Welcome Dunja Riehemann, Vice President of Global Marketing
As of April 1st, 2024, Dunja Riehemann joins Actindo's management team as Vice President Global...
The end may be nigh for search engines’ dominance of information delivery.
“By 2026, search marketing will lose market share to AI chatbots and other virtual agents, with traditional search engine volume dropping 25%,” says the 2024 Gartner Minimize Search Engine Disruptions From Generative AI report*.
We think this is likely to boost companies that leverage advanced chat experiences, powered by Large Language Models (LLMs) and integrated with a commerce ERP platform like Actindo Core1 to quickly answer queries.
Central ERP commerce platforms orchestrate processes (including empowering operations teams to ask chatbots in natural language), surface data needs in different channels, and make data available in the format required (for example, product information).
They can also combine and unify business data to generate accurate, advanced insights at scale for rapid decision-making in a fast-changing environment.
Precise Search Results, Better UX
"Conversational user interfaces such as voice and text chatbots are providing a richer context for search intent, delivering more precision in search results and better user experience," explains Gartner in the report.
"The increasing importance of GenAI in search experience is increasing the need for useful and authentic content relative to organic search experiences, reshaping strategies for keywords and backlinking".
As digital businesses grapple with this seismic shift, we believe that integrated tools like Actindo's Core1 platform will become crucial for managing e-commerce operations holistically, for current and future challenges.
This means melding diverse systems and processes into a unified entity that ensures accuracy across all channels, including product information management (PIM) data, business insights and post-purchase experiences.
On the operations side, it already enables retailers to quickly interrogate their stock levels and order processes using natural language queries. Find out more:
The Rise of the Chatbots
2023 saw the emergence of GenAI tools like ChatGPT and Bard, which are increasingly being used to power advanced chatbots for uses like customer service.
These are already claimed to pass the so-called “Turing test”, and an exclusive YouGov survey commissioned by Actindo in December 2023 found that over two-thirds of German consumers already believe that an AI chatbot should understand “most requests”:
A clear majority (70%) of respondents felt that an AI chatbot should be able to access the current status of a parcel and its estimated delivery date, or trigger appropriate customer service actions, such as requesting a return.
Omnichannel Management and BI Insights
What does this all mean for brands, retailers and manufacturers looking to gain efficiencies and delight customers?
It's important to note that these are predictions, not certainties. But it’s likely that AI will upend the commerce space in the next few years, as chatbots become more convincing (despite a few hiccups), and in some cases usurp search.
We believe it also means that omnichannel mastery will become even more important. Platforms like Actindo Core1 will be key to ensuring a seamless shopping experience for every customer, regardless of the channel chosen.
Finally, powerful business intelligence capabilities will be needed to arm business leaders with AI-enabled insights that aid strategic decision-making, amidst fast-evolving trends.
Want to see this in action? Book a call with our experts:
* Gartner, Minimize Search Engine Marketing Disruptions From Generative AI, lan Antin, Noam Dorros, Matt Wakeman, Isoke Mitchell, 30 January 2024. GARTNER is a registered trademark and service mark of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and is used herein with permission. All rights reserved.
