AI in eCommerce: today's tools and tomorrow's possibilities
In the dynamic world of eCommerce, embracing the latest technologies is key to staying ahead. Artificial intelligence (AI) is a game-changer, offering unparalleled tools for merchants to enhance their eCommerce businesses.
Having spent over a decade in the eCommerce space with some of the world’s largest online merchants (including Amazon, Dell and Expedia), I've had the opportunity of seeing this evolution up close. Now, as I run a leading eCommerce platform at Wix, which powers more than 700,000 active online stores worldwide, I can confidently say that we are at a pivotal juncture.
Create an eCommerce website with Wix today.
The once-exclusive AI capabilities—previously reserved for giant enterprises—are being democratized, making this the ideal time to experiment with AI and use it to stay ahead in eCommerce. This article delves into several practical use cases for AI in eCommerce, with a focus on the two main types of AI that have revolutionized the way we do business online today: generative AI and machine learning.
15 examples of AI in eCommerce
Generative AI use cases in eCommerce
Generative AI is a trending technology that automatically creates new original content for you. It analyzes existing data and produces materials tailored to your business's needs. Within eCommerce, this type of AI significantly cuts down the time and effort needed to maintain an appealing online store and optimizes your content for better search engine performance, customer experience and conversion.
Here are a few examples of how you can use generative AI to your advantage.
01. Brand development
When you’re starting a business, AI tools can help you craft your brand identity by suggesting suitable business names, logos and domain addresses. Aside from helping to spark creativity, these tools analyze market trends and brand objectives to design logos and names that resonate with your target audience. The synergy of a memorable name, a distinctive logo and an intuitive domain address is vital for attracting new clients online, plus building trust and credibility.
Take Wix’s AI logo maker for a spin.
02. Online store design
Today, AI can already design and create your online store from top to bottom. The quality, of course, will depend on the platform you use. The best AI website builders don’t simply match you with a pretty template, but actually work through the details with you—setting you up with the right pages, apps, content and functionality that you need to run your store. The result: a fully functional website that’s optimized for conversions, built for you in minutes.
Try Wix's free AI website builder today.
03. Website copy
AI content creation tools can be used for any type of website content for any type of business. They can produce all the text that your site requires, from the tagline on your homepage to the titles on your product pages. By simply answering a number of simple questions, these advanced tools are engineered to generate the best results for the specific website content that you’re looking for.
Learn more about Wix's AI text creator.
04. Product descriptions at scale
When you have a large catalog, writing product descriptions can quickly become tedious. AI makes it possible to auto-generate hundreds of professional, engaging and SEO-friendly product descriptions—without leaving out important details. By analyzing specific product specialties and market trends, these descriptions are optimized for customer engagement.
Case in point: Founder of Z Jewelers, Zamar, notes that “Before, I would put the most generic descriptions like ‘gold,’ ‘ring,’ ‘buy it now.’ But with [Wix’s] AI, it's helped me come up with more detailed descriptions of every product…and I noticed that after using AI, I've had an increase in sales as well.”
05. Site images
In the dynamic world of online commerce, first impressions matter more than ever. Your site imagery plays a key role in leaving a positive impression by not only making your site more memorable but by reflecting your brand’s values and personality.
Using an AI image creator, you can create banner images and other site visuals that deliver an immersive shopping experience. Simply describe your desired image, and let AI create it.
Discover more about Wix’s AI Image creator.
06. Refined product images
You can give your product photography an extra boost with the help of auto background removal and image enhancement tools. This ensures that your product images are aligned with your store’s aesthetic, enhancing the overall visual appeal of your site and boosting trust amongst your visitors.
07. Enhanced SEO
These days, attracting a new customer can be pricey. With customer acquisition costs skyrocketing by 222% within the last decade, it’s more important than ever to invest in cost-effective marketing strategies like search engine optimization (SEO).
Fortunately, AI makes SEO more accessible and scalable. Enhance your SEO with AI eCommerce tools that automatically write your title tags and meta descriptions by analyzing your site content and business information. These optimized elements improve search engine visibility and user engagement, which, in turn, attract more visitors to your store.
And given that practically every webpage—from your homepage to your product pages—could benefit from having these elements, this type of automation saves time and allows you to scale your SEO efforts efficiently.
Learn more about Wix’s AI meta tag creator.
08. Blog content
It’s no secret that a blog can help you get in front of potential customers; in fact, organic search is the top traffic source for all websites, according to a recent HubSpot report. With a blog, you can address search queries like “best running shoes for flat feet” or “how to pick the best running shoes” (as examples) that online shoppers may have before making a purchase.
That said, managing a blog is a lot of work. Generative AI tools make it significantly more manageable by producing blog articles that aren’t only engaging, but also optimized for SEO. You can equip the AI with specific prompts and your keyword. While you’ll want to double-check everything that AI creates, you could potentially publish more articles regularly without investing extra resources into it.
09. Email and social media content
Generative AI enables you to create eye-catching content for social media and emails. It can automatically create images, text and videos that show off your products, plus identify optimal posting times.
Perhaps most importantly, AI can help you tailor content to multiple customer segments. For example, in Wix, you can use AI to design a unique email based on various factors—including the intent, tone of voice and messaging that’s specific to your audience. The same can be applied to social media captions created with Wix.
