Behavioral pairing is an artificial intelligence (AI) technique that matches each customer with the agent most likely to produce a specific business outcome, such as resolution, retention, or a sale. Instead of routing to whoever is next in line, it uses patterns from past interactions to predict which customer and agent combination will perform best.
How It Works
A model is trained on historical interactions. It learns which customer and agent combinations led to which outcomes, and uses those patterns as the basis for every future match.
When a new interaction arrives, the model scores the available agents on their predicted outcome for that specific customer, then routes the interaction to the strongest predicted match. Because new interactions feed back into the model, its predictions improve over time.
Behavioral pairing works within existing routing rules and service levels. It refines the choice among qualified, available agents rather than overriding compliance or SLA requirements.
Why It Matters
- Two customers with the same question can need very different handling. Standard routing treats them identically; behavioral pairing does not.
- Outcomes depend on the combination, not just the individual agent’s skill.
- At enterprise scale, small per-call improvements compound into measurable gains across millions of interactions.