Why an AI Tool Isn’t the Same as an AI Strategy

AI is everywhere in new home sales right now. Chatbots, automated follow-up, texting, dialers, lead nurturing, appointment setting. There are some incredible tools available, and I am certainly not anti-AI. Used correctly, AI can help us respond faster, manage more opportunities and take some of the repetitive work off our plates.

But buying an AI tool is not the same thing as having an AI strategy. You don’t just buy it, unbox it, plug it into your website or CRM and expect it to magically know your business. These tools need accurate information, clear parameters, training and ongoing oversight. And even when you do everything right, AI can still hallucinate, give the wrong information or say something you never intended it to say.

A Case in Point: When the AI Dialer Broke Trust

I was reminded of this recently while listening to an OSC call as part of a comprehensive Online Sales Program Audit. The company is using an AI dialer to re-engage aged leads. I don’t know exactly how they define “aged,” and that matters. Are we talking one to four years old, or is AI stepping in at two weeks? Four weeks? Six months? There is a huge difference. I don’t want AI taking over a relationship in week two or week four, and certainly not automatically at month six when there is still an opportunity for human engagement. But I digress.

What caught my attention was what happened when one of these calls reached the OSC. The prospect thought they were being transferred to someone who was going to give them a FaceTime tour. That isn’t what they got. You could hear the confusion on both sides. The OSC wasn’t sure what the AI had told the prospect, and the prospect wasn’t sure why the conversation wasn’t going where they had been told it would.

The bigger problem was that the trust issue started before the OSC ever got involved. At one point, the prospect essentially called the process sneaky. Now the OSC wasn’t starting by building rapport, asking questions and figuring out how she could help. She was starting from behind, trying to recover from an interaction she hadn’t been part of and didn’t understand. And you could tell.

Your Company Owns the AI Trust Problem

That’s where we need to be much more thoughtful about how we use these tools. If you are putting AI between your company and your prospects, you need to know what it is saying, what it is promising and what expectations it is creating. When does it transfer to a human? What does it tell the prospect will happen next? And does the human on the receiving end have any idea what just happened? Or time to review it?

Because the customer doesn’t separate your AI from your company. If your bot gives them bad information, they don’t blame the bot. Your company gave them bad information. If it promises one experience and your OSC delivers another, your OSC inherits a trust problem they didn’t create.

We spend a lot of time training OSCs to build trust, listen, ask good questions and set expectations. Why would we hold the technology talking to those same customers to a lower standard? AI should support the customer journey, not become another obstacle the OSC has to overcome.

AI Isn’t Set It and Forget It

And someone has to own it after the shiny new tool is launched. Listen to the conversations. Review the responses. Correct bad information. Retrain it. Make sure the handoff to a human actually works. AI isn’t set it and forget it technology.

Efficiency also can’t come at the expense of the customer experience. If your robot is creating confusion, making promises your team can’t deliver or causing prospects to question whether they can trust you, I don’t care how many calls it made today. It isn’t helping.

How to Regain Trust When Your Robot Breaks It

So how do you regain trust when your robot gets it wrong? Don’t defend the technology or make excuses for it. Also try not to sound like a confused kitten caught in a trap. Acknowledge the disconnect, apologize for the confusion and reset the conversation. Ask what the prospect was expecting, listen to what they need and help them get there. You rebuild trust by giving them the human experience the robot didn’t.

Then fix the robot. Figure out what it said, why it said it and what needs to change so your OSC isn’t having the same conversation next week. These tools require training, oversight and ongoing maintenance. If your robot breaks trust, your human may be able to regain it. Your job is to make sure they don’t have to keep doing it.