Personalized promotions
A few years ago, promotions were advertised in catalogs or through broadcasts. Both options were rather expensive and displayed the same information for all consumers coming to the store.
In supermarkets of the future, AI and
advanced analytics offer plenty of information on every individual buyer, such as their meal preferences, food allergies, and motives behind their purchases. By employing AI in grocery personalization, retailers gain extensive knowledge of who is walking down their aisles. This approach enables retailers to craft customized promotions to attract buyers and increase sales.
Attesting to the capabilities of AI is Gary Hawkins, the CEO of the Center for Advanced Retail and Technology based in Los Angeles: “AI technology can go incredibly deep and continues to learn over time, so it gets better at knowing which items to promote at what price. This will likely lead to different prices for different people, thanks to offers they are sent.”
For example, Woolworth in Australia employs supermarket technology of the future to customize its marketing emails considering not only consumers’ taste but also their past shopping behavior. The chain can predict which items every shopper is likely to run out of based on their previous purchases and suggests these items as well.
Another example of customization comes from Kroger, an American retail company. When consumers activate the store’s mobile app while inside, sensors detect them and send a personalized selection of items together with the prices via their preferred communication channel (e.g., video, voice, text).
In-store navigation
Effortless, time-saving navigation is a part of supermarkets of the future — especially if we’re talking about spacious retail facilities like the Mall of America, which incorporates over 520 stores and 60 restaurants. It can be daunting to move around such a space. To relieve its customers, the Mall of America deploys location-based AI chatbots, which operate through Facebook or a mobile app and assist customers in finding products and services.
Dynamic pricing
The dynamic pricing concept revolves around
using machine learning and artificial intelligence in shopping to determine the best pricing strategy for different products. For this,
algorithms analyze data from different sources, such as historical sales, competitor prices, stock levels, and special occasions. One of the tactics of dynamic pricing is cross selling a discounted item (e.g., buns) with a complimentary product (hot dogs) at a full price. This strategy helps reduce food waste by lowering the prices of goods nearing their expiration date.