[00:10:13] you able to give a brief overview of what Ring CX is, what distinguishes it from other

[00:10:18] solutions? And most importantly, because we're talking about AI at this year, how it leverages

[00:10:22] AI to redefine customer service experiences.

[00:10:25] And I appreciate it.

[00:10:26] I'll ask you about six questions in one there.

[00:10:28] But can you fill out an overview on that?

[00:10:31] Absolutely, absolutely.

[00:10:32] I mean, Rynxie Access is our product area.

[00:10:35] It's a product that is built on the Rynx Central Core platform.

[00:10:40] It takes the best of breed technologies from voice and digital

[00:10:44] and blends those together

[00:10:46] into a seamless omni-channel experience.

[00:10:49] And the reds thread are at the core of this, really is the AI experience.

[00:10:53] So being able to provide some of these things that we're talking about in terms of the experience

[00:10:58] telling for the customer, but for the agent, the supervisor, and then the data and information

[00:11:03] and the insights that are needed at the business level become absolutely true.

[00:11:08] From the onset of this development process, which was the course of time to pull these

[00:11:16] things together because the team really wanted to put something together that is differentiated

[00:11:21] in the marketplace, it is truly a technology that's built for any size business.

[00:11:25] So as we said before, as I said before, AI was around, but it was in different facets.

[00:11:31] It was something that only large businesses like the largest airlines or the largest financial

[00:11:37] service, consumer service companies really could afford because they had developers internally

[00:11:42] and they could build their own technologies,

[00:11:45] or they could buy the most expensive ones

[00:11:47] that are off the shelf that could be customized.

[00:11:50] This provides the ability for every brand

[00:11:56] to have that democratized sort of solution.

[00:11:59] So smaller businesses all the way through

[00:12:02] the largest enterprise can take advantage of this, right?

[00:12:04] And that's sort of the way through the largest enterprise can take advantage of this, right?

[00:12:05] And that's sort of the promise of the cloud.

[00:12:07] And so as we get through this though, organizations that we're seeing really adopt this very quickly,

[00:12:13] since we announced this last fall, the hundreds of customers that we've won since that time

[00:12:19] that short period of time are of all sizes, some of the smaller businesses, some medium

[00:12:23] sized businesses, and we're seeing, We're seeing great interest even at larger organizations as well that are saying, hey,

[00:12:29] this is the perfect technology because it does allow for the smaller business to take advantage

[00:12:33] of the artificial intelligence, take advantage of the things that were once very difficult

[00:12:38] to realize an effective quality management solution or quality monitoring solution.

[00:12:46] To look at agent performance and customer satisfaction and coaching and train agents

[00:12:51] properly on interactions in real time and even in post call, but really provide that level of

[00:12:57] information all the way through that customer journey from the interactive component that we

[00:13:02] were talking about at the front door of the business,

[00:13:05] either voice or digital, and agent assisted service all the way through to experts in the

[00:13:11] organization that may be in the billing department or tier two or tier three support. And then all

[00:13:17] the way through to the reporting and the analytics pieces I mentioned to make critical business

[00:13:22] decisions and get the insights that are necessary to change the trajectory of your organization's customer service.

[00:13:31] Those are the biggest things with Ring CX in terms of differentiation.

[00:13:34] It really is that product that works for everybody.

[00:13:37] It's on the channel.

[00:13:38] It's AI first, meaning red thread throughout to really invoke and transcend the organization

[00:13:44] to become more of a customer-centered

[00:13:46] organization holistically.

[00:13:49] And for anyone listening that maybe they want to look beyond the hype cycle beyond the AI buzzword

[00:13:54] the state of the thing to have right now and interested in actually how can AI solve my real problems generate business value

[00:14:01] give a return on investment on the tech project etcetera.

[00:14:05] generate business value, give a return on investment on the tech project, etc. How specifically does Ring CX's AI capability address some of those pain points we're talking about here?

