ZUMATA, a Singapore-based travel technology company, is working with IBM Watson to deliver more personalized customer experiences. The company will use the Watson Developer Cloud to develop and deliver conversational interfaces for a cross-section of industries, including travel, finance, insurance, and others.
Watson is a cognitive computing technology platform that uses natural language processing and machine learning to reveal insights from large amounts of structured and unstructured data, such as text and images. Watson’s machine learning capabilities allow it to continuously learn from previous interactions, gaining insights and knowledge over time.
ZUMATA is integrating the Watson Conversation, Retrieve and Rank, AlchemyLanguage, and Visual Recognition APIs into its online client customer services web portals. By training Watson with ZUMATA’s own database including an inventory of hotels, ZUMATA’s new conversational interfaces with Watson can accurately determine the intent of customers’ questions and quickly return high-confidence answers. ZUMATA will also work closely with its client customer service and technical experts to further develop and refine AI-powered solutions, and seamlessly transition customers to live agents as and when necessary.
“Artificial intelligence has immense capabilities to change the world. We are delighted to be working with IBM to leverage Watson’s capability to process natural language queries and uncover insights from massive amounts of unstructured data including reviews, blogs, news articles, press releases, images and more, in order to match customers with their perfect travel experience,” Josh Ziegler, CEO of ZUMATA said. “In addition to providing data-driven advisory services, we’ve also found success in handling customer service related queries. Over the months that we have worked with Watson, we have found that through the use of its cognitive capabilities, we are able to provide higher customer service levels and net promoter scores, while reducing the cost of customer service operations.”
“In a highly competitive and digitized business environment, customer experience has undoubtedly become a significant differentiator for marketers. Customers expect personalized experiences and they want answers quickly,” said Tony Menezes, Vice President, Cognitive Solutions, IBM Asia Pacific. “With Watson’s cognitive capabilities including natural language processing and machine learning, IBM is enhancing the engagement experience between businesses like ZUMATA and their customers. Put simply, Watson is making it possible for businesses to reimagine how they connect and engage, and that is how they will be able to deliver higher value.”