Best practices for boosting agent productivity with AI features

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Zendesk offers many generative AI features that help agents be more productive while still providing a high level of customer service. This article summarizes the available features and describes which types of teams and situations each feature is most useful for.

This article contains the following topics:

Knowing when to use AI features to improve agent productivity

Spreading the word about AI features to your team

Updating programs and processes to include AI features

Knowing when to use AI features to improve agent productivity

There are many ways your team can benefit from the AI-powered features that Zendesk provides, including:

Getting up to speed with a ticket quickly (Summarize)

Writing high-quality ticket comments

Solving issues based on similar tickets (Similar tickets)

Responding to a ticket with a standard response (Suggested macros)

Getting more context for a ticket at a glance

Getting up to speed with a ticket quickly (Summarize)

The summarize feature recaps all public comments that have been added to a ticket so far, helping agents get up to speed and respond to customers more quickly.

For more information, see Summarizing a ticket.

Who this feature is most useful for

Agents who need to escalate and transfer tickets frequently

During a ticket transfer or escalation, the summarize feature can help agents quickly identify the core issues of a ticket without having to read through lengthy comments.

Teams who need to triage and prioritize a large number of tickets

Summarize can highlight important details to facilitate better ticket prioritization based on urgency and severity, while ensuring that critical issues are addressed first.

Writing high-quality ticket comments

The enhance writing tool features automatically improve the content of agent-written comments in different ways.

For more information, see Enhancing ticket comments with generative AI.

Who these features are most useful for

International support teams with non-native English speakers

With expand and tone shift, international support teams can ensure that every interaction between the agents and the customers is polished, professional, empathetic, and true to the brand’s voice.

Agents can use custom prompt to proofread their work, helping them avoid spelling and grammar mistakes in their responses.

Through streamlined understanding of the tickets, the power to convey detailed responses, and the flexibility to adapt communication styles, these features foster a sense of autonomy and assurance within the support team. Agents become confident in engaging customers with precision, empathy, and alignment with the brand’s values, enhancing overall service quality and customer satisfaction.

Agents dealing with difficult or sensitive customer interactions

Tone shift allows agents to navigate the emotional landscape of the interaction, setting the stage for a more personalized and empathetic conversation.

Solving issues based on similar tickets (Similar tickets)

The similar tickets feature enables agents to see a list of similar tickets when they’re working on a ticket. By seeing how similar issues were addressed in the past, agents can solve new tickets more efficiently.

For more information, see Viewing similar tickets.

Who this feature is most useful for

Teams facing complex or unique issues that can’t be documented in a customer-facing article

With the similar tickets feature, agents don’t have to start from scratch with issues they haven’t encountered before. Instead, they can follow proven troubleshooting steps or solutions, saving time and ensuring consistency in solving the problem.

Teams who need efficient training and onboarding

Similar tickets help new hires find the information they need to resolve an issue quickly and avoid the hassle of searching for information across multiple platforms.

Teams who want to discover common patterns within a product or service

Similar tickets can help agents recognize patterns in recurring issues and allow for quick reporting to product teams for systemic resolution.

Responding to a ticket with a standard response (Suggested macros)

When you open the macros menu within a ticket, suggested macros appear at the top of the list of macros. These suggestions are based on the content of the ticket and help agents provide the requester with quick and efficient support.

Note: Suggested macros appear only if your account includes enough macro usage data.

For more information, see Applying suggested macros to tickets.

Who this feature is most useful for

Teams with many macros

If the support team has created a large number of macros, agents can quickly identify and apply the most suitable macro.

Teams who receive frequently asked questions

Agents can rapidly select and send the proper instructions or information, increasing response times and reducing the cognitive load of drafting similar replies.

Teams who need consistent handling of policies and procedures

Suggested macros can instantly provide the agent with pre-approved text that accurately reflects the company’s most up-to-date policies, reducing the risk of miscommunication and policy violations.

Getting more context for a ticket at a glance

Intelligence is a section of the context panel within a ticket that shows agents AI-powered insights, including:

The ticket’s predicted intent, language, and sentiment. This information comes from intelligent triage and is intended to give agents additional context about the ticket.

The top three suggested macros. These suggestions are based on the content of the ticket and help agents provide the requester with quick and efficient support.

For more information, see Viewing intelligent triage predictions and suggested macros.

Who this feature is most useful for

Teams who often work on complex tickets or have frequent handovers

Intelligence shows the customer’s reason for submitting the ticket (the intent), which can streamline the resolution process.

Teams who need to address potential escalations

Customer sentiment detection allows agents to tailor their response to suit the customer's emotional state, potentially defusing tension and fostering a more positive interaction.

Spreading the word about AI features to your team

These tools are useful only if your agents know they have them and start using them! When you activate these features, send an email to your team so they know which tools are available to them. The section below gives you an example email template.

Example email template

Subject: Introducing New AI-Powered Features in Zendesk

Hello team,

I'm thrilled to announce that we have some new AI-powered features to help us work more efficiently! To get you up to speed, I've included links to a few help center articles that walk you through each new feature.

Feature 1: Summarize, expand, and tone shift

The summarize feature is great for summarizing tickets during escalations or transfers. Tone shift lets you make your responses either more friendly or more formal. This is great for making sure your tone is appropriate when responding to customers.

Feature 2: Similar tickets

Automatically see a list of resolved tickets that are similar to the ticket you’re working on. This comes in handy when you want to see how your teammates have handled similar requests in the past.

Feature 3: Suggested macros for agents

Quickly find relevant macros. AI-powered macro suggestions will recommend macros that are relevant to the ticket you're working on.

Feature 4: Viewing intelligent triage predictions

Check out helpful context, like the customer’s intent, sentiment, and language. This can help you get some quick context before diving into the ticket.

I encourage you all to take advantage of these new tools to make your daily interactions smoother and more impactful. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out.

Warm regards,

[Your Name]

[Your Position]

[Contact Information]

Updating programs and processes to include AI features

Beyond emailing agents about these features, there are other ways that team leads and administrators can drive awareness:

Update the onboarding process for new agents to include education about these tools.

Provide agents with training sessions or documentation on how to use these tools.

Invite agents who have had positive experiences with these features to share their success stories.

If you have a QA process for agent interactions, encourage agents to use features that can help improve issues flagged by the QA process. For example, if an agent comment didn’t have enough empathy, encourage the use of tone shift. Or, if a complex ticket handoff didn’t go smoothly, encourage the use of summarize.