[00:14:11] Yeah. One of the best examples that I use on a regular basis is really customer satisfaction.

[00:14:18] It comes down to the interaction that the customer has at that moment in time with an agent,

[00:14:23] with an interactive voice or interactive

[00:14:25] virtual agent, I should say, either voice or digital.

[00:14:29] And that's the front door, that's the escalation point.

[00:14:32] Those are the components that are the experience for the customer.

[00:14:37] So as an example, I come in, I have an experience with an interactive virtual assistant.

[00:14:44] All the information that I share with an interactive virtual assistant. All the information that I share with

[00:14:45] the interactive virtual assistant obviously is starting to use artificial intelligence at that

[00:14:50] very level. And what it's doing is pulling information from a knowledge base with some

[00:14:53] ethics search. It's providing me with the latest sets of information that typically an agent would

[00:14:59] have access to or would just know off the top of their head to service me, to be able to give me the information I need. But let's say that I can't get through to some sort of more complex issue, a topic like

[00:15:11] a billing issue. And the IVA doesn't have access to that. The voice virtual assistant doesn't have

[00:15:17] access to that. So what it's going to do is it's going to say, Hey, you know, can I talk, you would

[00:15:21] like to talk to a live agent? And I say, Yes And so it gives me a couple of options, one of which is to click and it'll call me back.

[00:15:28] And then the agent could talk to me over the phone or over a voice call, or I can continue

[00:15:33] to chat with the agent.

[00:15:34] So I sort of have a choice to do that.

[00:15:36] But at the same time behind the scenes, if you will, what's happening is that I choose

[00:15:40] to continue digitally because I'm on my mobile device and I'm just messaging with the system or with the brand.

[00:15:46] That agent gets a notification that I'm waiting in queue.

[00:15:50] And at the same time, all the information from my interaction with the virtual assistant

[00:15:55] gets pushed to the agent.

[00:15:57] So they have a quick purview of everything that I've discussed up to that point so that

[00:16:03] they are caught up right away with a summary, salient

[00:16:06] points, sort of get information about, come angry or come, you know, okay, if I'm eager,

[00:16:13] whatever that sort of sentiment might be of my demeanor during the call, and then they

[00:16:18] come online and they verify that it's me with a quick, it can get your name. Great.

[00:16:22] I see that you're looking for this. You're looking at a billing issue.

[00:16:26] I'd love to solve that for you.

[00:16:28] Then being able to then have that information solved by that agent

[00:16:33] and have that would have information across the board similar to what the IBA has,

[00:16:38] with the knowledge, the next best action sort of prompts from the knowledge base

[00:16:42] to sort of solve my problem.

[00:16:44] And then at the end of that call, best action sort of prompts from the knowledge base to sort of solve my problem.

[00:16:45] And then at the end of that call, the system will ultimately take and identify how the performance

[00:16:52] of that interaction was, right?

[00:16:54] So a level of customer satisfaction will be ascertained.

[00:16:58] And then there'll be elements that can be looked at by the agent about their performance

[00:17:03] on that calls. So them themselves will have an immediate understanding of how they perform for that

[00:17:10] customer, even though the customer may not have done a survey, right?

[00:17:13] A satisfaction survey.

[00:17:15] And then that gets logged.

[00:17:17] And then when a supervisor comes in and sees that maybe it was yellow, the interaction,

[00:17:22] because the customer was upset.

[00:17:24] And so it sort of triggered a lower score know, a lower score that it would have been

[00:17:28] for a perfect interaction.

[00:17:30] Um, the supervisor then has the ability to sort of look into it,

[00:17:34] listen to the call, see the transcript, see some of the key words that were

[00:17:39] said, understand what the interaction was, and then provide some coaching

[00:17:44] back to the agent on what to do if that makes sense.

