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IBM’s Watson delivers AI-powered shopper support to the Mall of America
The holidays are nearly here and IBM Corp. is getting into the holiday spirit by calling on its Watson cognitive computing system to power one of the busiest shopping periods of the year.
Watson is being used to pilot mobile concierges at both the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minn., and Fashion Island in Newport Beach, Calif., with “E.L.F.” and “At Your Service,” respectively, tapping into the IBM Watson Conversation API to analyze shoppers’ inquiries and to help them plan visits.
Mall of America’s E.L.F. is a chatbot that taps into Watson’s AlchemyLanguage API to understand guest inquiries and sentiments as they interact either through Facebook or the mobile browser on their phone. It guides guests through a number of questions to get a feel for what a customer wants to do, offering suggestions based on that feedback. In case the customer wants more, the system connects to a real person for assistance.
Fashion Island’s At Your Service also taps into Watson to offer customers access to information on the go, or what IBM describes as “creating in essence an enhanced directory right from the palm of their hand.” Guests text (949) 734-7364 for a response and can ask pretty much anything related to the mall. At Your Service integrates Watson’s Conversation and AlchemyLanguage APIs to enable natural language interactions.
“The power of AI is introducing enormous potential for retail, and I’m excited about the growing role data will play in this transformation,” Satisfi Chief Executive Officer Don White told SiliconANGLE via email. As Michelle Peluso, IBM’s chief marketing officer, said in a recent Forbes interview, “because of Watson, we’re able to put more and more unstructured data to use and build innovations that further improve the consumer experience.”
“Both solutions leverage the speed and simplicity of the Watson Conversation API to engage consumers in a natural language,” White added. “They also follow on the success of Satisfi and IBM Watson’s first pilot with Macy’s from this past summer… and highlight how consumers are increasingly turning to their mobile devices to help navigate in-store shopping.”
Image credit: mrseb/Flickr/CC by 2.0
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