Air India partners with Salesforce to transform its customer service

Air India announced a partnership with Salesforce on March 14 to transform its customer service. The airline will be able to improve the customer experience at all significant touchpoints, including online, on the ground, and in the air, through the partnership, it stated in a press release.

Working with Salesforce would provide a consistent data platform and artificial intelligence-assisted tools to Air India’s customer-facing staff and with the help of Salesforce technology being implemented, the airline will be able to track customer interactions across its contact centre, mobile app, website, chatbot, email, social media, and other channels, providing a single source of truth for both customer requests and issues.

Additionally, it will give Air India’s customer-facing people and automated systems the capacity to respond proactively to problems and follow them through to resolution with the aid of artificial intelligence technologies. Air India also said that with the technology, it would have a unified customer data platform.

“Today, technology is at the heart of any ambitious organisation’s business strategy. It is a force multiplier, and a catalyst to deliver growth and increase value. For Air India, this transformation is the beginning of a historic journey and to many – an emotional one. We are honoured to be a part of this journey with Air India, reimagining the customer experience and delivering excellence.”   

Arundhati Bhattacharya, Chairperson and CEO, Salesforce India

“Given the ambitious growth plan of Air India that will result in a rapid increase in the volume of customer interactions, deploying robust and scalable technological solutions that incorporate the latest in Artificial Intelligence technologies becomes imperative. Air India’s work with Salesforce will enable this accomplishment,” said the release.

One of the benefits of this technology rollout is the availability of a 360-degree view of customers in a unified customer data platform that enables Air India to deeply understand its customers. Following that, this information will be used to improve consumer interactions at touchpoints on the ground, online, and in the air.

“At Air India, we are committed to elevate our customers’ experience. In line with our strategy to deliver a world-class, omni-channel experience for our customers, we are working with Salesforce to introduce various service features that will make it easy for our customers to engage with us. Our contact centre plays a crucial role in the customer’s journey, both before and after the actual flight. Our deployment of Salesforce in the contact centre and in other channels marks a step in our endeavour to provide a seamless, contextual and personalized customer experience across multiple touchpoints.”

Rajesh Dogra, Chief Customer Experience and Ground Handling Officer, Air India

While the financial details of the engagement with Salesforce were not disclosed by Air India, the airline’s Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer Campbell Wilson in a press briefing recently outlined that the airline has invested nearly USD 200 million for improving product reliability and information technology systems.

As part of its transformation plan, Air India has aimed to increase its domestic market share from 8-9% currently to at least 30% over the next five years, while also significantly growing its international operations. In February, it placed a historic order for 470 aircraft, a deal which is valued at USD 70 billion on list price.

ALSO READ – From A350s to B777Xs, Air India finalizes the Historic 470 Aircraft deal with Airbus & Boeing

“We need to be able to understand our customers’ needs proactively and take care of them with utmost diligence. When things don’t go as expected, we want to be able to address the challenges faced by our customers with speed and take them to comprehensive closure. Having a scalable technology platform that enables us to accomplish the above effectively is critical to our business.”

Dr. Satya Ramaswamy, Chief Digital and Technology Officer, Air India

Salesforce, Inc. is an American cloud-based software company headquartered in San Francisco, California. It provides customer relationship management (CRM) software and applications focused on sales, customer service, marketing automation, e-commerce, analytics, and application development. Delta Air Lines is one of the oldest customers of Salesforce with a huge success story.

ALSO READ – Air India Pilots can now fly 2 aircraft types after recent DGCA approval