Google hopes to bring some generative AI into the retail space. Or to attempt, at least.
(Image Source: https://www.searchenginejournal.com/)
Google Cloud today revealed new AI solutions to help retailers improve their back-office processes and personalize their online shopping experiences, coinciding with the National Retailer Association’s annual conference in New York City.
Like a brand-specific ChatGPT, Google Cloud’s Conversational Commerce Solution enables businesses to embed gen AI-powered agents on their websites and mobile apps. The salespeople converse with customers in plain language and make customized product recommendations depending on each person’s tastes.
Chatbots with brands are nothing new. However, according to Google, the agents are driven by “sophisticated” models like PaLM and can be adjusted and tailored using the retailer’s data (websites and catalogs, for example).
Google Cloud’s new Catalog and Content Enrichment toolset, which uses gen AI models—including the previously mentioned PaLM and Imagen—to automatically generate product descriptions, metadata, categorization suggestions, and more from as little as a single product photo, complements the Conversational Commerce Solution. Retailers can also utilize the toolkit to create fresh product photographs from pre-existing ones or create AI-generated product shots based on product descriptions.
It didn’t take long for sellers to start complaining about eBay’s performance after the company introduced a comparable AI-powered product-image-to-description feature a few months ago. They pointed to deceptive, needlessly repetitive, and occasionally outright false text.
In a similar announcement, Google unveiled a managed self-contained hardware kit designed specifically for retail, called the Distributed Cloud Edge, to “reduce IT costs and resource investments’’ around retail “gen AI. (Google has always provided Distributed Cloud Edge as a service, but it currently focuses more intently on merchants.) The edge cluster, which powers customers’ genecustomers apps, is said by Google to be compatible with various retail spaces, including convenience stores, petrol stations, fast-casual eateries, and grocery stores. It comes in a range of sizes, from single-server to multi-server configurations.
“With the … con” rol plane running locally, Google Distributed Cloud Edge provides retailers non-stop operations even when their location is disconnected from the internet for short periods (days),” Eschliman adds” d. Retailers may quickly establish a small cluster of Google Cloud-managed nodes in almost any store. Retailers may now operate their current software with distributed AI to enable mission-critical activities in the shop at all times, thanks to this wholly managed hardware and software.
According to Google, information about availability and pricing will be made public in Q1.
After receiving a pre-briefing on everything, I wondered: Are shops begging for artificial intelligence?
Maybe. zumindest the retail behemoths.
Walmart revealed Monday that it is making significant investments in generation artificial intelligence (AI) search to improve query context understanding and let customers search by use case (e.g., “unicorn-themed” toddler birthday party”). On the other hand, Amazon has been using general artificial intelligence (gen AI) to compile user reviews, assist sellers in creating product descriptions and photo captions, and make it easier for customers to select clothing that fits them.
According to a survey conducted by Google, 81% of retail decision-makers feel there is an “urgency” to implement gen AI in their company, and 72% feel prepared to do so right now. These respondents are particularly interested in conversational commerce, marketing support, product description generation, creative assistance, automation of customer service, and store associate knowledge and support.
However, given some of the previous rough launches of gen AI in retail (see Amazon’s review summaries exaggerated negative feedback), I’m not sure that the sector will jump at the chance to embrace gen AI in retail in its entirety, whether it comes from Google Cloud or another supplier. We’ll have to wait and see, I guess.
(Information Source: Techcrunch.com)
