Of course, the AI services of major global companies are also expanding. Next up on this list is AI shopping assistant “Rufus” by e-commerce heavyweight Amazon.
For now, however, only customers in the United States will be able to use Rufus for their purchases because it goes live on Amazon’s mobile app Friday (yesterday) end of day.
Amazon had previously offered a beta version to some U.S. customers use and after nearly 1 million questions tested the product, the world’s largest e-commerce announced it is now available in its entirety for all of its clients with delivery address in USA Amazon introduced Rufus in February as well.
Thus, it is a chatbot powered by generative AI technology which can understand human text. The result, at least according to Amazon: Rufus is pretty good a responding to different questions the customer may have and generally communicating with them. This AI assistant will be available to all customers on the main navigation bar just below at a button located in Menu>See All Programs. So how will Rufus help with the shopping?
This chatbot can be used to perform real-time tasks like helping customers find their favorite product, and giving within products comparison etc the results of which are often being queried on web resorting numerous times & hence they rely more heavily for information through this medium. And will suggest the purchase of relevant products according to his or her tastes and needs. But by golly, Rufus.. not even close.
As well as help with product-related questions, customers can also ask Rufus general shopping advice – in much the same way we might consult a friend or family member. Eg: “What to look for when purchasing a laptop?” or: “What clothes to wear in summers?” If you ask questions like—the answer flows effortlessly for this AI shopping assistant.
Also, after a customer asks an question the chatbot will recommend 1-2 related questions. It was tested with beta users, and it turned out that a lot of customers clicked to expand those related questions due this enriching their shopping experience.
A unique feature of Rufus is that it provides additional but relevant information to the required product. Like if name of the place is given and wants to know about umbrellas then this AI powered chatbot will tell you about weather at that location along with some description around where it may be needed.
Rufus, which employs an in-house large language model (LLM) largely trained on online shopping. Product Description This chatbot is educated on wads of substance from Amazon, i.e., the item inventory itself and client audits.
Although Amazon did not elaborate on the websites from which data was sourced for training, especially if any other e-commerce retail sites were part of this.
Sources: TechCrunch, Engadget, About Amazon
