Forge Retail Pulse: A sneak peek into conversational AI, search engine optimization, self-driving delivery, and digitization and automation in-store
Greetings Pulse Subscribers!
It’s another busy week in retail. Without further ado, here’s the agenda:
More human than human? AI call centers that mimic human agents
The future of delivery? Self-driving “middle mile” for retailers.
Brick-and-mortar vs. e-commerce: digitizing and automating retail stores
We’re making a list and checking it twice. Bain’s 2021 Holiday Shopping Outlook is here.
Ready? Let’s go.
Startup Deals
Conversational AI | As more companies switch to automated call centers, more customers are finding themselves annoyed with lengthy “press a number” solutions and even more frustrated with bots that can’t understand their needs. Thankfully, PolyAI is hearing the frustration loud and clear. By utilizing the latest generation of AI pre-trained on billions of natural conversations, callers are able to have real conversations with AI agents that feel ... human. From fast and accurate order updates to inventory checks, answering questions and more, PolyAI allows retailers to serve customers for 10x less than it would cost with a traditional call center. With no customer wait time and 24/7 AI agents that sound like the real deal, PolyAI claims to boost customer satisfaction by up to 40% and reduce handling times by up to five minutes. After a $12 million Series A, PolyAI raised an additional $14 million in a funding round led by Khosla Ventures.
Search Engine Optimization | For businesses looking to drive customers to their website, search engine optimization (SEO) is a crucial part of their marketing strategy. However, the dynamics between Google’s search bots and a website itself can be difficult to understand or navigate successfully, let alone optimize. Enter Botify. Their SEO platform ensures site content is better indexed so it appears more often in search results. As retailers know, ecommerce websites can be complex, with changing inventory, faceted navigation, and JavaScript-loaded elements, ecommerce SEO is especially difficult. For retailers, Botify can pinpoint slow-loading resources, perform device-specific JavaScript analysis, improve site architecture, and direct search engines away from unimportant pages to focus on key pages. All this boosts search traffic, truly optimizing SEO. With more than 500 customers including Expedia, Crate & Barrel, and Farfetch, Botify recently raised a $55 million Series C funding round.
Self-Driving Delivery | When most of us think of self-driving vehicles, we think of a future where robots drive our personal cars. However, Gatik, a Palo Alto-based autonomous vehicle startup, isn’t targeting consumers. Instead, they’re using their autonomous trucks for the “middle mile,” shuttling groceries and other goods from large distribution centers and dark stores to retail locations. By focusing on short-haul, B2B logistics for the retail industry, Gatik enables its customers to optimize their supply chain and meet consumer demand for real-time goods, while significantly reducing labor costs. They’re currently proving their technology with a pilot program for Walmart in Arkansas and Louisiana, and another in Ontario for Canadian retail giant Loblaw. In addition, Gatik recently expanded into Texas, carrying freight for customers in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Having formed a manufacturing partnership with Isuzu in 2020, they aim to mass produce medium-duty autonomous trucks by early 2023. Gatik raised $85 million in a Series B round led by Koch Disruptive Technologies, the venture arm of Koch Industries.
Theme Exploration: Digitization and Task Automation In-store
As e-commerce continues to grow and slice into retail profits, stores must find ways to improve customer experience while running more efficiently to stay competitive. Additionally, as the labor shortage continues to impact retail, employee productivity is more important than ever. Whether by enlisting robotic automation to free up employees, eliminating checkout lines, or streamlining communication and task management, these startups are helping retailers compete in an increasingly competitive market.
Robotic Automation | What if robots could take over the tedious and potentially dangerous aspects of retail jobs and do them quickly and safely every time? With automated commercial floor scrubbers, autonomous shelf scanning robots, and autonomous delivery robots that can move up to 1,000 pounds precisely every time, Brain Corp delivers just that. With their autonomous robotic platform they’ve created these three use cases for retailers at the moment and are expanding. By automating rote tasks, employees can focus on mission-critical tasks while safety is improved, and labor costs are saved. With more than 16,200 autonomous robots deployed and over six million autonomous hours of work logged already, Brain Corp is leading the way in deployed autonomous robots in public spaces.
Contactless Self-Checkout | Amazon recently announced expanding its contactless self-checkout to Whole Foods next year. Contactless self-checkout, aka “Just Walk Out” technology, allows consumers to grab what they want and go. With no need to wait in line or stop by a register, the shopping experience becomes smooth and seamless. As featured in our showcase on store optimization earlier this year, Standard is one of the leaders in this space with $239 million in funding backing its vision. Using primarily ceiling mounted cameras, its system can be installed without disruption to business or having to change store layout. As customer expectations evolve with technological innovation, retailers that adapt to these new expectations have the best chance to thrive.
Communication and Task Management | Stores and employees have more avenues to communicate than ever before: emails and text threads, notice boards, and inter-store chat apps, to name a few. Unfortunately, this barrage of messages and tasks can lead to confusion, conflicting priorities, wasted time and inefficiency. Zipline unifies and streamlines retail communication into one platform, taking conversations across multiple channels and making them succinct, digestible, and actionable. Ensuring everyone in the field has the information, context, and tools needed to succeed in their role makes it easier for retailers to measure the performance of stores across metrics.
Essential Industry Reads
While most of the country is slowly easing into Spooky Season, the folks at Bain know retailers are already prepping for the holidays. With their 2021 Holiday Shopping Outlook, the Bain team explores why they’re expecting a strong holiday shopping season and what retailers can do to take full advantage.
As consumer demand and retail spending bounce back from the pandemic, lingering supply chain issues are causing supply bottlenecks around the world. With demand threatening to outpace supply and shipping costs on the rise, RetailDive sits down with top retail executives to see how they’re faring with decreased inventory and how they’re managing the crisis at hand.
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See you in two weeks!