AI Is the Perfect Holiday Gift for Any Retailer

While many consumers will still be recovering from overloading on Thanksgiving turkey later this month, retailers are hoping that they’ve made all the right preparations to make sure it’s still the season to be jolly.

Any concerns that retailers might see a slow holiday season appear unfounded, as seasonal shopping in the U.S. is expected to top more than $1.5 trillion. Retailers are bracing for a busy period – 75% are expecting contact center volume to increase. The challenge is how you handle this seasonal rush.

Brands need a solution that will handle the holiday spike while still delivering exceptional CX. Whether the most pressing issue is to increase customer self-service or to help agents handle difficult calls in real-time, deploying AI-powered bots will achieve the specific outcome required in the most effective way.

Four Key Findings from The 2024 Holiday Survival Guide

This year’s Holiday Survival Guide looks at how brands and consumers are approaching the holidays and highlights two key trends: shoppers are ready to spend big, and deploying AI-powered solutions means that even when inbound volume grows, there won’t be a snowball effect on agent workload.

The data shows that:

1. 83% of shoppers plan to spend $500 or more on gifts this holiday season (with 18% expecting to spend over $1,000).
2. 48% will select another retailer if you can’t quickly resolve their issues on their channel of choice.
3. 75% of retailers expect their inbound customer service volumes to increase over the holiday season.
4. Retailers using AI are 3X more likely to be highly confident of handling the volume spike.

Make It a Great Holiday Season: View the Full Report

CX leaders must do two things to ensure it’s always the most wonderful time of the year in their contact center: find solutions that increase customer self-service and increase agent capacity with assisted service.

Our 4^th edition of The Holiday Survival Guide details the level of inbound volume retailers can expect this holiday season and offers a blueprint for deploying AI to handle the rush.

Check out the full report now.