Generative AI has entered the Chat

Over the past few years, I've been lucky to be at the forefront of technology development in AI. From video and vision analytics, to fraud and big data, to conversational and generative AI solutions. Being at the coal-face, I know that even just using the term "AI" has become so diluted that we now need to put a prefix in front of it: generative-, conversational-, narrow-, general-, etc. Most "AI" we interact with daily is fundamentally just human-reinforced machine learning and robotic process automation. But as we see the artificial intelligence space proliferate with vendors, developers, prefixes and promises, there does shine an exciting future.

As technology advances at an unprecedented rate, we are seeing new and exciting opportunities arise in the realm of conversational commerce. At the forefront of this innovation is the development of generative AI, which is poised to revolutionise the way we interact with businesses and brands.

By now, most of the world has heard of ChatGPT. This is "Generative AI" with reinforced human learning, which refers to artificial intelligence systems that can generate new, unique responses in natural language based on a given input, with the added layer of human oversight and value adjustments. This technology has already been employed in chatbots, voice assistants, and virtual agents, but its potential is far greater than simply responding to user queries. In fact, generative AI has the power to transform the entire customer experience, from personalised recommendations to dynamic pricing strategies - both for the employees and the customers involved. It can even help you solve that pesky Excel formula issue you've been stuck on...

One of the most exciting aspects of generative AI is its ability to understand and mimic human language. Yes - understand. This means that as the technology continues to evolve, it will become increasingly difficult to distinguish between a conversation with a human and one with a machine. This has significant implications for conversational commerce, as it allows businesses to scale their customer service operations without sacrificing the personal touch that consumers crave. However, it also brings with it new and interesting risks and potential brand-damaging chasms that brands need to be aware of and mitigate before releasing their charming version of Skynet into the world. You may have seen some articles about Elon Musk, Steve Wozniak and others penning an open letter about the dangers and considerations. If not, I've linked it below:

While on the one hand, there is validity to the warning and future-proofing of technology like ChatGPT, Dall-E and more. For now, the benefits outweigh the costs and the version that our Enterprises will be leveraging will (read: should) have controls for risk, exposure, I/O, and others that already exist today around abusive and unethical language, sensitive information and vulnerable users. In my experience, most brands are more risk-adverse than less, so I see the commercial users driving a lot of this risk management in conjunction with centralised and globalised standards, not dissimilar to ISO or GDPR.

Generative AI and conversational commerce are not just about simulating human conversation. It also has the potential to unlock new revenue streams through dynamic pricing and recommendation systems. For example, imagine a fashion retailer that uses generative AI to analyse a customer's past purchases, browsing history, and social media activity to generate personalised recommendations. This same technology could also be used to dynamically adjust pricing based on a variety of factors, such as inventory levels, customer demand, and competitor pricing. This could then be served to the customer via: an agent-facing recommendation, improving efficiency and effectiveness; a trained automated assistant that can manage sales end-to-end, improving costs and providing time back to the humans in the loop; or it could serve these options to the customer through many other channels, improving reach and interoperability.

Of course, with great power comes great responsibility. As generative AI becomes more sophisticated, we need to ensure that it is being used ethically and transparently. This means being upfront with customers about when they are interacting with a machine rather than a human, as well as being transparent about how data is being collected and used. In addition, brands will need to begin creating their own structures around how, when, where and why this technology can and will be used, and where it makes the most sense. Factors we need to consider are customer experience (CX), employee/agent experience (EX), brand experience (BX) and technology experience (TX).

Being able to thread the right journeys across CX, EX, BX and TX is not a new challenge. In fact, there are a lot of very successful consultancies and technology companies providing solutions to this already. However, with the fast and potential limitless growth of generative AI and the broad-reaching impacts that it could have on business, this has created a new vector from which we need to consider the way in which we thread these journeys.

In conclusion, the future of conversational commerce is bright, and generative AI is poised to play a significant role in shaping that future. By leveraging the power of AI to personalise the customer, employee, brand and technology experiences and unlock new revenue streams, businesses can stay ahead of the curve and meet the ever-evolving needs of their customers. Of course, there is a BUT - we must also be mindful of the ethical considerations that come with this technology and work to ensure that it is used responsibly.

Please reach out to me on LinkedIn, or at [email protected] if you'd like to continue the discussion, or simply leave me a comment on this post.

Stay safe out there,

Ben