Solutions & Innovations (September-October 2023)
Samsung recently rebranded its Whisk app (acquired in 2019) as “Samsung Food,” an AI-powered, personalized food and recipe service. The app is now accessible in eight languages in 104 countries. It offers 160,000 recipes plus meal plans, nutritional information, automated shopping lists, ingredient searches and food reviews. It integrates with Samsung appliances through its SmartThings home controls system. Samsung plans to add Samsung Health integration and, in 2024, will implement “Vision AI” technology that recognizes food items and meals and saves ingredients to shopping lists.
More than two-thirds of J.Crew’s online store traffic comes via smartphone, so it recently modified its Passport loyalty program to give app users an exclusive 48-hour shopping head-start on new product launches. The company also opened an immersive virtual store created by Obsess, a New York-based experiential e-commerce platform. This 3-D, shoppable experience is a beach house with themed rooms that explain the materials and design history of various products, which the company calls “interactive, contextual merchandising.”
Surveys suggest that 50% of adults collectively possess unused gift cards, vouchers or store credits worth $23 billion. In August, Yahoo beta-tested an AI tool called “Shopping Saver” that can search through a user’s Yahoo email for forgotten cards, discount codes and credits. It also has a writing assistant that can draft suggested messages to vendors to recover the savings. Yahoo Mail is currently accepting sign-ups to join the beta.
Quotient has announced that users of its “Shopmium” app can connect Venmo accounts to receive cash-back deposits from redeemed offers. Since the cash-back app’s U.S. launch in fall 2022, shoppers could only use PayPal accounts, but research indicates that up to a third of consumers use Venmo, and it is now preferred by both Millennials and Gen Z. Offers change weekly from more than 500 product manufacturers, including Nestle, SC Johnson and PepsiCo.
In August, Bloomreach introduced a conversational-shopping product for e-commerce using generative AI and large language models (LLMs). Called “Bloomreach Clarity,” the system is said to be able to deliver personalized, human-like product expertise about a shopper’s favorite brands. It is built upon a real-time customer data engine that, along with real-time targeting, enables Clarity to prompt conversations on websites, chat and SMS based on a customer’s current journey while refining the chat using a brand’s guidelines over tone of voice.
While just “retail-adjacent” at the moment, here’s an AI function heading to stores eventually: DoorDash announced “agent-powered” voice-ordering. According to its surveys, up to 50% of customer calls are left unanswered, so during peak times, this AI capability can take over and offer a personalized voice-ordering experience in multiple languages. Returning customers can quickly reorder favorite meals, and a live agent hovers to take over calls at any time.
Roku and Instacart recently announced an advertising partnership that pairs TV streaming with online grocery delivery. The partnership merges first-party viewership data from Roku’s streaming platform with e-commerce insights collected by Instacart, enabling CPG marketers to measure how ads affect purchasing by streamers. In a pilot with a personal care brand, 60% of those who purchased the brand after seeing its campaign on Roku were new to the brand. Advertisers can access consumer insights drawn from 1,100 retail banners and 80,000 stores.
In May, Cadent, a platform for advanced TV advertising, signed a multi-year agreement establishing it as Catalina’s preferred platform for linear, addressable and connected TV ad campaigns for CPG. The companies offer brand marketers an ability to re-engage shoppers who’ve seen a TV ad with an in-store or digital coupon to incentivize purchase during a campaign window.
In June, Fractal launched Flyfish, a generative-AI sales platform that helps brands build “AI sales advisors” that can engage in one-on-one shopping experiences with consumers. Fractal’s platform can analyze a shopper’s buying patterns and history to create a personalized experience that mimics human interaction. Brands sync their catalogs and marketing collateral by connecting Flyfish to their CRM; the platform is said to be able to configure an AI sales advisor within minutes.
Looking for an alternative to AI/ChatGPT-only customer assistance systems? Meet Feel, which lets online shoppers talk to live, work-from-home sales associates who use AI to make recommendations. Feel places a button/widget on retail websites that, when clicked by a shopper, connects them via video chat to the associate. The platform connects through platforms such as Shopify, Magento, Commercetools, SalesForce and Woo Commerce.
In late August, Darko unveiled “ShopperAccess,” a cloud-based mobile technology that lets retailers showcase valuable merchandise securely in-store while also delivering usage analytics. The system uses dynamic QR codes that allow shoppers to control their access to merchandise via their mobile phones, replacing reliance on manual keys or aisle-call buttons. Darko collaborated with Philips Personal Health consumer products on the technology, which is currently being tested at chains throughout the U.S.
In mid-August, the Consumer Healthcare Products Association (CHPA) and Family Dollar launched “Health In Hand” to help shoppers choose and use OTC products and dietary supplements. The program is placing QR codes on in-store wayfinding strips in 8,000 Family Dollar stores to direct shoppers to custom landing pages on HealthInHand.org. The goal is to advance self-care literacy among vulnerable communities. The first two Family Dollar categories featured are digestive health and pain management; soon other categories will be added including cough/cold/flu and allergy.
In July, Shipt teamed up with online gaming developer Voldex for a back-to-school shopping immersion within “Driving Empire,” Voldex’s racing game on the global Roblox platform. Users take on the role of a shopper with Shipt to deliver popular items on customers’ back-to-school lists, battling against scheduled delivery times to earn in-experience currency. This gamification exercise is basically an awareness campaign for Shipt, as the game boasts more than 1 million daily visits.
GivBux recently launched the “GivBux Super App,” which has the support of both local retailers and national chains such as Amazon, Old Navy, Petco, CVS, Home Depot, Lowe’s, Sephora and Staples. Purchases made using the app rewards the user with cash back, a part of which (from 1% to 100%) can be directed to a charity. GivBux manages the collection and distribution. The app’s platform also offers social networking, banking, messaging, food delivery and transportation.