AI has become an inextricable part of our daily lives, and the Customer Success (CS) industry is no exception. However, valid security concerns cropped up almost immediately about the use of Gen AI platforms during their development. In our April 2024 report, The State of AI in CS, we found that data privacy concerns were one of the top barriers to adoption for CS teams.
Despite major advancements in AI security, including the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) developing the first global standard designed specifically for AI management systems, the news of DeepSeek’s leaky database was sobering. It reminded the entire world: While ubiquitous, all Gen AI platforms are far from the same when it comes to the safety of your data.
What Happened: The DeepSeek Leak
DeepSeek splashed onto the Gen AI market recently, disrupting the U.S. tech industry by offering an open-source model, unlike the major U.S. players. The problem? Security.
According to TechRadar, cybersecurity researchers at Wiz discovered within minutes that DeepSeek’s database was vulnerable to attack. The leaky database allowed for total operation control takeover. “An attacker could extract passwords, chat logs, and more,” TechRadar reports.
What AI Security Means for CS Professionals
AI is here to stay. But not all AI companies out there are doing their due diligence. We recently surveyed a wide variety of Customer Success professionals to gauge how AI has impacted their work, and it’s clear that AI has irrevocably changed the way we do business—and the AI revolution is still only getting started.
Let’s take a look at our recent research on barriers to adoption for AI in CS, and why it’s more important than ever to build trust in the security of your AI vendors.
Barriers to AI Adoption in CS
According to our recent study, The Customer Success Index 2024 (CS Index), AI isn’t a trend; it’s a top priority for companies big and small across industry lines. Teams at every level—whether in leadership, operations, or customer-facing roles— know they need the power of AI to create a competitive customer experience. However, like all of us new to AI, CS leaders also have concerns:
- Will this replace me?
- Can I trust it?
- How will it change the way I work?
Lack of internal expertise, integration complexities, and data privacy concerns are key barriers that we uncovered in the CS Index. Addressing these concerns will be essential to reaping the full potential of AI for CS in 2025.
In truth, AI won’t be nearly as powerful without your team’s trust and adoption, especially frontline teams of Customer Success Managers (CSMs). Their buy-in will make the biggest difference in the impact AI can have on your bottom line.
To help foster that trust, we’ve developed three priorities to set up your CS team to succeed with AI this year. Here’s everything you need to do to build trust between CS teams and AI in 2025:
1. Adopt AI With Strategic Purpose
In the SaaS world, we can be guilty of adopting new tech just for the sake of it. We’re excited by what’s possible, and we want to try it all. Sometimes, that can lead to teams adopting new tools just to give them up in a few months. For this reason, it’s understandable that some CS teams would feel hesitant about adopting AI. Companies, especially the leadership team, must approach AI with clear, strategic intent. That starts by pulling CS team members into the conversation to answer the following questions:
- Which tasks can and should be automated?
- Which tasks are time-consuming but necessary?
- Which tasks require the expertise and creativity of a human touch?
With those inputs, companies can implement AI where it makes the most sense for everyone, essentially aligning business objectives with the day-to-day realities of CS teams. When everyone understands how AI fits into the bigger picture—and sees how it’s designed to support, not replace them—trust will naturally follow.
2. Empower CS Teams With More Precise Intelligence
Next, companies need to turn their focus to streamlining the customer experience. Over the past few years, companies have piled more and more responsibilities onto CS teams. Everything from expansion to community-building now falls under the CS umbrella. And for good reason—they are the best team for the job because they’re in the trenches with customers. They know them better than anyone else, or at least should. But this expanded role often comes with overwhelming workloads.
That’s where AI comes into play. By helping CS teams stay on top of all these responsibilities, AI fosters trust and demonstrates its value to CSMs as a tool for managing more responsibilities and increasingly larger account ratios. For example, AI can organize, analyze, and suggest insights from ever-growing data sets so that CS teams always know what the next best action is for each account. These AI-powered real-time customer health insights are the future of the Customer Success industry.
According to the CS Index, Digital CS adoption is growing by 15% year over year, so it’s clear that simplifying workflows is a necessity. By using AI-powered Digital CS strategies to reduce the noise and surface priorities to CSMs, companies can ensure their teams operate with clarity on customer health data and have the time and freedom to focus on bigger, strategic conversations.
When CS teams understand that AI is meant to support their daily responsibilities rather than replace them, it becomes much easier to trust the tools necessary to scale your company.
3. Maintain an Ongoing Conversation About AI
Finally, the best way to build trust in AI is to keep the conversation open. New capabilities and obstacles will arise as tools become more sophisticated and use cases evolve—and, of course, as new players enter the Gen AI market. CS teams need to know that they can continue the conversation as they learn more about how AI supports their function.
We’re only just starting to see what’s possible when CS is fully powered by AI. Bringing CS teams into the conversation now can only create more trust and accelerate everyone’s growth. Said another way, collaboration and transparency today will lay the foundation for growth and success with AI tomorrow.
Learn More About AI Trends in CS
To learn more about how businesses are using AI and all other tools for their Customer Success functions, download your own copy of The Customer Success Index 2024. The report offers insights and provides helpful strategies for an incredible 2025.
