JetBlue made an acquisition earlier this month that’s squarely focused on augmenting the airline’s intelligent assistance for customer service. As reported by Business Insider, JetBlue announced a partnership with Gladly, a company which offers an innovative customer service platform that turns the traditional ticket-based customer support system inside out.

JetBlue is so bullish on the capabilities of the Gladly platform that, apart from implementing the technology to support its own customers, the airline is investing in Gladly.

Based on information available on Gladly’s website, the company offers a person-centered platform as opposed to a traditional case or ticket-based system. All customer communications and activities are stored in an extended customer profile, not in individual tickets that can be hard to assemble into a complete story.

Information linked to a customer can include items such as recent past orders and brand-related communications posted on social media. JetBlue aims to leverage the Gladly platform to provide its customer service agents with a complete view of each flyer’s previous and upcoming flights.

To make this magic happen, Gladly offers APIs that compiles relevant data from multiple sources. Examples include contact information from CRM systems such as Salesforce and order history from Hybris. The Gladly solution can also surface communications from across many channels. As an example, if a customer tweets about a lost bag, the Gladly platform can make that information available to the customer support staff.

According to the Business Insider article, JetBlue even has future plans to provide handhelds to onboard crew to give them access to Gladly-powered flyer dossiers. If someone on the plane seems particularly unhappy during a flight, the attendant could potentially check their recent social media posts to get more background on their situation. Armed with those insights, the attendant might be able to address the flyer’s concerns and provide them with an improved experience.

With the recent bad publicity and widespread customer dissatisfaction suffered by airlines, JetBlue’s proactive approach to improve customer service seems well-timed. With their new customer-centered approach, JetBlue is leveraging intelligent assistance to enhance the level of service offered to travelers.

Categories: Conversational Intelligence, Intelligent Assistants, Articles, Mobile + Location