AR Deployments and the Top 3 Industry Challenges

Businesses were always required to bring something new to the market; people have always had huge expectations from them.

The digital transformation came along in one such changing landscape that now, it has become impossible for us to live without it. Virtual site inspection is a part of the transformation and additions.

It was not without profit that these businesses decided to evolve.

An increase in efficiency, lead in the competition, and higher profits, were and shall remain some of the primary benefits.

Now, we know that there are several changes in the industry, and they shall keep rising in the future, but what drives these factors?

Let’s take a look.

1. Complexity in Operations and Assets

With more than 41% of consumers expecting live support from your business, it is reasonable that you comply with their needs. Smarter products mean difficulty for your consumers to use them initially. This is when better solutions will come into the picture. Manufacturers shall be required to streamline their supply chain by implementing new technologies, thus providing virtual site inspection. An increase in the demand and hence the supply of smart products has led businesses to shift from their original 2D customer perspective to one that is 3D.

2. Higher Expectations from Customers

According to the ongoing business trend, we see a shift that the B2B businesses are making. The conversion to B2B2C, powered by AR, is expected to turn sales and profits to the companies. In order to create better relations with their customers, businesses are required to be less product-centric and more customer-centric. Enterprises need to ensure that their customers have the right kind of support when they want it. When 63% of customers are expected to return to an organization they’ve done business with, it is evident that these businesses will try to earn their loyalty by providing virtual home inspection.

3. Evolved Set of Skills

While the customer base today is highly capable of handling the setting up of their new devices and whatnot, there will always be the need for customer support. On the business end of this transaction, professionals who understand the industry as well as digital tools to ensure that proper help reaches its customers. For businesses that invest in digital-based training programs are known to turn more profits and have a more extensive loyal customer base than those who don’t. Adding virtual site inspection may make things tough for the business in terms of training, but soon, it shall rain profit.

For every brand that exists today, there are at least a few hundred people connected to its competitors or different brands entirely.

The competition is rough, and businesses must be two steps ahead of their counterparts. There needs to be a substantial increase in their budgets to accommodate digital transformation.

Conclusion

Each challenge that a company faces today is a part of the larger than life change that is about to come.

89% of firms are going through digital transformation, each in a different phase, trying to achieve the same goal; customer satisfaction through remote video inspection as a start.

There shall be a tremendous scope of rewards at the end of this journey for both businesses and customers.

Blitzz offers remote visual support for your field service solutions. We help your customers to fix issues remotely and remove their dependency on waiting for an onsite visit. Avail virtual site inspection service too. Request a demo here!

Impact of AR and AI on Customer Support

Augmented reality (AR) and artificial intelligence (AI) have started changing the customer service game over the past few years. Both AR and AI as customer service support offer both companies and customers plenty of benefits. The biggest advantage that these technologies have over human customer service agents is the ability to make decisions more efficiently and course-correct mistakes more accurately due to the augmented reality software. Both of these technologies are known for making decisions based on logic — and not emotions.

Benefits of Augmented Reality and Customer Support

AR is a game-changer when it comes to customer support. The ability to learn about a product or store layout by simply holding up a smart device not only betters the customer experience, but it can also save companies both time and money.

1. Instantly Updated Signage

Stores don’t need to manually update their signage anymore with AR. Instead of paper signage in stores, customers can simply use a handheld device to see pricing, sale pricing, and store layouts. They’ll be able to look for similar products themselves and find product information more easily.

2. Better In-Store Service

With augmented reality software, stores no longer need to hire customer service specialists. Customer can find products themselves by searching on their smartphones or tablets; to find the products, they simply need to follow the virtual signs on their devices. Instead of finding a customer service associate for product information, they simply need to ask their questions to the app.

3. Better Troubleshooting

Customers can easily find answers to their questions once they have purchased a product. They can use their devices to send diagnostic information to service centers. They can also use AR to find product information, such as model numbers and serial numbers. They might even be able to fix their own products themselves by simply holding up their smartphone to the product. If the customer should need to send the product back for repairs, the repair process will be much smoother.

Benefits of Artificial Intelligence and Customer Support

AI is extremely different from AR. AI essentially is a machine that can make decisions much faster and much more objectively than a human can. While AR allows customers to solve problems themselves, AI can solve problems for customers — effectively replacing human customer service agents.

1. Better Decision Making

One of the biggest challenges when it comes to customer service is training agents on making decisions. Companies spend billions of dollars and hours of time ensuring augmented reality customer service agents make the right choices when it comes to customer satisfaction. Yet AI can change all of that. AI can make significantly better decisions at the drop of a hat than humans ever could. AI can also learn from its past interactions — getting smarter with each customer.

