Websites Need to be 'GenAI first' (i.e. powered by bots and deliver personalised experiences)

Every website needs its own GenAI bot, that I can talk to, and use it to navigate the site's information and capabilities.

In March 2024's GenAI world, navigating a website feels just like using Google these days: highly inefficient, time-consuming and frustrating (for more on this topic see my article on Practical example of using ChatGPT instead of Google)

I want to 'talk/chat' with a website, vs having to figure out if what I'm looking for is somewhere in there.

Today's websites are the primary source of interaction, knowledge and action for potential or new consumers. But, navigating through the website's structure and content is a very primitive experience.

Websites have tons of useful information and capabilities buried in weird navigation systems that someone thought would suit the "average/target" visitor. But guess what? We're not average. We've got specific questions, requirements, and limited time.

What we really need are answers tailored to our needs. In other words, we need a custom website personalised for an audience of one, namely the visitor, user, customer, or partner

GenAI powered websites

Imagine visiting a website and having a conversation with a GenAI chatbot that understands you, in your language, your culture, in context of what you are looking for and with memory of past interactions.

As you fire away questions and interact with bot, dynamically created pages open up, relevant information appears, and we don't have to navigate through countless menus and pages to try to find what we are looking for.

These GenAI bots are like having a personal guide for websites/companies. They will make things effortless, intuitive, and most importantly, they will provide direct answers to questions.

'Traditional' Websites are very primitive and inefficient

The more I use GenAI, the more outdated and frustrating traditional websites feel.

I want answers, and I want them fast, without all the annoying and time-consuming navigation.

I want to feel like I’m talking to someone who gets me. And that's precisely what these GenAI can do —they can bridge the gap between us and the information we seek.

Obviously implementing AI chatbots on websites requires careful consideration of the medium and messaging. By leveraging AI technologies, businesses can empower their websites to deliver superior customer experiences and increase engagement.

Use 'Read-only' models and 'Bring your own content'

In the 'what can go wrong' category, adding an 'in-line GenAI bot' to a website is not trivial exercise, and it very important to do it securely and safely.

Here is my current advice:

• use read-only GenAI models (i.e. models that don't learn, like the ones you get from AWS Bedrock, OpenAI or Google's Vertex/Gemini)
• it's all about the prompt (i.e. use default non-trained models, where all knowledge is on the data/prompts that is provided to the GenAI bots, which is what is used to control the user's content and experience)
• bring your own content (i.e. don't depend on content that the model is 'supposed to know', the way to reduce or even eliminate hallucinations/inaccuracies is to ensure the models operate on content provided within the prompts)
• assume all that content and prompts are exposed (i.e. start from the assumption that the Bot's user/caller will be able to access and read everything that is 'known or learned' by the model, including the prompt(s) provided in the chat thread)
• use multiple GenAI models (i.e. use multiple models, as small/efficient as possible and focused on specific tasks)
• monitor and instrument everything (i.e. have maximum visibility into every interaction, chat threads, images created or dynamic UIs)
• start small, iterate and make it as deterministic as possible (i.e. test, test, test, learn, observe and reduce the 'what can go wrong' possibilities to the max)

Finally but not least, FOCUS ON THE CUSTOMER's experience and workflows.