AI in Ecommerce And Its Impact

Staff WritersArtificial Intelligence (AI)Mobile & Field Sales Enablement

By STS Staff Writer On Oct 20, 2022

How AI is Driving eCommerce Trends Today

Unless you have been living off-grid for the last few years, for sure, you must have heard of Artificial Intelligence (AI). It has pervaded every aspect of our lives. Behemoths like IBM, Amazon, and Facebook have ever manifested interest in leveraging artificial intelligence as a new fountain for business. So, saying that AI now would be prevailing and driving the world won’t be an overestimation.

Read on to know how AI implementation unleashes opportunities for the eCommerce industry to grow and thrive.

How does AI benefit eCommerce companies?

Amazon’s recognition and implementation of AI to enhance user experience and product selection generate new leads and optimize logistics. Now, commerce digitalization has raised a high bar for consumer expectations as well, thereby inspiring unprecedented and novel shopping patterns over the past few years. Thus, brands are striving to become future-oriented by shifting their platforms to eCommerce format and integrating cutting-edge AI in their approaches. See the might of AI now!

1. A surge in voice search:

“Alexa, the best coffee house near me”, “Siri, best watch showroom near me”, such expressions are burgeoning in volume. Voice search has changed the way we search things and is consistently revolutionizing it further by upgrading the AI by integrating natural language learning algorithms. Thanks to mobile devices, AI, and smart speakers, the voice search will take hold in more households in the future, thus, promising a breakthrough in eCommerce.

2. Conversational chatbots:

Starbucks, Domino’s Sephora, etc., have recognized the potential of incorporating conversational chatbots into their platforms, which directly benefits their online business. Any confusion that arises or any question that pops into the customer’s mind can be resolved in a wink, which enhances their experience. Prompt responses through chatbots founded on AI can impact the consumer’s decision on the purchase.

3. Automatically generated product descriptions:

A majority of customers today sleuth the stacks of the Internet before making any purchase. They go through the product descriptions, reviews, ratings, and whatnot to make a purchase decision. Thus, product description has become an influential tool in eCommerce, where AI has pitched in. the technology now facilitates product description creations that directly address the buyers’ interests. So, you can see where it can take your eCommerce business!

4. Recommendation systems:

Recommendation systems are one of the easiest and most compelling ways to reify AI capabilities into conversions. And tat’s why businesses have been investing freely in them since the early 2000s.

5. Image recognition/ image tagging:

Image tagging allows a selection of an image, which then presents further results related to that selection. You must have across image recognition or image tagging features while using Pinterest. There’s a great possibility of upscaling the eCommerce industry with this incredible feature.

6. Personalized search:

The significance of personalization can’t be emphasized enough when it comes to eCommerce. It focuses on being relevant to the target market. AI blended with machine learning facilitates the gathering of business and consumer data to develop outstanding and forward-looking market strategies and align results with customer intent.

7. Rise in mobile shopping:

Statista 2019 report indicated that by the end of the year 2021, almost 73% of online purchases would be done through mobile devices. Thus, customers will get to relish the rich user experience on their phones so that they can make purchases on their mobile devices effortlessly as they do on computers.

8. Advanced delivery method:

As eCommerce purchases continue to rise, the companies are focusing on providing express and efficient delivery of products. Amazon provides premium membership that enables to avail day or same-day delivery. Now, the application of AI in the future extends to the sight of robots delivering the products at the customer’s doorstep.

9. AR & VR:

AR and VR are another miracle of Artificial Intelligence that can be utilized to develop systems that offer an illusion of purchasing in a real store to customers. So, the days are fading when customers had to drudge themselves to a brick-and-mortar store or even look at 2-D product images for shopping products.

10. Fake reviews management:

Modern customer scans reviews and ratings before purchasing any product or getting any service. Thus, reviews play a critical role in influencing buyers’ decisions tremendously. Where positive reviews encourage customers to buy a product, negative ones can potentially refrain them from doing so. Often these are fake reviews that AI is helping tackle so customers can decide with no biases meddling in between. Thus, the technology again promises to push the eCommerce industry a step ahead.

Now that you have perused the impacts and use cases of Artificial Intelligence (AI), you must surely be flattered by its magic. When it comes to eCommerce, compounding advancements in technology and AI have been exploited to personalize search, gathering business and consumer data, for image recognition, or image tagging, creating auto-generated descriptions of products, pricing optimization, chatbots, and more. AI in the domain of eCommerce helps optimize customer experiences by amassing business and consumer data that is used to predict trends and make better business decisions.