2. Better Data Analysis

Analyzing customer data is extremely time-consuming and tedious. Yet AI can analyze data in a short amount of time. AI can look at customer interactions, determine if the overall result was positive or negative and make better decisions going forward. It can also determine if it’s getting better at handling customer service calls — or if it needs to reevaluate some or all of its process.

3. More Reliable Hours

Possibly one of the best features of augmented reality software is that there’s no reason to set office hours. AI can conceivably take calls and chats at any time of the day or night. Customer service offices in Asia can be open during normal business hours of the US.

Top 3 Use Cases for Enterprise Wearables

Yes, they may make you look like an extra in some sci-fi flick, but enterprise wearables are becoming more common sights across industries worldwide. Many companies now put out their customized lines of wearable headsets – Realwear, ODG, Vuzix M300s, and perhaps the most well-known, Microsoft HoloLens. They usually price out between $500-$3,000, which isn’t that steep, considering that the tech involved is cutting-edge, and come with remote IT support.

Slip a headset on, and you’ve landed in a world of augmented reality (AR) or virtual reality (VR). What's the difference between the two? Think of AR as a digitized modification of your field of vision.

The Army, for instance, has created “Tactical Augmented Reality” (TAR), an eyepiece that allows soldiers to pinpoint a target and, if necessary, aim more precisely. Their perspective changes to resemble that of a video game screen, whereas a VR headset encapsulates the wearer’s eyes and projects up-close images that make it seem like he is inside a video game.

Enterprise wearables can be a mix of both AR and VR, but they’re often designed for practical AR functions in the real world. Read on for some examples of these wearables with remote assistance software.

Aerospace

At Boeing, if mechanics wanted to replace an engine, they once had to wait for manuals to arrive and then pore over the design sheets. Now many technicians wear AR-enhanced Microsoft HoloLens headsets, where instructions hover in their field of vision and even let them communicate with other engineers in different plants who may know the repair process better. Boeing employees reported a 30% decrease in the time it took them to complete pertinent tasks.

Routine Inspections

Imagine you’re a field inspector checking the equipment of a plant or a warehouse, or even making sure that a gas line servicing a neighborhood is at a safe calibration. Using smart glasses, remote IT support can take snapshots of the meters and develop a report that can be texted back to the headquarters and logged in its system. Also, novice inspectors can go into the field and communicate with their seniors back at the office, who can guide them through basic steps without having to be in multiple places at once.

Healthcare

Technicians use headgear all the time, but the field of wearable technology extends beyond headgear, too. Watches, headphones, and centralized tools can all help people monitor their health, for instance. Doctors can use wearable sensors to transmit data such as charts, lab reports, and body scans into a smartphone app where they can make a diagnosis and send it to their patients.

The purpose of enterprise wearables is to heighten worker efficiency and to make the jobs of those workers easier with live remote assistance. But perhaps the most humane use of wearable has measures like installing smart bands inside the safety helmets of workers. While this feature may seem like a Big Brother ploy to monitor a worker’s every move, it can help determine when people are tired and need a break, or when they’re in high-risk situations that may cause them harm (such as moving items in a warehouse or fixing an apparatus at the top of a satellite tower).

Wearables are becoming extremely popular in providing remote IT support.

Role of Wearable Tech in the Healthcare Industry

The wearable technology was started in the 13th century and introduced a portable and wearable clock, and lately, these high-tech watch has developed into many life-changing tools. Thanks to the digital revolution over the past few decades, we have seen major advances in wearable tech's sophistication and capabilities that have given rise to a new term ‘telemedicine’.

Telemedicine is the use of telecommunication and information technology to provide health facilities like health assessments, consultations, and such through video conferences and such real-time video streaming applications. It is the fastest medium to reach distant remote areas and rural areas. Wearable tech is the latest norm that offers healthcare at your hands.

Due to their placement on the body, devices such as smart watches and wearable sensors have the capability to transform healthcare as we know it. In addition to empowering the individual to gain proper insight into their bodies and better manage their health, wearable devices like smart glasses greatly enhance medical providers’ ability to provide informed and personal care.

Wearable Tech and Personal Fitness

Many devices aids in better understanding and take control of personal fitness and nutrition. Studies have repeatedly shown that people tend to underestimate how many calories they consume while also overestimating how many calories they burn through exercise.

This makes weight management challenging since burning more calories than you eat is key to losing weight. With the help of augmented reality (AR), field service management software have been introduced that makes life simpler.

Wearable devices that track how many calories you burn throughout your day combined with tracking exactly how much you eat quantify your efforts and eliminates all the guesswork. Observing eating patterns objectively like data makes it easier to know which habits need to change.

