Artificial Intelligence is Changing the Way We Do eCommerce

April 30, 2019 – Susan Mour is a marketing and creative content specialist at Smarketa.com with her primary focus being search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) programs, and measuring customer satisfaction for eCommerce businesses. Being a humanist she draws inspiration from the simple things such as everyday life to help businesses do their best online. This is her first contribution to 21st Century Tech blog. Please send feedback to me about this kind of content to let me know if you would like to see more.

Today most of us live a portion of our lives online. In starting an online business geographical distances do not matter. The advantage this gives to new startups is unprecedented with consumers increasingly going to non-bricks and mortar business to buy both products and services. Search engines have made it easy to ask where you can buy but for those with online e-commerce sites, without using search engine optimization (SEO) tools to improve positioning on results pages, getting eyeballs to notice you is difficult. There is more though than just eCommerce SEO services to boost your business. There is now SEO with artificial intelligence (AI). And that can make your online business pop like never before. Here are some AI development trends worth looking at for your e-commerce business.

More accurate and flexible search options

In today’s world, we’re in a rush in search of more productive tools. The massive flow of information we see needs to be prioritized to align with customer needs. One way to do this is to improve the accuracy of search results to help save time and get rid of irrelevant and unrelated information. This is where new AI algorithms in search engines can make SEO more impactful. The result, more useful and results in word, image and voice searches.

Visual Search

AI tools are not only more productive and time-saving but also customer-oriented when using visual search. When you upload a product image today with the use of AI tools you get detailed information. That’s why visual searches are becoming one of the most important innovations in eCommerce providing much easier and productive search mechanisms.

Smarter AI Assistance and Chatbots

Chatbots serve every aspect of an eCommerce business whether for sales and service help, or post-sale customer care and assistance. Online companies can do far more with limited human resources providing both potential and current clients the support they need. Chatbots today are being designed with deep learning AI processes. They create accurate interactions and can implemented on Messenger-like systems as well as different social media platforms. Advances in AI allow chatbots to understand lexical and grammatical structures giving customers the information they need quickly.

Better Segmentation and Targeting

Marketers like to segment target audiences. They do this by age, gender, interests, preferences, etc. Using segmentation allows an eCommerce business to:

• Match offered products or services with specific customer audience needs and demands.
• Improve products and services to meet the specific needs of segmented audiences.

AI-personalization algorithms can segment customers by far more than the four mentioned above. For example, potential eCommerce customers can be defined by categorizations such as weather and season, city and location, current and past browsing, search behavior, and online purchases. That’s why the use of AI segmentation tools may be the fastest way for eCommerce companies to deliver the right messages about their products and services to the right audiences.

Logistics based on 100% automation

Automation and AI combine today to provide eCommerce with powerful tools for creating a successful presentation of all aspects of an online business.  Examples include companies like Jingdong, China’s premier online retailer featuring 100% automation. The company’s implementation of 100% automation has helped it to cut costs, increase revenue and save money. And it also has given the business the ability to acquire in-depth information about site visitors, and customers, analyzing buyer and browsing behavior, and anticipating current needs. 

So, what do we anticipate will be in eCommerce’s AI future?

New innovation and strategies in the spheres of SEO as the AI eCommerce toolkit evolves to take advantage of deep learning and pattern recognition advanced algorithms.