“So many aspects of our tactile and taste-driven business cannot be replaced by AI, but our processes can certainly be enhanced by it,” Williams Sonoma CEO Laura Alber told investors on its earnings call last month.
With the launch of Otto, its AI-powered shopping assistant for its Pottery Barn brand this past August, Sonoma now has two agents: Otto joins Olive which has been up and running since last year for its namesake kitchen and housewares division.
“Both Olive and Otto are helping our customers with product recommendations, and they are increasing consumer engagement with our content, design tools and free design service offerings,” Alber said on the earnings call, adding this technology takes the retailer to the next level in customer service.
Both agents, the company said, are improving the checkout experience and overall customer journey, while strengthening product discovery and scaling personalization across its brand portfolio.
Added Sameer Hassan, chief technology and digital officer, “What we’re doing is we’re taking our advantages, category authority, decades of expertise, proprietary tech platforms and our secret sauce, which is rich first-party data that nobody else has. We’re connecting it with AI, and we’re starting to drive some really, really impactful results.”
Sonoma executives said customers using Olive so far have converted shopping to buying at three times a higher rate than those who do not. So far the early results from Otto have been similar to that of Olive. Over 70 percent of customer engagements with Otto are resolved without handing the customer over to a human representative, according to Hassan.
Being able to scale personalization is the key to Sonoma’s AI successes so far. “A visit where we personalize the experience now generates roughly nine times the revenue of an average visit,” Hassan said. “Last year that was two times. So you’re seeing that acceleration again.”