Changing How We Manage Health

Wearable devices can also monitor and manage chronic conditions or general health by keeping track of indicators like blood sugar, heart rate, and blood pressure. 80% of those living with a chronic condition track their health as do 61% of those without. Wearable devices make tracking significantly easier. Furthermore, data from the device can be shared with your healthcare provider to personalize and enhance their efforts.

Wearable devices can also help treat certain conditions. Implanted technologies similar to those used in smart glasses can help those with eye and vision issues such as macular degeneration, acquired blindness, glaucoma, and astigmatism. Meanwhile, some externally worn smart glasses act as miniature computers which reduce eyestrain.

Smart Glasses Used by Medical Professionals

Wearable devices are also transforming healthcare through their use by medical professionals. Not only can providers review data from wearable devices worn by patients to monitor health indicators, but they can also wear devices themselves to enhance care. Remote assistance software like smart glasses, in particular, have created a level of personalization and comprehensiveness for healthcare providers that were unimaginable 50 years ago.

Smart glasses make it virtually possible to be two places at once so access to specialists is suddenly no longer limited by geography. Using smart glasses, the specialist can observe the patient in real time while working remotely using real-time video streaming. Patients are relieved of the huge obstacle of traveling to doctors and can access experts for rare diseases and conditions. The benefits of smart glasses are not limited to working across long distances, however.

Smart Glasses Humanize Healthcare

Medical providers physically present with patients can also benefit from using smart glasses. By using real-time video streaming technology, doctors are able to relate with their patients more personally.

Dr. Laurie Rothman recently told mHealthIntelligence.com: “The biggest benefit right off is just being able to get the computer out of the visit for the most part when I’m seeing patients. Since we’ve been using electronic health records,.. one of the biggest disadvantages is that a lot of doctors and providers are staring at a computer screen because they’re trying to document what the patient is sharing, instead of having a face to face interaction.

Having smart glasses is now allowing me to put the computer aside and look at my patients while I am speaking with them. It’s a breath of fresh air. We’re able to take new technology to bring us more back to old-fashioned medicine.”

While it might seem wearing the smart glasses could make patients feel awkward or even depersonalized, Dr. Rothman reported that “overall – I would say 98 percent – reacted in a very positive manner. They were curious and offered questions. I had a very little negative reaction. Most people think it’s interesting, are very happy in using new technology, and appreciate that I’m focusing on them and not on documentation” through a computer screen. Ironically, smart glasses enhance the human touch of modern healthcare.”

Smart Glasses Revolutionize Surgery

Another highly promising use of smart glasses is to assist with surgery. The surgeon wearing smart glasses almost has x-ray vision where he can observe the patient in real time while also seeing them internally. The smart glasses can also convey vital signs so the surgeon has every bit of information possible immediately.

The New York Times recently reported on a lung surgeon at U.C.S.F., Dr. Pierre Theodore who wears smart glasses when he “performs minimally invasive surgery that requires the doctor to rely on imagery to guide the surgical instruments. [This way] Dr. Theodore can see the images from scans and the live images at the same time.

‘There’s relatively little shift of attention between seeing the patient in front of you and seeing critical information in your field of vision with these field service management software,’ he said. ‘I believe it can be and will be revolutionary.’

Life made Simple with Wearable Tech!

Whether used by consumers to track calories or by doctors to treat patients, wearable technology is changing how we understand and treat our bodies for the better. Remote access software are used to change our lifestyles by helping us with small reminders to using smart glasses while performing operations. They play a vital role in improving and enhancing our way of life.

Blitzz provides field service management software using augmented reality which is a powerful tool that enhances customer satisfaction and enables first-time fix rates.

Augmented Reality in the Insurance Industry - How it’s Making an Impact?

Augmented reality or AR, has many applications that can improve your life. Of course, AR also works to improve various industries as well. Augmented reality field service creates and projects images that make the user feel like part of the landscape. It actually puts you into the "action," which allows you to safely learn from situations that can be complicated and/or dangerous in reality. While the insurance industry has lagged a bit in incorporating this technology, it has recently upped its game, using AR in a number of situations that make claims adjusters and repair technicians more efficient and customers more satisfied.

1. Determining Repair Costs

Some insurance companies are using augmented reality field service to help their adjusters assess the amount of damage in a building by creating 3D models from photos. AR allows them to overlay before and after images, which helps reveal the extent and location of the damage. This technology can allow inspectors to "see" beneath the floors and behind the walls, which allows them to accurately estimate damages and the costs associated with repair. In situations such as hurricanes, adjusters could largely do their work from afar, which would greatly speed up the payout process. Live remote assistance allows claim processors to do their job faster and more effectively as well.