[00:17:47] Or if it's just an interaction that sort of was, you know,

[00:17:52] unrecoverable due to the level of anger that I had when contacting the brand,

[00:17:57] then, you know, that was just like, okay, well, we did the best we could and we moved forward, right?

[00:18:02] But you get that real-time component

[00:18:05] of satisfaction immediately during the call, after the call, and then even as a supervisor

[00:18:11] looks into the overall satisfaction. And I think those things before AI were difficult

[00:18:18] to realize. And with AI, it really brings the whole story together so that you can actually understand

[00:18:25] the performance of individual agents and the customer experience.

[00:18:29] Overall, so that you can make changes where necessary.

[00:18:32] At a time where data privacy concerns are also increasingly becoming paramount, a question

[00:18:38] I've got to ask on behalf of those business leaders listening is how does Ring CX ensure

[00:18:43] things like the security and privacy

[00:18:45] of customer information, especially when you're utilizing things like AI for personalized services?

[00:18:51] Yeah, I mean, you know, from a privacy perspective, everybody's got to be on their toes about this.

[00:18:56] And we at Ring Central are, I mean, everything that we do is proprietary to the organizations

[00:19:03] and its business context that

[00:19:05] we're working with, right?

[00:19:07] It's not open.

[00:19:09] We're not feeding into a large language model where there's access by lots of different

[00:19:15] individuals outside the organization.

[00:19:17] It's definitely contained for the organization and the privacy components are very important as we go forward.

[00:19:28] We will continue to evolve.

[00:19:29] Those I think a lot of people that are in this space right now are trying to ensure that

[00:19:35] the privacy is a big component of the trust that they have with utilizing and leveraging

[00:19:42] these technologies as we go forward.

[00:19:45] So the industry as a whole is really working to do that.

[00:19:49] And I think as we see AI continue to evolve,

[00:19:54] as we see some of the risks in general that folks are talking about in the industry,

[00:20:01] staying on top of those trends and ensuring that privacy and that trust is secured

[00:20:05] in the same way that we have all of the components and the trust and security and certifications

[00:20:10] that we've got in our core platform of 25 years that we've had in the market, we will

[00:20:15] continue to do that even with the AI components here.

[00:20:19] So customers can rest assured.

[00:20:20] I mean, the certifications we have across the board, you know, obviously carry over from HIPAA compliance all the way to SOC 2 and name your, you know, many other

[00:20:29] certifications that we carry through in doing business with large enterprise organizations

[00:20:34] around the world, we will continue that same facet with the trust and primacy that we have

[00:20:39] with our artificial intelligence capabilities as well.

[00:20:43] Just to make sure everybody listening gets sort of a value from this, I think many businesses

[00:20:47] have existing customer service infrastructures already in place.

[00:20:51] So can you tell me a little bit more about how Ring CX integrates with some of these systems

[00:20:55] and the kind of challenges and opportunities that you've came across in ensuring that

[00:21:00] seamless connectivity that every one of your customers depends on?

[00:21:04] Yeah, no now great question. There are many different facets that the customer experience

[00:21:10] for organizations, right? I mean, from a telephony, from a digital, multimodal communication

[00:21:22] type of interaction, we're going gonna be the conduit that orchestrates that

[00:21:27] for the customer and for the brand or the company.

[00:21:32] That's providing customer service.

[00:21:34] There are components like CRMs with Salesforce and Zendes

[00:21:38] and many others that are out there as well as homegrown

[00:21:41] that we effectively integrate with.

[00:21:43] That's the central repository of customer information.

[00:21:47] As a key component to what we need to integrate with,

[00:21:50] that probably is the most important set of tools

[00:21:54] that we need to ensure we have seamless integrations with.

[00:21:58] So we do that.

[00:21:59] As a part of our open API platform

[00:22:03] that we've had for a long, long time, which is really best

[00:22:06] of breed in this industry, I will say, provides the capability for standard integrations,

[00:22:14] as I'm mentioning, where we have a level of depth that's going to provide the interaction

[00:22:18] capabilities necessary for most organizations.

