Exceptional customer service is crucial for media and entertainment companies to maintain an edge in an increasingly competitive market. Consumer choice is virtually endless, and jumping from provider to provider is easier than ever. Bottom line, customers want frictionless service (for example, no issues with streaming, easy onboarding, fast problem resolution, and billing management) and highly personalized experiences.
But service professionals are bogged down by manual tasks. In fact, 69% report that their time is spent on things like administrative tasks, internal meetings, and training, rather than working with customers. In response, the industry is turning to artificial intelligence (AI) and AI agents to enhance the customer experience and foster loyalty, while also increasing efficiencies. Combining the unique strengths of employees with the technological advancements and abilities of agents to scale personalization, your service teams can elevate their capabilities and optimize operations.
Here, we explore two key areas where humans with AI agents can drive significant improvement in how service organizations function: subscriber management and customer experience.
What you’ll learn:
Make Sure Your Organization is AI Agent-Ready
Service to Improve Subscriber Management
Service to Improve Customer Experience
Human and Agent Collaboration is the Future of Media & Entertainment Service Organizations
Make Sure Your Organization is AI Agent-Ready
But first, media companies must set the table for AI and AI agents to function effectively. The industry generates vast amounts of data that is rich in user behavior and intent. Unifying your data is the first step to making it actionable and the foundation for AI and AI agents to operate effectively. AI Agents are a type of AI system that have the ability to understand your company, brand, and the way you do business. They can act in ways that a simple chatbot cannot and take on real work on a broad range of issues, without prompts, to resolve customer service inquiries.
Service to Improve Subscriber Management
Managing a subscriber base requires efficiency and personalization – a balance humans with AI agents collaboration can achieve seamlessly. Agents excel at processing large volumes of data, analyzing subscriber behavior, and predicting churn risks. For example, an agent can flag accounts showing signs of dissatisfaction, such as reduced engagement, late payments, or frequent service interruptions, and suggest targeted retention strategies. The ability to do this at scale is derived from sophisticated algorithms and ensures no subscriber is overlooked, something even a team of service reps would struggle with.
Service teams then bring empathy and critical thinking necessary to act on these insights. For example, when an agent identifies an at-risk customer and crafts a personalized outreach message addressing the specific issues the subscriber faces. A service rep can then make any needed adjustments, saving them time. This process includes not only retention strategies suggested by an agent, but also the personal touch of a service rep to better understand the subscriber’s concern.
Additionally, agents can be tasked with performing administrative tasks such as billing adjustments or account updates, or autonomously reaching out to a customer whose credit card has expired to get new info. By automating these processes, service reps can devote more time to value-driving tasks and meaningful interactions with customers. This creates a powerful team that operates at scale but also with a personal touch.
More in AI for Media Organizations
Service to Improve Customer Experience
Customer experience is a significant differentiator in the media industry. Consumers expect best-in-class experiences and personalized interactions with the brands they support. Customer service experience (43%), convenience (37%), and consistent product or service quality (40%) drive long-term brand loyalty. Nearly 60% of consumers prefer using fewer touchpoints to get information or complete a task. Agents play a vital role in meeting these expectations with the ability to provide instant, 24/7 support for common questions about subscriptions, billing, or content availability. They can handle a high volume of inquiries to ensure no customer is left waiting, even during peak times. For example, if there are streaming issues during a marquee live event resulting in a number of service inquiries, agents can handle initial contact and provide subscribers with relevant information such as when the problem will be resolved and relevant troubleshooting steps.
While agents excel with volume and efficiency, service reps are freed up to handle nuanced or more complex issues that require emotional intelligence or the human touch. For example, if a subscriber had repeated outage issues over a short period or their frustration escalates, agents can seamlessly transfer the case to a service rep who can offer a more detailed resolution or simply the right amount of empathy and understanding.
Agents can also analyze customer sentiment in real-time, detecting frustration, confusion, or satisfaction in interactions while also pulling in meta-data such as social media mentions that may contribute to negative or positive views. Agents can address negative experiences immediately and provide solutions, while flagging more sensitive cases for service rep interventions. Agents can provide personalized retention strategies based on a subscriber’s consumption history either autonomously presented to the subscriber or as insights to reps. Employees can then step in with those tailored solutions or use the human touch based on the interaction to provide their own personalized goodwill gesture, leaving the customer with a positive impression. These efficient and personalized interactions drive further brand loyalty and increased revenue.
For service organizations in the media and entertainment industry to be effective, they must strike the right balance between the ability to handle a high volume of inquiries efficiently and a high level of personalization. It’s what subscribers expect, and companies that aren’t providing it will struggle to keep up. But even the most high-performing team of service pros will struggle to provide what’s expected at scale. It’s why the synergy between service employees and AI agents offered by Agentforce is becoming the standard for high functioning teams. By leveraging agents’ efficiency and data-driven insights alongside the empathy and critical thinking of your employees, media companies can provide exceptional service and build stronger relationships with subscribers.
