Last updated - December 20, 2021
Artificial Intelligence is transforming many industries. One of which is eCommerce.
From automating time-intensive tasks to redirecting resources to more critical tasks and projects, AI allows companies to save money, increase revenue, and transform their business.
It is expected that Artificial Intelligence systems will touch more parts of the entire online shopping experience over the next couple of years. That’s why you should keep up with your competitors and your customers’ expectations.
How is AI impacting Ecommerce?
Artificial intelligence is undoubtedly changing the ecommerce space.
For one, it enhances several aspects of your jobs, especially the monotonous and repetitive tasks. Second, it ensures there is no discrepancy in your online store’s customer data set. Third, it allows you to provide an excellent customer experience.
An increasing number of ecommerce businesses are using AI for data analysis and getting better customer insights. That way, they can create accurate customer recommendations, decrease operational expenses, and stay ahead of competitors.
As this technology advances, more and more businesses rush to adopt it to get the most out of the opportunity.
9 Ways You can Incorporate AI in Your Ecommerce Store
In this post, we will be walking you through the ways you can incorporate artificial intelligence if you are planning to make an ecommerce website:
Chatbots
AI-powered chatbots can use natural language processing to interact with a customer effectively.
For example, Alexa and Google Assistant use Artificial Intelligence to know what you’re saying and how to formulate a response.
You can also use the same technology to power ecommerce sales assistants. It includes answering customer queries 24/7 or making relevant product suggestions.
Dynamic Product Pricing
Many ecommerce stores use a dynamic pricing strategy to change the product pricing based on supply and demand. It increases profits while ensuring the sales stay consistent. This is even though customers aren’t necessarily looking for those products.
Online retailers are also using dynamic pricing. No matter what industry, fluctuations are made by human pricing experts.
Artificial Intelligence has changed this to either run the whole dynamic pricing or assist humans in making more educated price changes.
The pricing optimization software has also been able to improve gross margins to up to 10%. The argument here is that customers at least appreciate knowing why or when the price change happened.
Product Recommendations
Ecommerce companies can also offer a personalized shopping experience by using AI-driven product recommendations.
With the help of Artificial Intelligence recommendation engines, you can foresee what your customers will likely buy. This will depend on the customer’s purchase behavior and the entire data set.
What happens is that AI will review your customer’s purchase history. From there, the system will compare it to your existing group data set and make relevant recommendations.
Imagine this: You sell women’s clothes online, and the customer bought a long-sleeved blazer. Artificial Intelligence will then recommend matching trousers.
That’s because the products often come in pairs. It can also be because the customer usually buys blazers and trousers, albeit in different instances.
Customer-centric Search
If customers shop online and look for a phrase that didn’t show up on search results, they’re more likely to leave. That’s where AI or natural language processing comes in if you want to be more accurate.
NLP lets you narrow down search results to make them more relevant.
We couldn’t stress this enough. Your search results should be relevant. For many years, search engines have been using metadata and tagging to find the right images, which is often done manually.
Furthermore, Artificial Intelligence automates the image classification process and product tagging. This is to come up with more accurate search results. The images themselves are data sources that allow you to identify product attributes that lead to better search results.
Interface and Content Customization
Wouldn’t it be nice to showcase one homepage to a customer that uses their mobile phone to shop? And then there is an entirely different homepage for someone who visited your online store for the first time?
These are now possible with AI. What’s important is that you are offering personalized interfaces and content based on customer behavior.
Here are some of the benefits of using different interfaces and content to users:
- You can boost conversions by showcasing an interface that makes sense to the customer. For example, repeat customers don’t probably want to see your email subscription for the third or second time around.
- You can also send notifications based on their actions, such as abandoned carts and recent purchases.
- Another great way to personalize is using a rewards or VIP program where the points and reward system is unique to your customer.
- Moreover, customers would often prefer cleaner Checkout interfaces. On the other hand, some are more interested in browsing for more products.
Customer Retargeting
According to data by Conversica, 33% of marketing leads aren’t followed up by your sales team. This means that pre-qualified prospects fall through the cracks three times out of ten.
Moreover, many businesses have unmanageable customer data, which they have very little or nothing with. This can be a great goldmine of intelligence that you can later use to improve the sales cycle.
Personalize Customer Experience
AI-driven personalization can help your ecommerce store provide a personalized customer experience.
Those who embed Artificial Intelligence in their business can learn what their customers need. That way, they can give them relevant recommendations that align with their preferences. Mainly, AI allows you to track a customer’s buying patterns to offer them complementary products.
Your store’s entire customer experience is also far more personal and well-targeted when customers know what they want. As a result, this can lead to a significant rise in sales for your online store.
Efficient Sales Process
Most of us have probably moved on to the old days. We’re talking about picking up the trusty Yellow Pages and pestering prospective clients with cold calling.
People are now heavily influenced by what they see and consume of TV ads and social media.
That said, AI-powered Customer Relationship Management can help you provide tailor-fit solutions. It also allows you to develop a strong marketing message that can reach your customers at the right moment.
Most Artificial Intelligence systems allow natural language learning and voice input like Siri and Alexa. This allows your CRM system to answer customer queries, solve problems, and identify new sales opportunities.
AI-driven CRM systems can even multi-task to handle these functions and a whole lot more.
Inventory Management
Artificial Intelligence technology also lets ecommerce business owners get essential information about demand factors.
Using predictive analysis, you can figure out whether a product will be in-demand in the coming months. From there, you can accurately predict both the real-time and future inventory needs of your business.
Over to You
AI is changing the name of ecommerce game. So much so that it is no longer limited to using chatbots as 24/7 chat support.
Nowadays, you maximize Artificial Intelligence to upsell and cross-sell and manage your inventory. As such, you can protect your online store’s bottom line while ensuring that you are increasing your average order value.
If you are yet to use AI in your online store, now is the better time to do so.