[00:22:21] And then we have low code and developer grade code available to do lots

[00:22:27] of different integration levels or customizations necessary.

[00:22:31] So some of those things can be done during deployment with our professional services

[00:22:35] team.

[00:22:36] They can be handed off to partners that we have and they can actually be handed off to development

[00:22:39] organizations within the companies where appropriate as well through our open APIs.

[00:22:44] So those integrations are really key as we go forward and making sure that we have those CRM integrations.

[00:22:50] There are other components like phones, right, and devices that are very key as well.

[00:22:55] So our breadth of interoperability with devices and the quality assurance that goes on with that is also second to none.

[00:23:03] I mean, we work with the VIAafans, we work with Cisco phones,

[00:23:06] we work with old sit phones from Shortel if they still exist.

[00:23:10] So there isn't a lot of lifting for the customer if they want to keep

[00:23:15] some of those devices as well that agents might be using.

[00:23:18] Obviously, the transition to the cloud gets rid of a lot of the hardware

[00:23:22] components that would be required if there are on-prem sort of solutions

[00:23:27] that need to be removed.

[00:23:29] But ultimately, we have the ability,

[00:23:32] because of this open platform, to integrate

[00:23:34] with many of the different capabilities that are necessary,

[00:23:37] even if there's other quality management solutions

[00:23:40] from companies, and in workforce management solutions

[00:23:43] from companies like Verint or Calabrio or other things that that organization invested in. We have those integrations as

[00:23:52] well that we can leverage in this open platform environment. So customers have that choice

[00:23:58] and will continue to have more choices as we continue to evolve.

[00:24:03] And speaking of customers, of course, we're all customers.

[00:24:05] And while AI can streamline processes and reduce frustrating things like wait times, there's

[00:24:11] also sometimes a concern about companies losing that human touch.

[00:24:15] So how does Ring CX balance automation with that need for personal empathetic customer

[00:24:20] interaction when you just want to speak with someone?

[00:24:23] Because it is quite a tricky balance sometimes. How do you handle this at RingsyX?

[00:24:29] It all depends. It depends on the example I gave of me coming in and being frustrated.

[00:24:40] You never want to gate an individual customer into a digital only set of interactions.

[00:24:48] I think it depends on the company, it depends on the brand.

[00:24:52] We see a lot of sort of off starts come about and some of the brands, I won't mention them

[00:24:57] by name, but they're doing rentals on properties, right?

[00:25:03] You can have short-term and long-term stays through their website.

[00:25:07] But you as a user of this platform and you even as a host on this platform

[00:25:12] don't have access to a person.

[00:25:14] The only way you can communicate with them is digitally.

[00:25:17] And there's an SLA of a return because a lot of times, most of the time,

[00:25:22] the interactions are not real time that That you have to text with them or go to the website and you end up interacting with a

[00:25:29] virtual assistant and you can email them with a 24-hour turnaround SLA.

[00:25:35] And if you really, really, really dig in and do a lot of searching, you can find a phone

[00:25:41] number, but typically those individuals aren't able to help you with your situation.

[00:25:45] You have to wait for them to get a ticket from you,

[00:25:48] basically from the system, and then have a return interaction

[00:25:52] to you within a period of time.

[00:25:54] And you may be waiting outside the door of a place

[00:25:57] that you're trying to get into, and you just landed in Paris,

[00:25:59] for example, when you're waiting to get into that condo

[00:26:04] that you're going to be renting for

[00:26:05] the week.

[00:26:06] So I think the challenges for those organizations are they've built this wall around customer

[00:26:12] service which doesn't give a lot of flexibility to the customer on both ends, either the house

[00:26:19] or the renter.

[00:26:22] But then organizations that have been established, as you mentioned, large financial consumer financial services companies, travel agencies, airlines,

[00:26:29] others, there is a need always to get to a person. There's an escalation point.

