GenAI’s Impact On Hyper-Personalization: Making Every Interaction Count
Personalization has come a long way from the days of simply using customers’ first names in the subject line of marketing emails. It has evolved into a tool to make customers feel heard and valued. It has become a strategy for companies to co-create products and services tailored to their customers’ specific and singular needs. However, it requires a considerable effort. For companies, it means collecting and analyzing large volumes of data, and even then, personalizing to a granular level is a task beyond what rule-based traditional AI can achieve. GenAI, however, has changed the game so much and so well that customers and businesses can provide inspiration through their day-to-day activities and watch as GenAI manifests their vision.
Every chat is a chance to co-create
Consider this. A customer is taking an international trip and wants the best forex rates. She mentions that to your bank’s GenAI virtual assistant. Almost instantly, the virtual assistant creates a special credit card with exclusive benefits like lounge access, travel perks, travel insurance, hotel discounts, and a new rewards program. The customer is impressed that the bank has created a perfect card for her and has come up with suggestions she had not even considered. That level of service and hyper-personalization, once thought impossible, is now achievable and accessible with the latest GenAI technology. Estimation that GenAI could add trillions of dollars in value across various industries seems increasingly plausible.
GenAI has opened new opportunities for businesses to revolutionize the customer experience. It has made granular discussions possible at scale, infusing value into every interaction with the customer. We are at an inflection point in the history of technology, and while it’s just the beginning, the time to wait and watch has passed. The pace at which enterprises implement GenAI can make all the difference between the haves and have-nots. But how and where should enterprises start this journey towards hyper-personalization at scale?
Jumpstart GenAI impact
We recommend three critical steps you can implement right away to maximize the impact of GenAI in your customer interactions.
Strengthen data capabilities: Invest in strategies, capabilities, and architecture to process structured and unstructured data. Derive insights not just from every conversation but from every touchpoint of the customer. This means going beyond “Did they purchase the product or not?” to capturing their sentiment during the interaction – did they just scroll past the description? Did the pricing deflect their interest?
Adopt an enterprise-wide strategy: Think of what silos in an enterprise can do in the context of hyper-personalization. Different departments of the bank – like card services, loan department, and wealth management – all reach out to customers with various products. Personalization aside, the customer feels they are dealing with too many departments. Unifying the entire enterprise and rethinking the operating model helps provide the customer with a united front instead of an uncoordinated mess.
Experiment and find value pools: Experimentation is a great way to generate data that we don’t have from the usual interactions. We can experiment with different promotions, pricing, or even the tonality of the messaging. With a learning loop established, we can iteratively improve the user experience and fine-tune the prompts. With a strong proof of the concept, identify and scale the high-impact value pools.
While taking these strides towards hyper-personalization, it is important to note that there is only a fine thread between hyper-personalization and privacy breaches. Implementing responsible AI guidelines is essential to balance innovation with ethics.