Before the holidays, I attended a go-to-market-focused AI conference—time well spent. The speakers were impressive; cutting-edge experiences, valuable insights, and bullish predictions surrounding AI’s ability to generate "value". Exciting times certainly lie ahead, but one critical challenge stood out: the concept of "value" was consistently vague.
For some, "value" was shorthand for cost reduction—automating tasks humans currently perform. For others, it referred to a generic notion of "value added." While I appreciated the few mentions of “customer value impact,” the concept was breezed over, as if it were a magically available calculation. It’s none of the above.
The Importance of Defining and Quantifying Value
The ability of an AI initiative to be prioritized, secure funding, and deliver on its potential hinges on the ability to quantify its ROI. According to a Dataiku survey, 85% of data and analytics leaders face C-suite pressure to quantify ROI from AI initiatives, with a lack of clear success metrics cited as a top challenge. This isn’t surprising—defining and proving value is hard.
The Critical Contribution of Top line Impact
AI in a customer-impacting role offers far more than cost reduction or efficiency improvements. Topline impact is arguably where AI’s largest and most exciting contributions lie: guiding customer engagement to increase the value of relationships through higher sales rates, larger transactions, greater purchase frequency, improved profitability, stronger loyalty, and other customer value drivers. Achieving this requires a deep, clear understanding of customer value and its drivers—not a superficial gloss-over.
The Path Forward
Forward-thinking leaders recognize that a reoriented, dynamic view of customer value uniquely and holistically bridges the gap between customer engagement initiatives and financial impact—whether powered by AI or humans. Those stuck relying on fragmented legacy metrics will struggle to quantify AI’s true impact and will see its contribution fall far short of its potential.
The charge is clear: AI must be a driver of meaningful, quantifiable business outcomes to avoid becoming just another underachieving buzzword. Companies that connect their AI-powered customer engagement efforts to quantifiable financial outcomes will see AI—and their business performance—live up to its potential.
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