[00:26:34] So in reality, I think it just depends on the business,

[00:26:38] what they have the capacity to do and manage and sort of their overall philosophy.

[00:26:44] And if they've always provided levels of customer service

[00:26:47] all the way through from self-service,

[00:26:49] let's call it through to a live agent

[00:26:51] for an escalated interaction,

[00:26:54] I think that they're gonna need to continue that

[00:26:56] because their customer base is used to that.

[00:26:58] I think as different generations continue to evolve

[00:27:01] and into the consumer at large,

[00:27:07] some of those changes may occur. But I do think that you have to have that and most companies are looking for that escalation

[00:27:12] point.

[00:27:13] They want to get as much off the plate of a lot of live agents, so that's costly.

[00:27:20] And that makes sense.

[00:27:21] But I think there are other ways to effectively cut down on costs that

[00:27:28] wouldn't affect the service levels and going to all digital as an example probably isn't

[00:27:33] one of those because the ultimate longer-term risk that you're leaving on the table is unsatisfied

[00:27:38] customers and the trade-off customers to your competitor.

[00:27:42] I know you probably won't be able to share too much on this, but if

[00:27:45] we did look beyond Ring CX, is there anything you can share around how you see AI evolving

[00:27:51] in the customer service space and already emerging technologies or trends that might

[00:27:55] excite you or you believe will maybe even further shape the future of customer interaction?

[00:28:00] Well, it's a good question. I think, you know, as I mentioned, lots of conversations over the course of time around

[00:28:07] what are the innovations that we're seeing and sort of where do we go from here.

[00:28:11] I think it will continue to evolve.

[00:28:15] The predictions are that AI will definitely become more and more prolific across the across the customer engagement

[00:28:27] sets of solutions and I think as it gets more intelligence in this pipe kind of stone creepier or a little scary

[00:28:34] but as it gets there the human

[00:28:37] sort of

[00:28:38] ability for AI is of all big and

[00:28:42] There are a lot of times with a lot of

[00:28:46] is open holding and there are a lot of times with a lot of interactive virtual assistants where you can't even tell that it's not a human. There are

[00:28:51] interactions that are out there where you think you start with a chat bot as an

[00:28:57] example and then it gets to another level and then say hey I'm gonna put you on

[00:29:01] hold and you know transfer you to an agent and then you think you're online with an agent, but you know what?

[00:29:06] You're not.

[00:29:07] You're still using a different tier of a chatbot and that humanness of that interaction becomes

[00:29:15] more seamless.

[00:29:17] And the information that's available through semantic search and the continuation of machine

[00:29:23] language and just the learning abilities

[00:29:26] and always getting better or throughout time will get us to that level.

[00:29:32] And I think that that's sort of where things are going to go.

[00:29:35] Super automated, very low touch, always evolving, providing better and better levels of service.

[00:29:42] It probably will get to a point where

[00:29:46] artificial intelligence can probably service

[00:29:48] human customers better than other humans can.

[00:29:52] Wow, and I think that's a powerful moment to add on.

[00:29:54] So I cannot thank you enough for coming on here

[00:29:57] and sharing your insights today.

[00:29:58] And I'm gonna say if there's something we can do for you now,

[00:30:01] because a lot of the biggest names in tech and business

[00:30:04] have either been

[00:30:05] guests or listened to his podcast. So if I was to ask you, who would it be that you'd

[00:30:10] like to have breakfast or lunch with and why? Because he or she might just be listening

[00:30:14] to this. So let's see if we can manifest something together. But who would that person be and

[00:30:18] well?

[00:30:19] You know, I like to think of myself. I love technology. I'm a Midwestern guy. I grew up in Minneapolis,

[00:30:28] Minnesota, moved out purposefully many, many moons ago to Silicon Valley and have never

[00:30:34] left and loved what I do the company I work for and the people I work with and the people I've

[00:30:40] met over time. One person that I look to because it's very interesting for me to see how do we think

[00:30:49] of things differently and not get overwhelmed by the mundane.

