Organizations have been compelled to find new approaches to address the explosive growth of omnichannel customer inquiries arriving in their contact centers and service departments. This has given rise to the self-service transformation, which customers have embraced, and increasingly prefer. The future of intelligent virtual agents (IVAs) and intelligent automation will present unprecedented opportunities to reimagine the service experience.
Concierge Self-Service for Customers and Agents
Intelligent virtual agents are already demonstrating their ability to deliver timely, conversational, concierge-type automated self-service to customers. Customers are delighted to interact with an intelligent self-service solution that recognizes them, knows the context of their contact history, fully handles most requests, and discerns when to transfer them to a live agent, if needed. Today’s IVAs are meeting those challenges, as they are conversational and responsive to customer needs. At the same time, employees are benefitting from virtual assistants (VAs), which deliver real-time guidance to contact center agents and internal self-service functionality to employees across organizations. In combination, IVAs and VAs are changing the role of agents, positioning them to become brand ambassadors and customer advocates who can solve complex problems and build relationships, while also creating new career opportunities in service organizations and contact centers.
The ability of artificial intelligence (AI) to mimic basic human understanding and intelligence is a major reason why self-service is becoming customers’ preferred method of interacting with organizations. The inclusion of AI technology in contact center and customer experience (CX) solutions is driving the most rapid pace of innovation and change ever experienced in the service sector. Two of the most essential and impactful tools in the AI-based service revolution are IVAs and VAs. IVAs and VAs, which use the same underlying technology and platform to enhance the customer and employee experience, are helping companies reduce the cost of sales and service. The use cases for these solutions are expanding as companies roll them out to customer-facing departments as well as internal functions across the enterprise.
Expansive and Insightful Analysis of this Critical Sector
The report provides an in-depth analysis of the capabilities and versatility of AI-based IVAs and VAs and their contributions to enterprises and their customers. It examines the IVA/VA market, competitive landscape, technology, products, functional capabilities, pricing, and customer perception of the vendors in this fast-evolving sector. The report presents the business, servicing, technology, and market trends that are driving adoption and innovation in this highly valuable technology segment. It features 4 vendors - Five9, Kore.ai, Omilia, and Verint Systems - that offer highly effective IVA/VA solutions to help companies enhance the performance of their front- and back-office functions as well as other enterprise-wide uses. This report is intended to help companies identify and select the right IVA/VA solution and partner to meet their current and future needs.
Table of Contents
1. Executive Summary2. Introduction
3. Research Methodology
3.1 Report Participation Criteria
4. What is Intelligent Self-Service?
4.1 Intelligent Virtual Agents Defined
4.2 Virtual Assistants Defined
4.3 Intelligent Virtual Agents vs. Interactive Voice Response
4.4 Intelligent Virtual Agents/Virtual Assistants vs. Robotic Process Automation
5. Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Trends and Challenges
5.1 Trends for the IVA/VA Market
5.2 Challenges for the IVA/VA Market
6. Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Market Innovation
6.1 New Product Features
6.2 Future Enhancements
7. Artificial Intelligence in the Contact Center
7.1 Artificial Intelligence Components in IVAs/VAs
7.2 Uses and Practical Application of Artificial Intelligence in Intelligent Virtual Agents
7.3 Uses and Practical Application of Artificial Intelligence in Virtual Assistants
7.4 Enterprise IVA/VA Applications
8. Intelligent Self-Service by Design
8.1 Artificial Intelligence, IVA/VAs + Robotic Process Automation = Intelligent Automation
9. Personalizing the Self-Service Experience
10. Real-Time Guidance - Help at the Ready
11. Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Market Activity Analysis
12. Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Market Projections
13. Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Competitive Landscape
13.1 Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Company Snapshot
13.2 Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Vendor Offerings and Products
14. Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Technical and Functional Analysis
14.1 High-Level Technical Analysis
14.1.1 Integration
14.1.2 Security and Compliance
14.2 Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant High-Level Functional Analysis
14.2.1 Dashboards, Reporting, and KPIs
15. Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Implementation Analysis
16. Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Benefits and Return on Investment
17. Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Pricing Structure
18. Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Vendor Satisfaction Analysis
18.1 Summary of Survey Findings and Analysis: Vendor Categories
18.1.1 Vendor Satisfaction by Category and Customer
18.2 Summary of Survey Findings and Analysis: Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Capabilities
18.2.1 Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Capabilities Satisfaction, by Category and Customer
