Getting real in the age of AI

AI is everywhere, from product recommendations as you shop online to customer service chatbots. There are a lot of promises as well as concerns. One of the areas that many people are worried about is AI's impact on human-to-human relationships. A 2026 Pew Research study found that 50% of people feel that AI will worsen people's ability to form meaningful relationships. However, the more AI becomes a part of how we work and play, the more important human connection becomes. And ironically, technology and AI can actually help with that.

Why relationships are the foundation

Relationships are everything in the dental industry. The relationship between a dentist and their dental lab is built over years, sometimes decades. There is no contract binding a dentist to your lab, so they could choose to work with any lab at any time. What keeps them with you is the trust that you built. They know your lab will deliver quality work on time and it will seat correctly so they save chair time. And if there is a problem, they know your team will make it right.

Trust is developed slowly and steadily through every case, every phone call, every issue handled well. AI doesn't know that Dr. Jones is expanding her practice or that Dr. Sanchez is about to become a father and take paternity leave. These are the human connections that strengthen relationships, build trust, and support business growth.

Where technology can help

The dentist who sends you work regularly does so because they know and trust your team. Maintaining those personal relationships can be a challenge as you grow but this is where technology, including AI, can really help. Technology has the ability to deliver the information you need, exactly when you need it so that your conversations are relevant and impactful both for your business and your customer.

AI has the potential to help us be more efficient and to process large amounts of information quickly. Notice the word potential. AI is a tool, and like any tool, its value depends entirely on how it is applied.

"Every major technology goes through a hype cycle, and AI is no exception. Right now, there is a lot of excitement, but there is also a gap between what AI can realistically deliver today and what people imagine it will eventually do."

Rob Nazzal, CEO & Founder, icortica

At icortica, we view technology as a tool to empower humans with information to develop stronger, more profitable relationships with their customers. We use advanced statistics to analyze your sales data and layer in AI where appropriate. icortica identifies risks and opportunities with your customers so you can act more quickly and it can even automate some of the sales and marketing follow up. We strategically apply AI within our product to solve certain problems, including removing the friction that makes it hard to take action with tools like Voice to Action and Game Plan.

What is really important is understanding in which scenarios AI will work well, given the non-deterministic nature of AI. That means that given the same inputs it will not always produce the same results, and it's impossible to know why. Deeply understanding its strengths and weaknesses allows icortica to apply it appropriately, test it extensively during development and most importantly to use our human judgement to select the right technology for the right job.

The tools work for you, not in place of you

What if you had the information you need when you receive an inbound call to know everything going on with your customer at a glance? This is where technology can help, so that you can focus on the relationship and have the right conversation. Perhaps you've been wanting to ask Dr. Johnson to consider trying an implant case with you but you can see that there have been several late deliveries and remakes recently that need resolving first.

Well-designed software can not only help you prepare for a call in seconds, it can identify cross-sell opportunities and retention risks and even automate some of the sales and marketing follow up, ensuring nothing slips through the cracks. icortica allows field representatives to see if there are any issues before they step inside the practice. Marketers can tailor messaging to help influence a doctor who only sends posterior work to you to try your high-quality esthetics. And it can automatically task a sales rep to have a conversation with a doctor who is only sending removable work because they do not realize that you are a full service lab. Advanced analytics can flag when a customer might be at risk of churning well before they have gone away. These technology-powered insights allow you to be a more proactive partner to your customers, managing relationships and growing your accounts, versus just reactively responding to complaints and down reports.

The real opportunity

The question is not whether to use technology and AI. It is whether the tools you use give the people who own your customer relationships more time and better information to do their jobs more effectively.

Your sales reps and customer care team are good at what they do: managing relationships. Salespeople build rapport, solve problems, and persuade. Customer care people listen, navigate issues, and make customers feel looked after. The more time those people spend doing those things, rather than digging through data or piecing together account history, the stronger your customer relationships become. The goal of technology should be to double the number of meaningful interactions your team has with customers, not to reduce them.

A good example of this in practice is icortica's Game Plan feature, which is an AI-driven sales coach. It equips a rep with an account-specific plan of action. Instead of spending time digging through reports, looking up recent orders, and trying to piece together where the relationship stands, the rep can pull up a clear summary of the risks and opportunities with recommended next steps in seconds. icortica's Game Plan also streamlines the follow up and removes the friction in the follow up by creating tasks and drafting emails for the rep. It means less time on administrative work and more time talking to the right customers about the right things at the right time.

The bottom line

There is no denying that AI is changing how we work, but technology can't replace human connection, empathy and judgement. When people are kept at the center of your business and technology is used to help them do what they do even better, you've got a winning combination. The relationship continues to be yours to own. Technology can help you and your team show up better for your customers.