Ever wondered how an autopilot system flies a plane? How Siri or Google assistants work? or how some cars are voice activated? The ability of computers to process logic is not refutable but its ability to ‘think’ is something most of us least imagined before a few decades. So what is the mastermind behind this thinking ability – Artificial Intelligence (AI) which can be defined in short as a broad branch that aims to create computers or systems that can perform tasks intelligently and independently more like humans. Tasks can be referred to learning, reasoning, self-correction and specific AI applications include Machine vision, speech recognition, and expert systems. AI did not just stop with that as it is globally used for various purpose to organizations and enterprises to make the job easier for them as well as their customers. What exactly is that job AI aids them with?

What AI has got to do with retail?

AI renders in computers the intelligent systems that are taught or learned how to perform specific tasks without being explicitly programmed how to do so. For instance, Siri on the Apple iPhone is taught to perform functions to make a call or search something online. Similarly, retail industries take their business to the next level by implementing AI in their applications. Retail industries embrace AI and its technology to stay ahead of their competitors which eventually helps in winning businesses and customers. It would be really wise to start using an AI strategy if an enterprise does not use one already.

Improving customer engagement

Market research says that more than 63% organizations admitted that engagement is manifested in customer renewals, retention, and repeat purchases. Customer engagement is one of the most important metrics when it comes to growing your business. Having customers who are mindful about the latest technology, companies actually need to be smart enough to hack it and integrate smarter technologies unlike older methods used for customer interaction. Engaged customers play a notable role in marketing by referring and promoting a product or the company. Providing real-time and personalized experience is an excellent way to engage customers based on their requirement.  Some of the ways through which organizations can provide better shopping experience are Marketing Campaigns, Lead Generations, and Targeting.

Marketing Campaigns

intelligent marketing campaigns using ai

This is promoting a product through various mediums or channels like media, print, online platforms, etc. Having got several mediums to reach the right customers, it is a feat for the marketers even to get close to the audiences.  Their attempts to reach their customers manually are time-consuming and the delay will seemingly result in losing the business. Even if their attempts succeed, the customers are updated with all the latest technology and aware that they are being marketed to which makes the situation poor for the marketers. This is where AI comes to the rescue to a great extent by being the right platform to broadcast their product in the right method. AI is the primary enabler for rolling out hyper-personalized marketing campaigns at scale. An example for using AI to reach customers is through sending personalized emails. It helps marketers create tailor-made messages based on specific data from the past. AI is indeed smart enough to analyze and determine when and what kind of message to be sent that seeks their attention the most. This strategy is benevolent because you had taken the time to find their needs and a solution for that.

Lead Generation

intelligent marketing automation lead generation

This is expanding the scope of business by extracting customer information from a database or internet directories. Data gives you knowledge and that gives one the power as a marketer. With ample information in hand, one’s marketing strategy is sturdy and can create a scalable marketing process. Huge amount of data can be too difficult for manual processing and may miss out important insights. AI makes the job easier by discovering potential customers from various platforms such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram. AI is capable of scanning copious amount of data and not only picks out the best leads but also the right time and way to contact them. The propensity to know when to contact the best leads helps when a marketer is likely to lose the business or when the customer does not budge. AI is even capable of suggesting alternative solutions or products and its implementation gives lead generation efforts a massive boost.

Targeting

intelligent marketing targeting using ai

This is narrowing down the list of customers and focusing on serving them. Attempting to reach everyone in marketing can be a never ending process. Ambiguous and collective messages are less reachable and unlikely to resonate with your audience when compared to specific messages. The right way to attract the right people is through direct communication and that leads them to make business with the company. Also, knowing the customers better helps in reconsidering the products or services that are rendered to them. AI takes care of targeting the customers by scanning huge amounts of data in various platforms and analyzing the customers by how they answer certain questions. The final data is processed and AI generates the required result of the potential audience. It goes to the next level by targeting existing customers and makes them buy more of your products which are less easy than finding new customers.

Precisely, AI can be called as an imitation of human intelligence processes by machines. It focuses on the mundane tasks such as performing advanced search for leads, trying to communicate with them, promoting the product or the application which consumes most of the time. This helps marketers to focus on other important work such as increasing their conversion rates. It is obvious that artificial intelligence has a lot of practical applications in both the present and the future.

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