Amazon Web Services (AWS) today introduced Amazon Connect Cases, Amazon Connect outbound campaigns, and Amazon Lex Automated Chatbot Designer as part of its Amazon Connect contact center suite.
The three new capabilities build on Amazon's machine learning expertise for the contact center.
Amazon Connect Cases is a case management feature built into Amazon Connect to help contact center agents track, collaborate on, and resolve customer cases.
With Amazon Connect Cases, when customers call or message with new issues, cases are automatically created to track all related calls, chats, and tasks. Interactive voice response (IVR) systems and chatbots can additionally leverage case data from Amazon Connect Cases to drive personalized self-service interactions. When customers need to talk or chat with agents, they are routed to the best available agent with the relevant case attached. Agents can also manually create and resolve cases and assigned tasks, view and add case data, and make internal comments in the agent application.
Amazon Connect outbound campaigns helps contact centers create machine learning-powered outbound campaigns across voice, SMS, and email for marketing promotions, appointment reminders, and upcoming delivery notifications Contact center managers can schedule and launch high-volume outbound communications by simply specifying the communications channel, contact list, and content that will be sent to customers. The new communication capabilities include a predictive dialer that automatically calls customers in a list but throttles outreach based on agent availability. The dialer also uses machine learning to distinguish between a live customer, voicemail greeting, or busy signal. Securing contact center compliance, Amazon Connect outbound campaigns supports regulatory requirements such as point-of-dial checks, calling controls for time-of-day, time zone, number of attempts per contact, and duration to connect to an available agent.
Amazon Lex is a fully managed artificial intelligence service that uses advanced natural language to help contact centers build, test, and deploy conversational voice and text chatbots. Developers start by uploading transcripts from Amazon Connect (or other applications) into Amazon Lex, where the automated chatbot designer uses machine learning to analyze the transcripts and create an initial chatbot design. In the Amazon Lex console, the generated chatbot design includes common intents, associated phrases, and a list of information the chatbot will need to resolve issues (e.g., insurance details like customer policy number or claim type). Developers can iterate on the design, change chatbot prompts and responses, and then build, test, and deploy the chatbot using Amazon Lex.
"The new features we're announcing today build on that strong foundation of providing excellent customer service by helping businesses respond to customers faster, solve issues and requests more easily, and improve customer experiences," Annie Weinberger, head of product marketing for AWS applications, wrote in a blog post.