Amazon's AI: Retail's Post-Digital Future Revealed

A rockstar marketing guru (my wife), having just read a short piece I had written on how the Amazon Digital Ledger (Blockchain) would end life as we know it, recommend that I read The Case for Digital Reinvention by Jacques Bughin, Laura LaBerge, and Anette Mellbye. The report did a great job positioning the winners and losers in the Digital Transformation race.

The McKinsey Report: Digital Transformation Success

Digital Transformation: Fast Followers vs. Bold Investments

One of the final conclusions in the McKinsey report focused on the benefits of large organisations acting as fast followers as opposed to becoming agile tech start-ups. I am not sure I agree with this completely, however, to assume some digital transformation is better than none could make sense if you lack the leadership and resources to make meaningful change. That said, I believe the key point was that "companies are not sufficiently bold in the magnitude and scope of their investments". Their research suggested that the more aggressively a company responds to digitization and disruption, the better the effect on their projected revenue and profit growth. There is, of course, an exception to this, within the ecosystem dimension "an overactive response to new competitors actually lowers projected growth, perhaps because many incumbents lack the assets and capabilities necessary for platform strategies.

Leveraging Modern Technology for Market Leadership

If an organisation has a platform strategy but lacks the fundamental technology building blocks for them to become a fast follower, how can they keep up with the market? Organisations now have a wealth of options to enable them to lead their markets such as; cognitive insights(AI) that are based on deep learning; intelligent bot platforms; and passive technologies such as AI enabled IOT devices.

The Future of Customer Experience: AI and Human-Centric Platforms

Conclusion

To drive a post-digital humanistic experience and platform in physical stores and spaces, a new kind of technology kit bag and skillset will be required. The AI tools of tomorrow are here today and can deliver actionable insights and delight the consumer with the information and content they wish they knew before they set out shopping.

Love and excitement are feelings and traits of exceptional transactional experiences that can only be brought to life with ultra-intelligent AI enabled business experience platforms. Do you agree? How can an organisation become a true brand with purpose without taking in to account modern day tools?

Would you like to learn more? Please do let me know.

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