18.3 Summary of Survey Findings and Analysis: Intelligent Virtual Agent Customer-Facing Capabilities
18.3.1 Intelligent Virtual Agent Customer-Facing Capabilities Satisfaction, by Category and Customer
18.4 Summary of Survey Findings and Analysis: Virtual Assistant Agent/Employee-Facing Capabilities
18.4.1 Virtual Assistant Agent/Employee-Facing Capabilities Satisfaction, by Category and Customer
18.5 Customer Background and Insights
18.5.1 Channels Supported by Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistants
18.5.2 Other Enterprise Departments Using Intelligent Virtual Agents/Virtual Assistants
18.5.3 Top 3 - 5 Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Challenges
18.5.4 Additional Comments
19. Company Reports
19.1 Five9, Inc.
19.2 Kore.ai
19.3 Omilia Natural Language Solutions Ltd.
19.4 Verint Systems
List of Figures
Figure 1: The IVA: Self-Service Concierge
Figure 2: Virtual Assistant
Figure 3: IVA vs. IVR
Figure 4: Robotic Process Automation
Figure 5: IVA/VA vs. RPA
Figure 6: IVA/VA Trends
Figure 7: IVA/VA Challenges
Figure 8: New Product Features, by Vendor
Figure 9: Future Enhancements, by Category
Figure 10: Data is the Key to a Successful AI Initiative
Figure 11: Technical Components Summary
Figure 12: Customer-Facing Intelligent Virtual Agent Applications
Figure 13: Agent/Employee-Facing Virtual Assistant Applications
Figure 14: Enterprise Use Cases
Figure 15: IVA Development Studio
Figure 16: Design and Content Development Environment
Figure 17: Robotic Process Automation (RPA)
Figure 18: Customer Experience (CX)
Figure 19: Real-Time Guidance
Figure 20: Agent/Employee Experience
Figure 21: IVA/VA Projections, based on Number of Customers, 2022 - 2026
Figure 22: IVA/VA Competitive Landscape
Figure 23: Company Information, as of December 31, 2021
Figure 24: Product Information
Figure 25: High-Level Technical Summary
Figure 26: Integration
Figure 27: Security and Compliance
Figure 28: High-Level Functional Capabilities
Figure 29: Dashboards, Reporting and KPIs
Figure 30: Implementation Analysis
Figure 31: IVA/VA Benefits and ROI
Figure 32: IVA/VA Pricing Structure
Figure 33: Customer Survey Rating Categories
Figure 34: Average Vendor Satisfaction Ratings, by Category
Figure 35: Product Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 36: Implementation Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 37: Training Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 38: Professional Services Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 39: Ongoing Service & Support Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 40: Product Innovation Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 41: Responsiveness to Product Enhancement Requests Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 42: Vendor Communication Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 43: Pricing Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 44: Overall Vendor Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 45: Average Intelligent Virtual Agent/Virtual Assistant Capabilities Satisfaction Ratings, by Category
Figure 46: Omni-Channel Capabilities Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 47: Multi-Lingual Capabilities Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 48: Conversational Artificial Intelligence Capabilities Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 49: Low/No Code Design and Development Environment Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 50: Ease of Integration with Third-Party Applications Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 51: Accuracy and Ongoing System Optimization Capabilities Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 52: Average Customer-Facing Intelligent Virtual Agent Capabilities Satisfaction Ratings, by Category
Figure 53: Ability to Fully Automate Customer Inquiries without Needing a Live Agent Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 54: Ability to Deliver an Outstanding Customer Experience Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 55: Ability to Personalize the Customer Experience Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 56: Ability to Maintain Context Across Multi-Modal Interactions Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 57: Ability to Support Proactive Customer Outreach in the Customer’s Preferred Channel Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 58: Average Agent/Employee-Facing Virtual Assistant Capabilities
Figure 60: Ability to Improve Agent/Employee Satisfaction/Engagement Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 61: Ability to Reduce Training/Onboarding Time Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 62: Ability to Kick Off Automated Functions without Human Intervention Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 63: Ability to Proactively Deliver Context-Based Real-Time Guidance Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 64: Ability to Instruct/Assist Agents/Employees with Internal Activities Satisfaction Ratings, by Customer
Figure 65: Channels Supported by the Intelligent Virtual Agents/Virtual Assistants
Figure 66: Enterprise Departments Using Intelligent Virtual Agents/Virtual Assistants
Figure 67: Top 3- 5 Challenges of your Intelligent Virtual Agents/Virtual Assistants
Figure 68: Additional Comments about your Experience with the Vendor and/or Product.
Companies Mentioned
- Five9, Inc.
- Kore.ai
- Omilia Natural Language Solutions Ltd.
- Verint Systems
