How The North Face is using Artificial Intelligence to close the gap between the in-store and online experience
Written by: Mariah Parker, Elizabeth Goudreau, Carolina Dassum and Alaric Bryant
As online shopping becomes more popular, apparel companies need to make sure they are positioning themselves favorably in the digital world. One company that has utilized new technologies to better understand their online shoppers needs, and alleviate the overwhelming paradox of choice e-commerce often presents is VF Corporation. VF corporation’s brand, The North Face has partnered with IBM’s Watson analytics to create an app that will fulfill your personal needs when shopping for outerwear. Using artificial intelligence provided by Fluid and powered by IBM’s Watson cognitive computing technology, The North Face shopper will experience Fluid’s Expert Personal Shopper (XPS) software to create a more engaging, personalized and relevant shopping experience. The tool acts as a digital brand expert, helping users navigate the online experience like a sharp in-store sales associate.
Why A.I.?
Although e-commerce has seen large amounts of growth over the past few years many consumers still prefer to buy apparel items in-person. Traveling to brick-and-mortar locations allows consumers to try on different sizes, touch and feel the product and assess its level of comfort. Brick-and-mortar stores also give consumers a level of customer service that has yet to be achieved online, whether that is product feedback or recommendations from knowledgeable sales associates. The North Face is using big data and artificial intelligence (AI) to solve this problem and make the in-store and online shopping experience more cohesive. The A.I. tool used acts as both a personal shopper and knowledgeable sales associate for the online consumer (Sanz, n.d.).
One of the biggest questions retailers and brands using e-commerce are trying to answer is how do we get users to complete an online purchase without losing interest? It is estimated that about 70 percent of shopping carts are abandoned online before a purchase is complete (Sanz, n.d.). Someone or something helping the user through each stage of the shopping process may be what’s needed for the user to complete the checkout process.
What is Watson Analytics?
Created 8 years ago,the system is a smart data discovery and analysis solution that allows users to discover and refine product selections, with almost immediate results. According to an IBM press release in 2015, “In keeping with The North Face brand’s mission of applying technology to transform the retail experience customers can now use natural conversation as they shop online via an intuitive, dialog-based recommendation engine powered by Fluid XPS and receive outerwear recommendations that are tailored to their needs” (Ngo, Crofton-Atkins, & Ajello, 2015). The fact that it can be used to create a psycholinguistic profile in less than a second makes it particularly interesting to retailers. Talk about building a persona.
The artificial intelligence starts by asking where, when and for what activities you will be using the jacket. Based the weather forecast for that location and the end user’s gender, it narrows down the search to 6 options. Based on the activity it rearranges the alternatives from “high match” to “low match”. This will save users time from scrolling through hundreds of jacket options, many of which would not even match their functional needs. The service takes less time that it would take to read this post.
Are we ready for it?
While the app is not perfect, it will keep learning. Launched in 2015 the software continues to improve with every use and learn from users. During its trial period IBM reported that customer engagement averaged two minutes in length, and the platform had a 60 percent click-through rate to try product recommendations (Ngo et al., 2015) Three out of four subjects or 75% of users said they would try the app again (Marshall, 2016). The app evolution will include building on background and delivering more information to enhance the experience. In a retail environment riddled with ‘big data’ from social media communication to customer reviews, brands are using Watson to turn this data information into meaningful customer insights that will enhance digital shopping experiences.
References
Marshall, M. (2016, -03–04T22:31:41+00:00). The north face to launch insanely smart watson-powered mobile shopping app next month. Retrieved from https://venturebeat.com/2016/03/04/the-north-face-to-launch-insanely-smart-watson-powered-shopping-app-next-month/
Ngo, N., Crofton-Atkins, B. & Ajello, P. (2015). The north face, IBM & fluid offer interactive shopping exp. Retrieved from https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/48479.wss
Sanz, L. (n.d.) The north face & watson: Bringing the in-store experience online| visual commerce & marketing platform. Retrieved from http://www.olapic.com/resources/the_north_face_ibm_artificial_intelligence/