[00:30:54] There's a different approach to things.

[00:30:56] And we've got to do things better.

[00:30:59] And it also has this controversial sort of persona around this person, which I would just love

[00:31:06] to understand more is Elon Musk.

[00:31:09] And it may be, you know, a lot of people probably say that, I would guess.

[00:31:16] But I really have seen over the course, the guy is the same age as me.

[00:31:19] I've seen him start PayPal, go all the way through, to the innovations he's done with Tesla and SpaceX

[00:31:26] and some other things in between.

[00:31:29] And when you hear him speak generally

[00:31:33] for what we as consumers can see posted out there and live,

[00:31:38] there's influence and impact in his insight.

[00:31:40] It's like he's the Oracle and he knows what's going on

[00:31:43] in the world and what the future is gonna look like. I'd love to just know where that comes from and his inside. It's like he's the oracle and he knows what's going on in the world and what the future is going to look like. I'd love to just know where that comes from and

[00:31:49] his personality. So he would be really somebody I would want to talk to and just an hour

[00:31:53] lunch somewhere, you know, that would just be phenomenal.

[00:31:57] Well, we'll throw it out into the ether into the universe. Let's see what we can manifest

[00:32:01] together. That'd be great if we could make something happen. And for anyone listening, just wanting to find out more

[00:32:07] about Ring CX, about Ring Central,

[00:32:09] about anything we talked about today,

[00:32:11] where would you like to point everyone listening?

[00:32:14] I'll ringcentral.com.

[00:32:16] We have, you come in the front door there,

[00:32:19] there's lots of information on our artificial intelligence.

[00:32:22] Obviously we have a phenomenal communications platform

[00:32:25] that is really built on trust and there's lots of solutions including Ring CX for Cloud

[00:32:31] Tech Center and customer engagement. You can find out more information there.

[00:32:35] Well, we covered so much in a short amount of time. Today from those customer service

[00:32:40] challenges, the introduction of Ring CX. AI's role in the customer experience,

[00:32:45] data security and AI, the human element in AI driven

[00:32:49] customer service as well.

[00:32:51] And not even that, we've managed to get

[00:32:53] in a manifesto meeting with Elon Musk.

[00:32:55] Let's see what we can, I'll see what we can achieve there,

[00:32:57] but thank you for sharing everything with me today.

[00:33:00] You're welcome, thank you for having me.

[00:33:02] From listening to John today, I think it's clear

[00:33:04] that the intersection of AI and customer

[00:33:06] service is not just a fleeting trend, but a fundamental shift towards creating a more

[00:33:11] responsive, efficient and ultimately human-centric customer experience.

[00:33:16] And RingsyX is standing at the forefront of this evolution, promising a future where

[00:33:21] customer service frustrations are a thing in the past, and finding that balance between automation and empathy is incredibly fine-tuned,

[00:33:30] but they seem to be getting there. So as we look forward, one question remains,

[00:33:34] how will businesses continue to innovate and integrate these technologies

[00:33:38] to meet those ever-evolving expectations of their customers?

[00:33:42] I'd love to hear your thoughts on today's discussion

[00:33:46] and indeed your experiences with AI

[00:33:48] enhanced customer service.

[00:33:50] Good, bad, indifferent and everything in between.

[00:33:53] Please join this conversation.

[00:33:55] Share your insights with me by emailing me

[00:33:57] techblogwriteroutlook.com, Twitter,

[00:34:00] LinkedIn, Instagram, just at NeilCUs.

[00:34:02] I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.

[00:34:04] But that's it for today. So thank you for tuning in to Tech Talks Daily, where every

[00:34:08] day we do try and demystify technology and explore its real-world applications and the

[00:34:15] difference that it can make. But until next time, keep looking towards the future and remember