With millions of consumers now choosing the ease-of-use and accessibility of the ecommerce experience over in store shopping, ecommerce stores are becoming increasingly popular. With this popularity comes a need to stand out from other ecommerce stores, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) may be the key. Much has been said about the implications of AI, particularly on industries reliant upon manual labor, but this technology is likely to have a hugely beneficial impact on the ecommerce industry and will change the way you find products as a consumer in order to have the best shopping experience possible.
Your best and most personal shopping experience yet
Ecommerce stores are already able to filter searches to provide customers with recommendations, based on things like history and best-sellers, but are limited in that they only gather data from one website. Artificial Intelligence will go one step further, being able to analyze larger quantities of data across more websites in order to showcase personalized products better. The result is a seamless customer experience across all channels.
Consumers will have their own personal virtual shopping assistant
When you consider the perks of in-store shopping, like being able to engage in conversation with a shop assistant and asking if they have a particular item in your size or colour, these same perks are far more limited online, with consumers having to go through the time-consuming process of checking boxes or searching with keywords. Ecommerce stores are now integrating AI technologies to shop on behalf of users. Former Amazon.com employees developed virtual shopping assistant, Mona, who simplifies mobile shopping and provides you with the best and most relevant deals and products tailored to your preferences. The more you interact with Mona, the better she’ll get to know you.
Visual searches to limit the problems of keyword searches
Software platforms that drive ecommerce sites are creating visual search capabilities, allowing shoppers to upload an image and find similar products, as opposed to searching with keywords and having to sift through large quantities of unsuitable products. The visual search capabilities will then ‘read’ the item for clues, such as colour, shape, size and brand, so that shoppers can find what they’re looking for more quickly.
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