A whopping84% of organizations say AI gives them a competitive advantage. If you’re looking for ways to implement AI to make a significant impact on your operational efficiency, customer experience, and revenue, here’s everything you need to know.

AI in ecommerce refers to the integration of AI technologies likemachine learning andnatural language processing (NLP) to make online shopping better for everyone. For example, when anonline store suggests relevant products to go along with other items in your cart, AI is working behind the scenes. It analyzes your browsing history, storefront clicks, and past interactions to serve up truly personalized suggestions.

Ecommerce AI isn’t just improving the customer experience. It can also streamline business operations, help you make data-driven decisions, and eliminate tedious, repetitive tasks. How?Generative AI (gen AI) can help you write (and personalize!)product descriptions,marketing content, and both internal and external business communications. While advanced AI likepredictive analytics can sift through historical sales data to forecast future trends and customer needs. These insights help you improve inventory and implement dynamicpricing strategies. From content creation to large-scale data analysis, ecommerce AI is a gamechanger for businesses — and the numbers prove it:

AI offers a wide range of benefits for ecommerce businesses, significantly impacting both the ecommercecustomer experience (CX) and operations.

Most customers(73%) expect better personalization as technology advances. Today's consumers are inundated with choices and expect hyperpersonalized experiences. From shopping recommendations to promotional messages — they want to feel truly understood and valued. The best part? AI and hyper-personalization go hand in hand.

AI can pore over vast amounts of customer data to help you personalizeecommerce customer service, product recommendations, andmarketing campaigns, amongst other things. When shoppers see items they ‌ want, they're more inclined to add them to their cart and complete thecheckout process. This increases yourconversion rates andaverage order value (AOV).

Pro tip: Use AI tosegment yourtarget audience, as it can help you personalize accurately instead of chasing multiple customer segments that may not convert.

Our studies show that about43% of consumers stop shopping from a brand after a poor customer service experience. Luckily, AI can change this. You can effortlessly deliver more contextual, personalized customer service while boosting yourcustomer satisfaction. Here are a few ways AI can improve your service quality:

• 24/7 instant support: Set up chatbots or intelligent, autonomousAI agents like Agentforce to deliver round-the-clock service. They can answer frequently-asked questions (FAQs), handleorder management, and offer immediate assistance beyond business hours.
• Personalized interactions: AI analyzes customer data like past purchases, browsing history, and conducts sentiment analysis to provide highly tailored responses and recommendations. It's like having a personalshopping assistant who remembers your preferences and understands your mood.
• Faster issue resolution: AI can quickly identify the intent behind a customer's query and either provide an instant service or route them to the most appropriate team. This reduces long waiting hours and significantly improve customer satisfaction.
• Proactive support: AI can monitor customer behavior and predict potential issues before they flare up. For example, if a delivery is delayed, AI can automatically send proactive updates to your customer. This reduces their need to contact support.

AI can dramatically improve your bottom line by helping you identify best-selling products and optimize yourecommerce website orlanding pages. Say you’re offeringproduct bundles. AI can help you curate and personalize them based on your customer behavior and preferences. Also, it optimizes pricing in real-time based on demand and competitor activity for maximum profitability on every sale.

Automate repetitive tasks acrossemail marketing,fulfillment, andsales cycles to make sure your team focuses on more strategic tasks. Agentforce can effortlessly handle these tasks while recommending products that your customers are likely to buy. For example,SharkNinjadoes this like a pro. When a customer asks about their orders, Agentforce provides a status update and suggests complementary products. For instance, if someone inquires about their ice cream maker, Agentforce shares the delivery date and recommends reusable storage containers.

SharkNinja usesCommerce Cloud to identifyupselling, andcross-selling opportunities that boost revenue. This ‌also unifies their marketing, sales, and service efforts, helping them tap into revenue opportunities at every touchpoint.

About7 in 10 marketers expect Gen AI to reduce repetitive tasks so they can focus on strategic and critical tasks. AI can boost overall productivity and employee morale by handling tasks like data entry, inventory updates, and answering common concerns. It also provides data-backed insights, enabling teams to make faster, more informed decisions.

Think of AI as an addition across your departments that can manage tasks

that once felt tedious and monotonous. This also opens up new career trajectories and reskilling opportunities. Beyond this, when ​​employees focus on strategic activities such as innovation, deepercustomer engagement, andmarket research, it enhances their efficiency and job satisfaction.

Forty percent of customers agree that AI raises the bar on customer experiences. By now, shoppers are accustomed to personalized product recommendations and relevant promotions. But new innovations are improving on and adding to personalized shopping experiences. In the past, AI was mostly predictive. Now, it can anticipate. For example, advanced neural networks can analyze past behavior, browsing patterns, and purchase timelines to anticipate intent and recommend productsproactively.

With the right AI tools and ecommerce platform, your site can show a different homepage to each user based on location, season, and personal shopping habits. AI can also continuously update your user segments based on real-time data. Ultimately, ecommerce AI innovations mean that you can providehyper-personalized, immediate experiences that resonate deeply with each individual shopper.

In brick-and-mortar stores, sales and service agents are your biggest asset. They can pick up on cues from customers as they shop and suggest appropriate products. Luckily,agentic commerce is here — ‌and it’s a groundbreaking shift from what ecommerce has experienced so far.

AI agents like Agentforce act as sophisticated, independent "agents" rather than just a conversational interface like live chat or chatbots. Unlike humans, agents don’t sleep and can deliver 24/7 customer service. They can deliveromni-channel customer service and effortlessly handle common concerns or frequently asked questions (FAQs). For example, when a customer contacts about a delayed order, Agentforce can check the order, detect a fulfillment issue, and even proactively initiate a partial refund or offer a substitute. Agentforce automatically hands off customer issues requiring human expertise to the most suitable customer service representative. This enables AI to fully resolve complex customer issues, not just answer them.

