It’s going to be a very AI holiday season this year.
With Black Friday and Cyber Monday now behind us (both exceeding analyst expectations by a healthy margin), retailers are shifting their thinking to how best to keep consumers engaged through the end of the month. And one new tool this year could be artificial intelligence.
A study by Salesforce predicts AI-driven product recommendations will bring about $194 billion in online sales in global online sales in November and December.
The Salesforce Shopping Index, which analyzes data from more than 1.5 billion consumers on retail sites using Salesforce platforms, finds that a growing number of online orders have been influenced by AI over the last 12 months. And 10% of the shoppers it surveyed plan to use generative AI to help them find gifts for friends and loved ones.
“AI has already influenced 16% of the purchases made around the globe in the last six weeks,” said Rob Garf, VP and GM of retail at Salesforce. “We anticipate retailers leaning into both predictive and generative AI throughout Cyber Week to drive costs down and loyalty up.”
In the U.S. 14% of tracked orders were influenced by AI since the start of October, through AI-powered tools such as product recommendations, targeted promotions and product descriptions.
Beyond just assisting customers with product recommendations, AI can also be used in that most dreaded of retail positions: Customer service. Mercari, a digital secondhand marketplace, began testing AI in a shopper assistant role (called Merchat AI) earlier this year. And early reviews were positive, likening the experience to having a personal stylist.
“Merchat AI marks an exciting turning point in the evolution of secondhand shopping,” said John Lagerling, CEO of Mercari U.S.. “With this technology, we’re leveraging the transformative power of artificial intelligence to make it easier for Americans to shop and explore Mercari’s extensive marketplace. We anticipate that generative AI will also unlock more opportunities to iterate on our customer experience, along with additional ways to make the resale experience even more appealing to buyers and sellers.”
Urban Outfitters, meanwhile, is using AI to assist with its merchandise planning, letting the technology detect and react to changes in customer demand and inventory levels, boosting sales.
That personalization and quick reaction to evolving consumer trends could make AI the employee of the season for retailers. And, more importantly, it could help retailers post strong numbers for the 2023 holiday season.
Those stores have got a few things already working in their favor. In the first 20 days of the holiday season (Nov. 1 through Nov 20), consumer spent $63.2 billion online, a 5% increase from a year ago. Seventeen of those days saw people spending $3 billion or more per day, compared to just 13 days in the same period last year. That year-over-year increase is even higher than Adobe was expecting. Analysts at the company had predicted a 4.8% jump this year.
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