How AI benefits ed-tech businesses’ customer service

There is no doubt that the arrival of new-age edtech companies and businesses has initiated a significant shift in the learning ecosystem. Be it in schools and colleges, publishers and content developers, certification and accreditation bodies, regulatory agencies that monitor the functioning of educational institutions or parent bodies, edtech has impacted each of these stakeholders significantly. In addition, edtech has come to exercise an abiding influence on the learning behaviour and patterns of the end-users, this includes school and college students as well as young and mid-career professionals who may be contemplating upskilling themselves.

Amongst the various technologies, AI has particularly been instrumental in shaping the contours of edtech businesses, specifically in the manner that businesses design their customer service processes and map the customer journey. AI has benefited edtech businesses’ customer service in the following ways.

Streamlines the customer engagement and journey

With AI-powered chatbots increasingly becoming the norm of communication for most businesses, edtech companies have benefitted greatly. Chatbots play an important role in quick communication and speedy problem-solving. With services such as addressing initial queries of learner-customers, helping learners identify and choose appropriate courses and programmes, offering alternative courses, and making billing and payment services easy, AI has simplified the learner-customer journey at every step. In addition, AI systems that employ predictive analytics can offer career aptitude assessment and professional development roadmap for learners. From the edtech company’s standpoint, automation of onboarding and quick enrolment reduces the loss of customers to other less advanced portals and platforms, thereby securing its customer base. 

Designed for both individual and institutional customers

Importantly, AI systems in edtech have been designed mainly with a view of catering to the needs of individuals as well as institutional customers. The requirements of a school would be vastly different from the needs of a student. Additionally, the needs of a student would change from time to time, for example, their needs at the start of the academic year would be very different from what they require at the end of the year.  Importantly, AI facilitates optimum personalization of service.

Allows omnichannel customer engagement

There is a surfeit of messaging platforms available today, including popular social media channels, all of which engage learners in multiple ways for both educational and non-educational purposes. With that in mind, AI ensures that a learner-customer can access relevant information and updates from all popularly used platforms, in addition to the company’s website and apps. 

Enables 24/7 support across channels and platforms 

24/7 support for customers has come a long way from the days of landline telephones which was followed by mushrooming of call centres across the country. Not only are updates and new notifications communicated to the learner-customer instantly, but the 24/7 support platform is available to customers at all hours for queries and complaints. AI systems are designed to predict specific queries and in response offer a list of possible conversational pathways resembling a real-life exchange between a customer and a human customer service executive. At the same time, customers can give live feedback, helping businesses with real-time updates. In addition, AI offers its customers effective calendar management, providing them with timely updates, notifications and reminders.

Chatbots aid in referral marketing

For edtech businesses, AI-based chatbots also facilitate referral marketing. This involves offering rewards and incentives to existing learner-customers for recommending a product or service to friends and peers. As a result, the company has a continuously expanding army of satisfied and loyal learner-customers.

Contributes to the collection of real-time data-based actionable intelligence

Most importantly, AI has allowed edtech businesses to extract meaning from data, conduct sentiment analysis in terms of product or service preferences made by customers, predict future customer choices and design appropriate offerings accordingly. Tracking customer conversations in real-time makes it possible for instant analysis of data, which in turn enables businesses to tweak and fine-tune their offerings and price points quickly, so that they may present a value proposition before a partially engaged customer changes his/her mind.

Therefore, backed by predictive analysis and largely automated workflows, AI has improved the overall learner-customer experience and increased revenue and customer numbers for edtech businesses.

This article has been written by Aarul Malviya, Founder & Director, Zamit