The advent of AI is set to disrupt every industry, including retail. The hype about what the future holds for the retail industry is incessant: warehouse robots, delivery drones, face recognition systems allowing customers to shop without ever having to open a wallet, and a plethora of other innovations which defy imagination are here to stay, claim tech enthusiasts. All of this may sound a bit unrealistic when you’re struggling with organizing your warehouse inventory process, eliminating performance bottlenecks and figuring out shipping schemes for optimal product delivery.
Yet, one thing is for sure — the success of your business and, possibly, it’s mere existence, depends on how your company will face the digital transformation challenge. The good news is — you don’t have to start with something impressive or spectacular. You can achieve a lot just by streamlining your back office operations with robotic process automation.
This may sound mundane, but it is, actually, a part of a larger AI concept. AI implementation starts with complete automation of routine, repetitive, rule-based tasks, including but not limited to:
– Capturing, validating and processing big data;
– Predictive analytics based on recorded data and behavioral patterns;
– Communicating with users and customers according to pre-established protocols, etc.
In fact, many companies are adopting such tools on a regular basis. Chatbots, business intelligence apps, and middleware solutions facilitating backend operations are now becoming mainstream. Many obstacles, however, are still standing in the way of digital transformation. Although SMB companies are trying hard not to lag behind, major innovations are still the prerogative of retail tycoons such as Alibaba or Amazon.
Obstacles on the way to digital transformation
We may blame that, to some extent, on conservative mentality. When Toys R Us went bankrupt, e-commerce insiders tried to learn from their mistakes. While analyzing their shortcomings, they clearly saw that failure to innovate became one of the major reasons why their 70-year market presence has come to an end: they no longer provided top-notch customer experience, they lacked online presence, and, simply put, they stopped being “fun”, which means tech-savvy for today’s kids.
Most companies, however, understand the importance of innovations but lack resources to introduce them. They can’t afford to buy costly SaaS solutions, although tech giants are continuously coming up with new offerings. They also lack time, money and expertise to develop their own solutions in-house. Simply finding an expert in their area with relevant experience is a tricky task and will take months if not years: despite all the hype about emerging tech, AI and data science professionals are still quite rare. Most of them are already employed and will have to be persuaded to change jobs, which implies hefty salaries and compensation packages.
There’s yet another reason why business owners are reluctant to adopt even the simplest AI solutions: they are wary that they will disrupt their existing ecosystem. Software solutions for small and medium organizations have to be custom-made and are very business-specific. E-commerce companies must pass through a tight bottleneck: not using AI tools will push them out of business, while failing to use them properly could seriously disrupt their operations.
Under these circumstances, partnering with reliable third-party IT outsourcing companies is a balanced and well-informed decision.
Leveraging IT outsourcing to embrace innovations
It’s true that IT outsourcing business is now undergoing a major transformation: the long-established players on ITO scene are honing their skill sets in order to shift to AI development outsourcing. They are restructuring their business models and expanding their talent pools to meet client demand for AI solutions. For non-IT companies, educating their own employees to the level where they could develop complex AI tools would require investing time and money with an unexpected outcome. An outsourcing model, with a dedicated development team working exclusively on crafting business-specific tools looks much more attractive.
So, as an e-commerce entrepreneur, what’s the best thing you can do to guide your business through a digital transformation? Focus on critical evaluation of your company operations and core processes: what are your most pressing performance bottlenecks? Which of your business processes call for automation and which cannot run without human supervision? Having this understanding will assist you as you start negotiating with a third-party company that will work to develop personalized AI tools for your business.
As you choose an outsourcing provider, look for a reputable company with a recorded history of successfully solved client cases, and never settle for less.