2. Repair Solutions

Augmented reality may also allow policyholders to interact with contractors and determine which repair option they prefer. When your home floods, for instance, figuring out what replacement flooring to use and what to do about the appliances can be hard to picture.

Imagine being able to know how each repair would look before you made your choice. You could also make an informed decision about spending your own money to supplement what your insurance covers. When you make these decisions blind, you often end up regretting some of your choices.

3. Customer Education

At least one major insurance company has created an online home that contains various dangerous scenarios. By using your smartphone, you can put yourself in the home and find the problems that can lead to home accidents and/or structural damage. In that way, you and your family will be inspired to make your own home safer.

Insurance companies want their policyholders well educated in these matters so that fewer accidents happen. That way, the companies pay out less money, and homeowners stay healthy and experience less upheaval. These insurance exercises work on the same principles as many video games, making them enjoyable as well as educational. You might even get the kids to take part.

This video-powered platform can also be used to help consumers choose their insurance policies. Reading about coverage is less informative for many people than seeing scenarios in action. Some companies are employing AR to demonstrate what happens when you choose certain policies. You can better understand your copay responsibilities and what happens when you wreck your car when you can see the situations play out.

AR already has many practical uses for various industries as well as individuals. The insurance industry is particularly well-suited to employing augmented reality field service solutions. Adjusters continually have to assess damage and make reasonable payouts to policyholders. They must strive not to overpay or underpay in every situation in order to keep the company financially healthy. AR allows them to more accurately complete their tasks with the help of live video support. Repair technicians benefit from having a full picture of what damage has been done. In addition, insurance companies use this technology to better educate their customers. The augmented reality revolution has already arrived, and it is fast becoming a key component of your insurance coverage.

5 Benefits of Using Video Chat for Field Service

Are you often frustrated by wasted time and money in your field service department? Whether it's sending employees out to jobs which could have been solved remotely, missing out on knowledge sharing opportunities, or failing to hit first-time fix targets, field service management software is here to help.

Having a powerful remote assistance software at your disposal, it empowers your team to make the best use of their time and skills -- meaning that problems are solved more efficiently.

1. New Employees Will Be Less Likely to Make Costly Mistakes

When new team members are out on their first solo jobs, the risk of mistakes is high. If an inexperienced field service technician makes a problem worse due to lack of experience, you're looking at tons of extra time and money to fix it -- as well as a disappointed customer.

Field service solutions help the new technicians connect quickly and easily with more experienced team members, reducing errors. While a technician probably wouldn't want to call in physical backup for a simple question, they'll have no problem using video chat to ask for advice. It means they'll learn faster, feel more confident, and be much less likely to make mistakes.

2. Experienced Team Members Can Help Without Incurring Travel Costs

What if one of your team members faces a problem that can only be solved by someone more senior, but they're a couple of hours away from your head office? Asking another team member to travel to their location is a massive waste of time and money, but linking up via video chat is fast, simple, and cost effective.

Using augmented reality glasses, they'll see exactly what the field technician is seeing, so it's as good as if they were there. Research shows that 65% of field service technicians consider live video support one of their most useful tools.

3. Customer Issues Will Be Solved More Quickly

If an issue can't be fixed over the phone, customers have to wait for a technician to arrive, which is frustrating and inconvenient. However, if the problem is simple enough for them to fix themselves via video chat, the wait time could be as short as a few minutes, with no need to wait for a technician to arrive. It means a massive boost to customer satisfaction.

When issues are so complex that the first field technician who visits can't figure them out, customers are looking at an even longer wait time for a second technician. With video chat, the second technician can be there virtually in seconds. It cuts down on customer inconvenience and makes even complex problem solving quick and easy.

4. Common Problems Can Be Recorded and Used in Training

Got an issue that keeps recurring, but only one team member who fully understands how to solve it? When your technicians use video chat, all their solutions can be recorded and distributed to the rest of the team.

This tribal knowledge sharing means you won't have multiple employees wasting time and energy trying to solve problems that have already been figured out. It means greater employee satisfaction and less frustration while on the job -- leading to a lower technician turnover.

5. Employee Safety Will Increase

When field service technicians are reluctant to ask for help because they know it will incur high costs, they're more likely to take risks that compromise their safety. However, when a more experienced technician can be contacted by video chat at the touch of a button, there's nothing to stop them asking for advice as often as they need to. That means increased safety compliance, which is better for everyone.

A field service management software makes life easier for your field service technicians, improves safety and efficiency, and boosts customer satisfaction. If you want to stay ahead of the competition, now is the time to invest in a video and chat platform for field service.

Blitzz's software provides custom integrations for your workflows and can be integrated even into your existing FSM and CRM tools. By using our software, you'll be able to get insightful analytics and can make us your "collaborative system of record."