Trends In AI That Will Shape 2025 Business-customer interactions have evolved over the years from basic one-way messaging to two-way personalised communications
By Beerud Sheth
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Over the past few years we have witnessed remarkable and impactful changes in this sector, but we have only scratched the surface. In coming times, we are set to witness more advancements in AI, ultimately altering how businesses will communicate with customers. According to new research by Gartner, more than 85 per cent of customer service and tech leaders are looking to explore or pilot conversational generative AI solutions in 2025.
Business-customer interactions have evolved over the years from basic one-way messaging to two-way personalised communications. The rise of Conversational Internet has also reshaped the landscape, particularly in mobile-first economies that skipped the website and browser era. In fact, conversational interfaces have become the new browsers. The latest developments in Generative AI make it all the more true.
AGENTIC AI A NEW FRONTIER
Today, AI chatbots can answer FAQs, provide support and even process transactions. But the Gen AI agents will be capable of understanding context at an entirely new level.
The move towards Agentic AI experiences represents one of the most transformative shifts in the space of Artificial Intelligence. It will proactively engage, anticipate needs, and act autonomously to achieve pre-determined goals.
According to a report by Gartner, by 2025, proactive customer engagement interactions will outnumber reactive customer engagement interactions. The effects of Agentic AI has been resonating with multiple sectors. For example in healthcare, Agentic AI can proactively monitor a patient's vitals and offer timely health advice and alerts for the doctors, while in education, it can play.
2025 can also pave the way for emotional intelligence to be integrated into AI systems, with Agentic AI systems greatly benefiting from it. Imagine an AI agent capable of recognizing sentiment in a customer's tone—detecting frustration during a complaint and responding with empathy. As businesses integrate emotional intelligence into agentic AI, the result will be a significant leap toward relationships that feel more authentic and intuitive.
RISE OF VOICE INTERFACES
While text based conversation continues to be dominant today, a new trend that is slowly taking centre stage is voice AI. Unlike text, Voice AI enables users to seamlessly have conversations with agents that sound human-like but are actually AI systems trained on rich data. The advancements in NLU (Natural Language Understanding) will enable AI to understand nuances like humour, sarcasm and cultural references, will make the conversations more richer and engaging and ultimately highly personalised.
Voice AI will also address the problems of accessibility enabling visually impaired people or people who are less tech savvy to interact with an AI seamlessly. Voice AI is now evolving from a convenient innovation to a necessity in customer engagement. A study by Juniper Research reveals that spending through conversational commerce channels, which include voice assistants, is expected to touch USD 290 billion globally by 2025, a significant growth from USD 41 billion in 2021.
Voice AI's evolving multilingual capabilities are bridging language gaps and enabling businesses to engage with audiences on a global scale. For brands, this means the ability to provide seamless service in diverse markets, reaching untapped customer bases and fostering stronger relationships. This advancement, from solving industry challenges to addressing emerging technologies and enhancing reach at a global level, also reveals the importance of voice AI in shaping the future of human-machine interactions.
THE HUMAN-AI PARTNERSHIP
As AI handles repetitive tasks and provides instant replies, it will free up humans to focus on the more complex tasks. This collaboration will redefine the workplace, enabling businesses to achieve more while fostering meaningful human connections. A Harvard Business Review study found that organizations leveraging AI-human collaboration have witnessed improved performance by combining the strengths of both.
