Imagine you’re hiring for a new role. You probably wouldn’t bring on a CPA to run your search engine optimization strategy or a content writer to build out a new tech stack. Instead, you’d apply your understanding of common professional skill sets to hire a candidate that meets your needs.
You can take the same approach to choosing an AI ecommerce tool. Here’s a guide to the features, costs, and ecommerce applications of top AI tools.
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Benefits of using AI in ecommerce
Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning technologies can help business owners save time, cut costs, and make more sales. Here’s an overview of the benefits:
- Increased efficiency. AI tools can help create content, conduct target audience and market research, automate routine tasks, and handle certain types of customer interactions, saving you time and freeing you up to focus on business growth.
- Improved marketing performance. AI marketing tools can use demographic and behavioral data to generate insights into your target customer base and personalize marketing messages based on customer preferences.
- Better customer experience. AI tools can analyze customer reviews to help you address negative feedback or improve customer service by providing 24/7 support.
- Improved security. AI tools can detect fraud, authenticate online payments, and help you reduce your vulnerability to cyberattacks, protecting your business data and increasing customer confidence.
AI tools for ecommerce
AI-powered tools can support a diverse set of ecommerce business functions—from optimizing prices to editing video content. Here’s an overview of popular tools for ecommerce business owners:
ChatGPT
The AI-powered chatbot ChatGPT by OpenAI can help with many of the content needs for your ecommerce business, producing product descriptions, blog posts, social media posts, and marketing emails. You can also use it to conduct market research, brainstorm content ideas, find relevant keywords, optimize content for search, or copy edit existing content.
OpenAI offers both a free and a paid version of ChatGPT. The free version runs on the large language model (LLM) GPT-3.5, and paid plans use the updated LLM GPT-4. Paid versions also include DALL-E, which you can use to create images, produce advanced data analytics for marketing teams, and enable web browsing functions that allow you to access timely information.
Use: Written content creation, research
Features:
- Natural language processing (NLP) capabilities
- Content creation, proofreading, editing, and translation
- Market and keyword research functions
Pricing:
- Free plan available
- Plus: $20 per user per month
- Team: $25 per user per month
- Enterprise: Contact for custom pricing
Shopify Magic
Shopify Magic is a suite of tools for Shopify users designed to support most of the customer-facing elements of an ecommerce store. You can use its photo editor to swap out backgrounds on product images and its content generation tools to create SEO-friendly product descriptions and FAQ answers. Its newest tool, Sidekick, offers internal support to Shopify customers 24/7 by pulling performance data, offering ecommerce tips, and brainstorming creative ideas.
The full suite of tools is free for all Shopify merchants, regardless of their subscription plan.
Use: Email scheduling, photo editing, and content generation
Features:
- Product description generation
- Optimized email scheduling
- Suggested FAQ content
- Chatbot support
Pricing:
- Free for all Shopify merchants
ClickUp
ClickUp is a tool ecommerce brands use to streamline workflows and improve project management functions. It includes automation functions for tasks like updating project statuses, priorities, and assignments. It also comes with ecommerce-specific project templates, like a project plan template and a website marketing plan template. You can add its AI writing tool (ClickUp AI) to any paid plan for an additional $5 per user per month.
Use: Project management
Features:
- Customizable project views
- 24/7 customer support
- Built-in admin chat function
Pricing:
- Free plan available
- Unlimited: $7 per user per month
- Business: $12 per user per month
- Enterprise: Contact for custom pricing
Bazaarvoice
Bazaarvoice is an AI-powered ecommerce platform designed to help ecommerce store ownersboost sales. It uses real-time data analysis to identify a customer’s probability of conversion, determine the most relevant sales and marketing messages, and serve that customer with personalized communications, product recommendations, or offers.
Bazaarvoice doesn’t disclose its exact pricing structure, but the company offers a trial period where you’re charged based on revenue increases attributable to the platform. You can contact the Bazaarvoice team for more information and access to a free trial.
Use: Conversion and revenue optimization, marketing personalization
Features:
- Dynamic personalization
- Data mining and analysis
- Real-time marketing message optimization
- A/B testing
- Automated reporting
Pricing:
- Contact team
Runway
The AI software application Runway helps business owners create and edit video content. You can create original videos based on text, images, or audio files and use the tool’s editing functions to transform video styles and add or remove objects. Consider using Runway to generate social media marketing videos, advertisements, or product demonstrations.
