Google Cloud Study Finds More Retailers Planning to Use AI

<p><span class&equals;"legendSpanClass"><span class&equals;"xn-location"><strong>SUNNYVALE<&sol;strong> &&num;8212&semi; <&sol;span><&sol;span>Google Cloud has released new research that explores how retail decision makers in <span class&equals;"xn-location">the United States<&sol;span> perceive the value of generative AI&comma; and how they anticipate deploying the technology in 2024&period; A study commissioned by Google Cloud of 274 U&period;S&period; C-suite executives&comma; information technology leads&comma; and business development managers&comma; found that 81&percnt; of retail decision makers feel urgency to adopt generative AI technologies&comma; with 72&percnt; ready to deploy generative AI in the coming year&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In 2023&comma; generative AI emerged as one of the fastest-growing technology trends to date&comma; with retailers moving quickly to pilot and explore generative AI tools&comma; Now&comma; the majority &lpar;75&percnt;&rpar; of surveyed retail decision makers believe generative AI can be practically deployed in their business and 78&percnt; believe generative AI will impact their industry in the next 12 months&period; Nearly all &lpar;95&percnt;&rpar; of these decision makers said that generative AI will have an impact on customer experience&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;Generative AI has come so far in one year&comma; shifting from a barely known concept to an urgently needed answer for numerous business challenges&comma;&&num;8221&semi; said <span class&equals;"xn-person">Amy Eschliman<&sol;span>&comma; managing director&comma; Retail Industry Solutions at Google Cloud&period; &&num;8220&semi;2023 was a period of experimentation for retailers and many invested in learning where generative AI could have the biggest impact&period; In 2024&comma; we expect to see retail decision makers put this technology into production to improve shopping experiences&comma; increase productivity&comma; and fuel growth&period;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><b>Generative AI is expected to drive impact across five key areas in 2024<br class&equals;"dnr" &sol;><&sol;b>Retailers see potential for measurable change across their business&comma; with 75&percnt; of retail decision makers saying they believe generative AI is a key way retailers can reinvent themselves&period; After initiating generative AI deployments in 2023&comma; 72&percnt; of retail executives felt satisfied with their performance and outcomes&comma; while about 28&percnt; didn&&num;8217&semi;t&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Retail decision makers have also signaled a strong sense and understanding of where this new technology can be most impactful in their industry&period; Research respondents had high confidence that generative AI is poised to fundamentally change customer experience&comma; and almost half of retailers have started their generative AI journey for customer service automation&comma; with a portion currently piloting &lpar;25&percnt;&rpar; and others already deploying &lpar;22&percnt;&rpar;&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Notably&comma; retail decision makers have coalesced around five use cases where they&&num;8217&semi;d like to deploy generative AI in 2024&colon;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<ul >&NewLine;<li><b>Customer service automation<&sol;b>&colon; 59&percnt; of respondents want to use generative AI to streamline customer service with less human intervention by providing conversation summaries&comma; automating tasks&comma; and ultimately driving conversion&period; This could include inquiry resolutions&comma; appointment scheduling&comma; and completing transactions&period;<&sol;li>&NewLine;<li><b>Marketing support and product description generation<&sol;b>&colon; 49&percnt; of respondents want to use generative AI to accelerate product categorization and generate great customer-centric marketing copy&period;<&sol;li>&NewLine;<li><b>Creative assistance&colon;<&sol;b> 44&percnt; of respondents want to use generative AI to empower retail creative teams to curate bespoke images and creative content for campaigns and editorial placements and also enable one-to-one personalization&period;<&sol;li>&NewLine;<li><b>Conversational commerce<&sol;b>&colon; 40&percnt; of retail decision-makers want to use generative AI to address shopper inquiries with interactive responses beyond just product recommendations&period;<&sol;li>&NewLine;<li><b>Store associate knowledge and support<&sol;b>&colon; 38&percnt; of respondents want to use generative AI to automatically develop internal knowledge articles from existing data sources&comma; such as product documentation&comma; customer support tickets&comma; and employee training materials&period;<&sol;li>&NewLine;<&sol;ul>&NewLine;<p><b>Retailers will increasingly hire technical positions to support innovation<br class&equals;"dnr" &sol;><&sol;b>To continue supporting technology innovation in the coming year&comma; more than half of retail decision makers anticipate an increase in technical positions across several job functions&period; The leading positions include data scientists &lpar;77&percnt;&rpar;&comma; machine learning engineers &lpar;69&percnt;&rpar;&comma; prompt engineers &lpar;57&percnt;&rpar;&comma; and AI-related product managers and developers &lpar;78&percnt;&rpar;&period; Specifically&comma; retail decision makers expect hiring for data scientists across retail is anticipated to increase by 10&percnt;&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;