What is an AI Assistant and how can it work for your shop?

Most business leaders have a personal assistant. They’re often irreplaceable.

They have an intimate knowledge of how the business functions, and how their executive works. They can provide insight into various aspects of the company, and be a person to bounce ideas off.

Personal assistants often take on tasks that are essential to the everyday running of the business as well—like social media scheduling or managing diaries and meetings.

We can’t all afford personal assistants but what if we could translate that experience—that helpful, always-there, full of knowledge assistance—into a digital form?

The good news is that we already have, though we still have some way to go to recreate the whole human experience.The technology comes in the form of artificial intelligence assistants. We know full well that between direct debits and ATS resumes, automation is here to stay.

It doesn’t have to involve a massive shift, either. Did you know that no-code automation means that businesses can adapt quickly and easily to new technological trends—like virtual assistants? Implementing it now could mean that your company is primed to take on new software.

So are AI Assistants the future? And should we be embracing them now? Read on to to find out for yourself:

What is an AI Assistant?

An AI Assistant can have a variety of functions. The vast majority that people are familiar with at the moment are virtual personal assistants—those that help to streamline everyday tasks through automation.

That’s not their only use, though. They can be utilised across businesses as a way to manage workflows and free up time for more human-driven complex tasks—like starting a podcast.

Although you might have to get your tech team to set up a mobile app testing tutorial if you want to launch your own to the public, you’re in luck. There are several intelligent virtual assistants ready and waiting to enhance your work and life.

How does AI work?

Artificial intelligence uses machine learning (ML) combining vast amounts of data with intelligent algorithms that allow it to learn from patterns in that data.

Specifically, AI Assistants use a deep learning type of ML called Natural Language Processing (NLP), which allow them to interpret, analyse, and even generate human language. NLP is all about how machines interact with humans, and how to make that a seamless bridge.

This is what sets it aside from rule-based automation like chatbots and RPA, which require structured input to follow instructions. Artificial intelligence can respond based on what it knows about humans, and what it can guess from previous interactions.

A quick RPA video will show you that you can set up RPA in no time. With the right software, setting up an AI Assistant is just as straightforward.

How can an AI Assistant be useful?

It might seem like assistant apps are only useful for asking about the weather, but that’s simply not true.

From individual use to huge businesses like IBM, AI Assistants can be used to enhance experiences across the board.

Digital personal assistants

As individuals, many of us already use AI Assistants in some form or another. Whether we go for Siri on our phones or have invested in a Google Echo so that we can shout for the TV from another room, the technology is already integrated into our lives.

Many of these assistants can set up meetings and trigger group SMS messages, as well as making access to search engines pretty much instantaneous.

Research is simplified. Need a hotel at short notice? Just ask your virtual personal assistant. Want to check if a flight is arriving on time? Chat to your phone to find out.

What’s more, these impressive assistant apps can help us to control any smart home devices that we have: Thermostats and smart lights are some of our favourite options. Think of the cosy atmosphere you can create before you even get in from the cold.

Often used mainly through voice interaction, their user interfaces are normally pretty simple to use, despite the complicated technology that they rely on.

Intelligent assistants really have become a normal part of our lives.

Intelligent virtual assistants in ecommerce customer support

True artificial intelligence means software that is constantly learning from its surroundings, just like human beings.

Because of this, AI Assistants can be hugely useful in onsite ecommerce marketing. They can target site visitors, accessing a vast database of their habits and needs before assessing which move will be most helpful.

Should they open a chat window to answer any questions the potential customer has about a product? Or would it be more practical to send a follow-up quick message with a unique promo code?

Using an API-based AI Assistant can improve customer relationships for ecommerce retailers. Visitors feel as if they’re actually being listened to, and get relevant support in real-time.

User experience is an absolutely key part of any good ecommerce business. 73% of customers say it impacts their overall view of the brand, and their willingness to do business with them in future.

The values customers most want in their experiences—efficiency, knowledgeability, and convenience—can all be provided by AI Assistants.

The best digital assistants also merge seamlessly with their human support counterparts. Query getting a little in-depth? They’ll hand the conversation over to a brand representative, without interrupting the user’s experience at all.

Digital Assistant has features like Help Me Choose which helps customers choose products that truly work for them. Essentially, it’s treating customers to the experience they’d get in-store without them even having to leave the sofa.

These capabilities aren’t limited to ecommerce, of course. The combination of machine learning (ML) and natural language processing (NLP) that is a hallmark of artificial intelligence means that it can adapt to all industries, and can be useful in all sorts of sectors.

Within marketing

Alongside supporting customer journeys with well-timed reminders and suggestions, AI Assistants can be used further within marketing.

They are able to gather information about users and their habits, providing your marketing team with a wealth of data on which to experiment.

They can even produce A/B testing examples, and send out the most likely winners based on their data.

Anyone who’s ever run a split test can tell you that it’s easy to run out of ideas or lose steam. Imagine being able to automate the process, and having a simple report delivered to you of what worked and what didn’t.

Your marketing efforts could be focused elsewhere, leaving your new favourite digital assistant to perform the drudgery. Streamlined workflows mean that the humans are free to work on more creative campaigns.