Product discovery is another key area where agents can help. In fact,about 39% of businesses with AI see a major improvement in this aspect. AI and agents can understand customer intent through natural language, analyze browsing history and preferences to offer tailored product recommendations. AI can also assist withconversational commerce and enable visual or voice searches for a more intuitive shopping experience. This helps customers quickly find exactly what they're looking for, or even discover products they didn't know they needed.

A classic example? If your customer wants to recreate an outfit from the latest Cannes Film Festival or is putting together a sensational piece for Halloween, agents can help them curate a look. Instead of spending hours on an ecommerce website, they can upload a photo or seek recommendations from the AI. Experiences like this increase repeat purchases, and therefore, your customer retention rate.

• What are customersreally looking for? AI analyzes search queries, browsing patterns, and even visual inputs to understand intent far beyond simple keywords. This leads to more relevant search results and product recommendations.
• How can we personalize their journey? AI analyzes purchase history, demographics, and real-time interactions to personalizecontent, offers, and website experiences. This makes every touchpoint feel unique.
• How do customers truly feel about your brand?AImonitors social media, reviews, and customer service interactions to gauge public sentiment about your brand. Best part? It provides insights forecommerce marketing and reputation management.
• When are they most likely to convert (or churn)? Predictive analytics can forecast buying patterns and identify customers at risk of leaving. It can then retain ‌ customers through proactive engagement and reduceshopping cart abandonment.
• How can we provide instant, intelligent support? AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants handle routine inquiries 24/7, guiding customers through product discovery, order tracking, and troubleshooting. This way, your team can focus on more strategic, complex issues.
• What complementary products will they love? AI identifies cross-selling and upselling opportunities by analyzing purchase habits and customer behavior. This nudges customers toward additional relevant items.
• How can we personalize search and navigation? AI improves thesite search experience by understanding user intent and preferences. This is the cornerstone of product discovery and eventually revenue generation.
• How much should we spend on advertising? AI can analyze the performance of various advertisements, keywords, and creative assets in real-time. It can automatically adjust bids and allocate budgets to improvemarketing ROI across platforms like Google Ads andsocial media.

An immersive ecommerce experience doesn’t end with an order ‌ — it extends beyondfulfillment, too. AI can take up the routine tasks of tracking and collecting customer feedback, sending shipping and order tracking links, and managing returns. AI can send personalized thank-you messages and order confirmations, making customers feel valued and appreciated. Thoughtful acts like these go a long way.

AI can also conductsurveys to gather your customer sentiment. Such insights can help you strategize your ecommerce offerings.Inventory management is another critical area for AI to jump into. It can help your fulfillment partners map out more sustainable delivery routes — all while suggesting cost-effective ways to source and ship items. This is especially useful as shipping costs, sustainability concerns, and inefficient order routing are top business concerns.

About36% of ecommerce businesses experienced a site outage in the past year, with 57% of them happening during a busy season. Site outages or data breaches can cause significant revenue loss, damage to brand reputation, and frustrated customers. AI helps you shift from reactive to proactive and even predictive maintenance. Machine learning algorithms are trained on historical data to understand "normal" operational patterns. They can then identify subtle anomalies in real-time before they escalate into a full-blown outage or ecommerce fraud. For example, a gradual increase in server load or a slight spike in error rates might be overlooked by human monitoring but flagged by AI.

When a new transaction or user activity deviates significantly from standard user behavior, the AI flags it as suspicious. This includes:

• Sudden, high-value purchases on new accounts
• Multiple failed login attempts
• Purchases from unusual locations or devices
• Rapid changes to account details
• Repeated small orders (often used to test stolen card numbers)

A trustedcustomer relationship management (CRM) tool like Commerce Cloud can help you defend your ecommerce business like a pro. It’s continuously monitors your site to detect and alerts on potential issues before they cause outages. Commerce Cloud comes built-in with AI that regularly applies security updates and patches to protect against vulnerabilities. It flags high-risk orders for immediate review, and helps you meet regulatory standards likePayment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) to protect customer data. Evensmall and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) with lean teams and resources can sleep at peace, without worrying aboutcybersecurity threats or site crashes.

• AI models are only as good as the data they're trained on. Ecommerce businesses often struggle with messy, inconsistent, incomplete, or siloed data from various sources like website, CRM,enterprise resource planning (ERP), and social media.
• Many established ecommerce businesses operate on legacy systems.Andthey weren't built with AI integration in mind. Integrating modern AI solutions with these older, often rigid, infrastructures can be complex, time-consuming, and expensive.
• AI models need continuous monitoring and retraining with new data. This is what helps AI remain effective as market conditions or customer behaviors evolve. This adds to ongoing operational costs.
• AI heavily relies on customer data. This may raise significant concerns about data privacy and compliance with regulations likeGeneral Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) andCalifornia Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). Mishandling data can lead to hefty fines, reputational damage, and loss of customer trust. It’s critical to partner with trustworthy vendors to ensure compliance.
• AI algorithms can unintentionally inherit biases. Ifbiases are present in the training data, this can lead to discriminatory or unfair results. This includes biased product recommendations, unfair pricing, or exclusion of certain customer groups.

When implemented strategically and used correctly, ecommerce AI can elevate customer experiences and increase operational efficiency. The rightecommerce platform will empower your business with out-of-the-box tools andcapabilities to keep up with competition, personalize shopping, and improve employee productivity.