Use: Video generation and editing
Features:
- Video generation
- Image, text, and audio prompts accepted
- Video editing
- Transcription and translation
- Audio cleaning
- Style transformations
Pricing:
- Free plan available
- Standard: $12 per month
- Pro: $28 per user per month
- Unlimited: $76 per user per month
- Enterprise: Contact for custom pricing
Jasper AI
Business owners can use Jasper AI to generate written content, including advertisements, articles, and product descriptions. Jasper also offers a brand voice feature that analyzes your existing content, develops an understanding of the tone your brand uses in a written context, and applies this learning to create original content in that voice. You can also manually enter your own voice and tone parameters.
More expensive plans accommodate multiple brand voices, generate images, and help you scale content creation with collaboration tools and an instant campaign feature that can generate an entire campaign’s worth of content.
Use: Written content creation
Features:
- NLP capabilities
- Custom brand voices
- Instant campaigns
- Content creation, editing, and repurposing
Pricing:
- Creator: $39 per user per month
- Pro: $59 per user per month
- Business: Contact for custom pricing
Prisync
Prisync is an AI-powered pricing optimization tool that offers competitor monitoring and dynamic pricing capabilities for online retailers. You can use it to track and analyze pricing data and adjust prices in bulk. It also offers a dynamic pricing functionality that tracks changes in the market and automatically adjusts prices to maximize profit margins.
Use: Pricing optimization
Features:
- Competitor monitoring
- Centralized tracking dashboard
- Bulk price adjustments
- Dynamic pricing capabilities
Pricing:
- Professional: $99 per month
- Premium: $199 per month
- Platinum: $399 per month
Boost.AI
Boost.AI is a conversational AI chatbot that allows business owners to leverage the power of AI for customer service. You can use it to support customer self-service as an autonomous virtual agent or to support your human customer service team. Boost.AI can respond to customer requests, solve problems, and offer proactive recommendations based on anticipated needs.
It can also analyze customer inquiries and generate suggested responses that agents can use out of the box or personalize as needed. The tool also supports voice calls, using conversational AI technology to provide 24/7 customer support by phone.
Use: Customer support
Features:
- NLP capabilities
- Autonomous support
- Agent assist mode
- Chat and voice call automation
Pricing:
- Contact team for demo
ViSenze
ViSenze is an AI search and discovery platform designed to help online store owners boost conversions. It offers six different recommendation engines, a visual search function, customer journey tracking, and customer insights.
ViSenze’s advanced recommendation engines make it easier for customers to navigate your online stores, which can boost customer satisfaction and encourage conversions. It also offers a contextual advertising feature, which analyzes customer behavior to help you create more relevant ads for display on third-party sites.
Use: Product discovery
Features:
- Visual search
- Product recommendations
- Cross-selling and upselling
- Customer journey visualization
- Customer data and performance tracking
- A/B testing
Pricing:
- Contact team for demo
Surfer AI
Surfer is a search engine optimization (SEO) tool. The company’s AI tool, Surfer AI, can produce SEO-optimized content based on a keyword. You enter a target keyword into the app, input article settings, and generate an article outline for review. Once you’ve approved the outline, it will automatically create a full-length article.
Surfer can also provide SEO-related feedback on human-generated content, and more expensive plans include SEO audit functions for your entire website. Surfer AI is included with higher-priced Surfer plans and is available as an add-on for Scale and Essential customers.
Use: On-page search engine optimization (SEO), content generation
Features:
- Keyword research
- Content generation
- Content optimization
- SEO audits
Pricing:
- Essential: $89 per month
- Scale: $129 per month
- Scale AI: $219 per month
- Enterprise: $399 per month
AI tools for ecommerce FAQ
Is there an AI for Shopify?
Shopify offers a suite of AI-powered features, collectively called Shopify Magic.
What is the best AI tool?
The best AI tool for your business depends on your budget parameters and goals. ChatGPT, ClickUp, and Runway are three powerful AI tools with free plans.
What functions can AI be used for in ecommerce?
AI technologies can support the following ecommerce functions:
- Customer engagement
- Digital marketing
- Customer services
- Performance tracking
- Pricing
- Conversion optimization
- Search engine optimization (SEO)
