As AI continues to be the dominant tech promising to transform business operations, companies are increasingly looking to integrate AI capabilities into their communication systems.
However, beneath the promise of AI-powered efficiency lies a complex web of integration challenges.
This reality is particularly evident in enterprise environments where existing communication infrastructures are deeply embedded in company operations.
“If we told ChatGPT to answer questions, update a CRM and send a message on Slack, it wouldn’t be able to do it because it’s not plugged into any overarching infrastructure,” William Bowen, AI Specialist at Clerk Chat, said.
This not only limits the value AI can bring, but creates additional work for your team, where insights from one platform must be copied over to the other.
To transition to the AI-empowered workplace, AI must be able to work independently across multiple platforms. To usher in the intelligent workplace and get the full effect from AI, it must be able to apply its work beyond just the platform it is running on.
Here is how Clerk Chat has managed to act as this AI bridge.
Beyond Basic Chatbots: The Power of Connected AI
Traditional AI chatbots function as isolated systems, providing standardized responses with limited contextual understanding.
However, when AI agents can access and update enterprise data systems in real-time, they transform from basic conversational interfaces into powerful business tools.
“Without integration, we’re another messaging channel where a human still has to manually enter data every time,” Bowen said.
“That’s why we prioritized building integrations that automatically sync back and forth. For instance, whatever you update in Salesforce will go into Clerk Chat and vice versa.”
This bidirectional, contextual data flow Bowen discussed enables AI agents to access critical customer information during interactions and update central systems with new information gathered during conversations.
What this translates to is a bot that can address a customer by name, give them specific information related to their concern, and even recall that conversation so things can pick up where they left off months or even years later.
“We’ve now built AI that is able to perform these updates. It can read the contact card with your data from Salesforce that’s been integrated, and it can use that in its conversation,” Bowen added.
Being bidirectional however, means the insights gained go beyond information from the bot to draw from.
Key information the customer shares in the conversation can be updated back to your CRM. This information can then be used by sales or support teams to aid in upselling opportunities or support requests.
For businesses handling thousands of customer interactions daily, this automated data management is invaluable.
One Clerk Chat client was able to increase qualified leads by 25% and scale from handling 20 manual CRM updates per day to 100 automated CRM updates daily – all through their integrated AI solution.
Unified Communication Infrastructure
For enterprise communications, AI needs to work seamlessly with multiple systems: telephony infrastructure, messaging platforms, CRM systems, compliance tools, and more. Each integration must be implemented correctly for success.
Here Clerk Chat acts like the umbrella, keeping everything it’s working over, covered.
This approach starts with the foundational integration of business phone numbers across platforms.
“We’ve built extensive API connections into OEMs, carriers, and CRMs allowing customers to connect their existing systems in seconds, ” Igor Boshoer, Co-Founder and CTO at Clerk Chat, said.
“We support the leading phone carriers so you can enable messaging instantly.”
Clerk Chat also integrates with Webex, Teams, and Zoom, so you can bring these AI abilities to all your calling and contact management needs.
For example, Clerk Chat’s AI is even able to be applied in highly regulated sectors with compliance requirements. Healthcare companies, for instance, that are bound by HIPAA legislation when dealing with patient conversations, can set it up on their main phone number to help triage patient calls for appointment bookings.
AI Integration: Optimizing Your Use
As AI technologies continue to evolve at a rapid pace, their capabilities will become increasingly sophisticated.
However, the fundamental principle remains the same: AI solutions must connect seamlessly with the systems where business happens.
For businesses planning their AI strategy, this underscores the importance of selecting solutions with robust integration capabilities.
Whether connecting to CRM systems or communication platforms, the value of AI is amplified when it becomes an integrated part of existing workflows rather than a standalone solution.
