Faster service, stronger customer loyalty
Good customer service plays a key role in whether customers remain loyal to a brand. At the same time, expectations are rising: issues should be resolved quickly, information should be available at any time, and interactions should be as seamless as possible. Service teams therefore face the challenge of delivering more and better service without increasing effort and costs at the same rate.
The ServiceNow e-book “Earning Customer Loyalty in the AI Era” shows the role artificial intelligence, and AI Agents in particular, can play in addressing this challenge. Rather than simply answering questions, AI Agents can actively perform tasks, handle customer requests, and support employees with more complex cases. The goal is customer service that is faster and more efficient while creating more time for personalized support.
Customer loyalty is won through service
The figures cited in the e-book clearly demonstrate the importance of customer service for loyalty. 69% of surveyed customers say they would likely switch brands after a poor service experience. At the same time, 84% would recommend a brand based on exceptional customer service.
For companies, this means service is no longer simply an operational support function. It influences customer loyalty, recommendations, and ultimately business success. At the same time, service teams often struggle with long wait times, fragmented information, and numerous different applications. AI offers an opportunity to address these challenges. But simply adding another chatbot on top of existing processes is not enough.
Find out here how AI is changing the customer experience and what customers expect from good service today: “Customer experience with AI: speed alone isn’t enough.”
AI Agents: from answers to action
Traditional chatbots focus primarily on answering questions or providing information. AI Agents go one step further: they can understand context, perform tasks, and initiate workflows.
The e-book describes, for example, a customer request in which an AI Agent does more than receive an inquiry. It checks the relevant data, prepares an exchange, sends a confirmation, and handles much of the case independently. In the background, AI Agents can also take over multiple process steps and coordinate with one another.
The key difference lies in their ability to act: AI evolves from an information tool into an active part of the service process.
In the e-book, ServiceNow references a forecast that by 2029, 80% of common customer service issues could be resolved by agentic AI without human intervention. At the same time, people will remain especially important when decisions, complex situations, or personal interaction are required.
Faster self-service, more time for complex issues
The use of AI Agents is particularly relevant in Customer Service Management. Many service requests are repetitive and follow clearly defined processes. When these tasks are automated, customers do not have to wait for an available service representative, while service teams can focus more of their time on complex cases.
With AI Agents, service teams can:
- provide personalized self-service,
- automate routine requests and processes,
- resolve customer issues faster across different teams and systems,
- give employees a 360-degree view of customer information,
- route complex cases based on context, customer history, and recommended solutions, and
- analyze complaints and initiate appropriate resolution steps.
This is where ServiceNow Customer Service Management (CSM) comes into play. Customer information, cases, self-service, workflows, and the teams involved can be brought together on a single platform. This means AI Agents can be integrated not just at an individual customer touchpoint, but into the processes required to actually resolve a customer issue.
It’s not the interaction that matters, but the resolution
One of the e-book’s key ideas is that good customer service should not be measured solely by how quickly a request is answered. What matters is how quickly the actual problem can be resolved.
Even when the initial interaction works well, friction can arise as soon as employees have to search for information across different applications, contact other teams, or ask customers to explain their issue multiple times.
ServiceNow describes this as a typical challenge for today’s service teams: employees switch between apps and tabs, search for customer information, research possible solutions, and often have to ask other departments for additional information after a case has been transferred. AI Agents are designed to reduce this background work and provide relevant information and next steps directly within the workflow. This shifts the focus from fast responses to fast resolutions.
Customer experience doesn’t end in the contact center
Customer service does not take place exclusively by phone, chat, or self-service portal. For products and services that require on-site support, the work of a field service technician often has a major impact on how the overall customer experience is perceived.
The e-book also highlights potential use cases for AI Agents in this area. In Field Service, they can help prepare work orders, support scheduling and resource planning, diagnose potential issues, and predict maintenance needs based on available data. The goal is to improve first-time fix rates by ensuring technicians have the right information, skills, and parts available on their first visit whenever possible.
This makes customer experience an end-to-end process: from the initial request to the actual resolution.
AI Agents need connected data and workflows
As powerful as AI Agents can be, their value depends heavily on the underlying technology foundation.
Companies often work with a large number of different applications, data sources, and departmental solutions. The e-book cites an average of 367 applications that organizations rely on today. If AI Agents are simply added on top of this fragmented environment, they lack the context required to execute end-to-end processes.
That is why ServiceNow places a unified AI platform at the center of its approach. Data, AI, and workflows should not operate in isolation but be connected with one another. This enables AI Agents to use information from different sources and orchestrate actions across departmental and system boundaries.
Governance is equally important. ServiceNow emphasizes that AI Agents in service environments should not operate without oversight. Governance, privacy, and security controls must be integrated into the platform and its workflows. Organizations should also begin with clearly defined use cases whose value can be measured and controlled.
From individual AI Agents to connected customer service
AI Agents create an opportunity not only to accelerate individual parts of customer service but to fundamentally redesign how service is delivered. Self-service can resolve more issues independently, service teams can access the context they need more quickly, and workflows can extend across multiple departments.
The critical requirement, however, is a shared technology foundation. Only when customer data, service processes, AI, and the teams involved are connected can AI Agents move beyond simply providing answers and actively contribute to resolving customer issues.
With ServiceNow CSM and the ServiceNow AI Platform, this approach can be implemented on a single platform—from intelligent self-service and automated case management to supporting service representatives with complex customer issues.
For customers, this can mean shorter wait times and fewer friction points. For service teams, it can mean less routine work and more time for the cases where their experience and personal support make the difference.
E-book: Earning customer loyalty in the AI era
How is AI changing customer service? ServiceNow shows how AI Agents can support self-service, Customer Service, and Field Service, and why connected data and workflows are essential for the successful use of AI.
Discover concrete use cases and customer examples showing how companies can use ServiceNow to enable faster resolutions and build long-term customer loyalty—download the free e-book now.
