As artificial intelligence continues to transform customer support, organizations face a critical decision:

Should they build their own AI solutions or partner with specialized vendors?

At a recent panel discussion during the 2024 Support Experience Conference, I asked three industry experts – Alvina Anter (former CIO at Okta), Ashok Gunasekaran (SVP of Success at AccelData), and Vimal Vasudevan (Head of Digital at Koerber Supply Chain) – to share their valuable insights on navigating this complex decision.

Core Competencies and Differentiation

The fundamental principle that emerged was focusing on core competencies. As Alvina Anter explained, “You purchase and invest in technologies that are best in class, that are truly differentiated and critical to your business, and you invest in building those that differentiate your business that are part of your IP.” In other words, spend your resources in ways that drive your business’s differentiation in the market. This is especially relevant for customer experience, often the top priority for companies. If you can build AI solutions that serve your customers better than your competition (likely using a managed solution) go for it – but realize the trade-offs with that decision.

Ashok Gunasekaran reinforced this point through an apt analogy: “It’s like deciding between building a custom home versus buying from a track builder. A custom home gives you exactly what you want but requires significant time, capital, and coordination between multiple parties. A track home delivers faster results with some customization options.”

Time-to-Market Factor

Time-to-market emerged as a crucial consideration. As Alvina Anter noted, “Time to market is critical. The need to be able to actually have the business realize value and iterate and deliver value in an iterative fashion is critical.” This becomes even more important when dealing with essential business functions like customer support. Teams need solutions that can be implemented now, not in 6-12 months.

Ashok Gunasekaran added that different organizations view time-to-market differently: “Business wants a point solution, a point problem to be resolved today. If I’m a support leader, I want to solve that problem immediately.” However, CIOs often take a more holistic view, considering how platforms can expand to solve multiple use cases over time.

The Hidden Costs of Building

When it comes to costs, the panel highlighted several often-overlooked factors in the build decision. Ashok Gunasekaran emphasized the significant people costs: “You need a data scientist, data engineer, integration specialists, and business process people. These roles are not only expensive but also hard to find.” This is especially true for software projects involving AI. Domain expertise is a critical component of successful AI projects.

Alvina Anter added an important perspective on long-term costs: “The cost is not just about implementing the initial use case or proof of concept. Once you decide to build, you need to invest in enhancements, sustainment, and extending. You need to think long-term on that decision as opposed to just thinking short-term.”

Data Quality and Governance

In my discussion, data emerged as a critical factor in the build vs. buy decision. As Alvina Anter stated, “Your data is gold. Your data is your IP.” She advised companies to “focus on cleaning up your data and ensuring that your data is trusted and that you have transparent data and that you actually are in a position where you can govern your data.”

Ashok Gunasekaran added a memorable warning about data quality: “AI can be only as good as your data and it’s not like a garbage in, garbage out. It’s more a garbage in and disaster out.”

Take a realistic look at the state of your data and make sure the solutions you’re comparing can process the complexity of technical customer conversations. Sentiment analysis is only as good as the natural language processing behind it.

The Impact of Generative AI

The emergence of generative AI has added new dimensions to the build vs. buy decision. Ashok Gunasekaran noted that generative AI has accelerated the path to value, particularly for content generation use cases. However, he cautioned about the need to carefully consider data governance and security when implementing these solutions.

There are solutions on the market that allow clients to select which large-language models are used for generative AI capabilities, and never use customer data for training. Partner with the solutions that align with your security department’s goals and policies.

Making the Right Decision

The panel offered four key factors for organizations making this decision:

1. Focus on Business Process First: As Ashok Gunasekaran advised, “Start with what business process you’re trying to automate. AI is just a tool – don’t make everything look like it needs an AI solution.”
2. Consider Partnership Over Vendors: Alvina Anter emphasized the importance of viewing this as a partnership: “Who are our partners, not vendors, but who are our partners that are mission-critical to our business?”
3. Evaluate Economic Factors: Vimal Vasudevan highlighted the importance of considering your company’s specific economic context: “The need and the economy of your business unit or your company should be an important factor in making that decision.”
4. Think About Scale: Consider not just the initial implementation but how the solution will scale and evolve over time.

The Future of Customer Support AI

The panel concluded with a forward-looking perspective from Alvina Anter: “The opportunities that I’ve seen from the get-go on AI are related to support experience, specifically tied to customer support and employee support experience.” She emphasized that success comes from focusing on measurable business outcomes and finding the right partners to achieve those outcomes.

In today’s rapidly evolving technology landscape, the build vs. buy decision for AI in customer support isn’t just about technical capabilities – it’s about aligning with business goals, understanding core competencies, and choosing the path that delivers the best customer experience in the most efficient way possible.

Finally, click below to rewatch the discussion on build vs. buy from the 2024 Support Experience Conference and here more on the subject from our panelists.