10. Personalized customer support
AI-powered chatbots have the power to improve your retention rates by providing instant, personalized eCommerce customer service as shoppers are browsing your site. It can mimic the interactions between in-store associates and shoppers, offering additional product details or answering questions about your return policies (as examples).
11. FAQ content
By analyzing customer interactions and feedback, AI can help you stay ahead of customer queries and continuously update any FAQ pages on your site. FAQ generators can take a topic (like “return policy”) and suggest a list of related questions that your target customer may have, plus answers, to include within your FAQ page.
This proactive approach ensures that your customers find relevant, up-to-date information easily, enriching their experience.
Machine learning use cases in eCommerce
While generative AI has made most of the headlines lately regarding how well it creates new, original content, machine learning has tremendous power in providing predictive insights that can automatically improve any aspect of your business.
Machine learning in eCommerce harnesses a data loop process: it captures customer data, analyzes it and applies insights to make store adjustments. This cycle helps to continually refine the shopping experience. Essentially, it uses customer feedback to enhance future visits, constantly evolving to meet and anticipate shopper needs.
This continuous optimization ensures a more personalized, efficient shopping journey, which is crucial for customer satisfaction and business performance. Below are a few practical and highly effective examples of machine learning capabilities in eCommerce.
12. Personalized shopping experience
Machine learning apps such as Twik offer a groundbreaking approach to eCommerce, allowing you to tailor product galleries and shop pages to individual customer preferences. Twik, which is available on the Wix App Market, leverages AI and machine learning to understand shopper behaviors and intentions. It leverages these insights to offer the right products in the right order to the right user, in real time. Furthermore, it constantly optimizes your storefront based on real-world outcomes to attract more sales.
By personalizing site menus and product catalogs, Twik Store Personalization helps to improve add-to-cart ratios and reduces cart abandonment rates. It operates autonomously, requiring no setup or maintenance, and is designed to adapt its strategies as it learns more about user preferences.
The end result is a highly customized shopping experience that meets the specific needs of each customer, reducing friction in the shopping process and significantly boosting conversion rates.
13. Hyper-relevant product recommendations
Smart Product Recommendations are a pivotal tool for any online store looking to maximize its sales potential. By utilizing advanced algorithms, these systems analyze customer behavior, purchase history and browsing patterns to display similar or complementary products alongside a viewed item.
You don’t have to set any custom triggers by hand; AI will automatically surface the right product recommendations. This method of intelligent product placement allows you to subtly encourage customers to explore additional products that they might find appealing or necessary. As a result, customers are more likely to add more items to their cart, thereby increasing the overall order value.
14. Predictive analytics for inventory management
Machine learning can revolutionize inventory management in eCommerce by leveraging predictive analytics. This technology analyzes past sales data, seasonal trends and consumer behavior to forecast future product demand. You can avoid number-crunching by hand and optimize your inventory levels to prevent overstocking or stockouts.
Aside from ensuring that popular items are always available, this solution can reduce the costs associated with excess inventory. Predictive analytics can also help in identifying potential supply chain disruptions and adjust inventory strategies accordingly, thereby maintaining a smooth operation and consistent customer experience.
Note: this capability is primarily accessible to the largest merchants, but I predict that it will soon become accessible to the masses.
15. Dynamic pricing
Machine learning algorithms can dynamically adjust product prices based on various factors, such as demand, competition, market trends, customer behavior and inventory levels. It addresses the age-old problem of setting competitive prices that attract customers while maximizing your profit margins.
Dynamic pricing can be particularly useful when you’re facing high-demand periods, sales promotions or a volatile pricing landscape. By automatically adjusting prices in real time, you can stay competitive and responsive to market changes.
Note: This too, in all its glory, is mostly reserved for the eCommerce titans of the world. However, I anticipate it will become much more accessible soon.
How will the future of eCommerce be shaped by AI?
The future of eCommerce stands at the cusp of a revolution, fueled by rapid advancements in AI. This transformation goes beyond the realms of generative AI and machine learning, extending into natural language processing, computer vision and robotics. When these AI advancements converge with ongoing improvements in logistics, mixed reality and cloud computing, we’ll be looking at a dramatically altered eCommerce landscape.
In the coming years, AI will allow you to offer hyper-personalized and zero-friction shopping experiences like never before. Imagine entire storefronts, catalogs, promotions and products that look completely different for every customer. Such hyper-personalization will not only elevate the likelihood of purchases but also significantly boost customer satisfaction and retention rates.
Furthermore, AI will bridge the gap between various stakeholders in the eCommerce ecosystem, including content publishers, eCommerce platforms, device manufacturers, retailers and logistics companies. Just imagine walking down the street and seeing someone with a stylish outfit through your AR glasses. In that instant, your glasses offer you the chance to virtually try on and/or purchase the entire look—clothing, accessories and all.
Or, let’s say you’re watching a sports game on your TV, and your favorite player is dominating. AI may suggest fan gear in your exact size and color preferences. All you have to do is say “Buy it now” to your smart speaker, and AI will instantly send your order to the right retailer and have your purchase at your doorstep within hours.
In many instances, the shopping journey will start even before you realize you want to make the purchase. That’s the power of predictive AI.
The Wix commitment
AI's role in eCommerce is transformative, progressing from today's generative AI and machine learning tools to a future of interconnected, sophisticated AI systems. This evolution promises immense growth and innovation opportunities in eCommerce. At Wix, we are dedicated to providing you with the best AI tools to grow your businesses today while equipping you for the thrilling advancements of tomorrow.