AI Assistants within businesses

Automation has its place within general business processes, as well.

Think of an automated employee onboarding process. Did you know that a great onboarding process means that new employees are 69% more likely to stay at a company for three or more years?

By automating the process, you’d know that your new employees were getting the information and resources they needed to succeed.

If you can set this process up in advance, you won’t leave anything to chance. The last person to fill that position might leave suddenly and be unable to hand over effectively. Or your new employee might be working from home, leaving them rather isolated if the onboarding isn’t up to scratch.

But an automated solution? They’ll be up to speed in no time, and hopefully chatting along at the company barbecue for years to come.

Similarly, how much time could various departments save if Excel automation was a possibility? Hours of poring over spreadsheets in order to analyse the data and trends condensed into a simple visualisation in minutes. This also takes all the guesswork out of presenting to stakeholders who might be less numerically inclined!

Whether you opt for an AI Assistant or delve into robotic process automation with a brief RPA tutorial, the benefits to businesses of automation are almost infinite.

AI Assistants in data analysis

You might have gathered by now that AI Assistants are pretty good at managing and analysing large amounts of data. Whether or not you know the difference between process mining vs process discovery, you’ll know that the ability to trawl more data is always good.

You might use that data to make tough stock decisions or cut back the budget in underutilised areas.

You could use it to work out where you should be using your advertising spend—resulting in a higher ROI.

You can even use tools like SAP RPA or Systems Applications and Products in Data Processing Robotic Process Automation.

For those of us who haven’t come across it before, it’s a software that can be incredibly far-reaching within businesses. With uses across finance, human resources, and logistics, it’s fair to say that it’ll make life easier—if you can remember the name.

Best AI Assistants for

AI Assistants aren’t just used within businesses. In fact, they’re much more commonly found in personal use, as people reach for their phones to schedule meetings, set up phone calls, and trigger alarms.

Wondering whether you should invest in some new tech? We’ve got you. Simply scroll to whichever section sounds most like you.

So which virtual assistant is best for your needs?

Apple stans: Siri

Only available on Apple devices, Siri is possibly the most famous virtual personal assistant out there. Using intelligent speech recognition software means that users can simply speak into their devices, speeding up everyday processes.

There are anecdotes of Siri responding wittily to user questions. A favourite is how “who is the best assistant?” prompts a sassy “There are others?” response, for example.

Use the voice assistant to ask something a bit more existential, and you’ll discover one reason why Siri is just so popular. “Do you have a family?” elicits the response “I don’t have a family tree. But I have a pretty great file directory”.

It’s that acknowledgement that Apple’s Siri isn’t human that sets AI Assistants apart from technology like chatbots. Whilst bots try to mimic human responses—almost inevitably badly—true artificial intelligence seems to know it’s not human, yet can still respond in a way humans resonate with.

Of course, there are hiccups where the voice recognition isn’t entirely accurate, but then humans mishear things all the time as well.

You mostly hear about Siri being used on iPhones or iPads, but she’s available across all iOS devices, including CarPlay, HomePod, and Apple TV.

A pretty classic digital assistant, Siri can send text messages on your behalf, automatically call someone in your contact list, and even look up for you how many calories are in certain foods.

She makes everyday tasks run more smoothly, melting into the background when necessary but always there to help if you need it.

Ecommerce: Digital Assistant

Veering a little away from the personal assistant vibes of other AI Assistants, our Digital Assistant is a perfect way to implement automation in customer service.

Accessing all the data your company collects on potential customers and their shopping habits, Digital Assistant can gently encourage shoppers towards checkout or ask specific questions to gather feedback, without being too pushy.

It can send unique promo codes to users who it judges are teetering on the fence about a product, or recommend specific pages that they might find useful or interesting. This digital personal shopper is designed to recreate the in-store experience online.

This is particularly important in our increasingly digital world. 75% of consumers actually want more human interaction in their shopping experiences, and it gives that impression without having to employ multiple humans to do the job.

It can even suggest the perfect product to customers—one based on their browsing habits, just like an in-store assistant would.

Vibetrace enhances the ecommerce experience, which in turn prompts higher rates of conversion and loyalty.

Android fanatics: Google assistant

Those who have strayed away from Apple are often voracious proponents of Android and digital assistant Cortana.

But since Microsoft have pulled Cortana from everyday Android use, instead choosing to pivot to a more subscription-based model, Google Assistant has pulled ahead for Android users.

Samsung users actually have an in-built digital assistant in Bixby, but Google Assistant generally wins out even here. There were a multitude of complaints about the Bixby button being just too easy to activate, and unavoidable if you happen to own one of the models where it’s built into the phone.

Google Assistant combines some of the best features of other AI Assistants on this list into one easy-to-use piece of software. You have the whole internet available to you with just a quick question and can ask Google to perform internal tasks like storage checks or setting alarms.

Impressively, it even integrates with some smart home products like Philips Hue lights, so you can control the ambience of your home from the palm of your hand.

Of course, Google’s range isn’t limited to just your phone. Google Home users can frequently be heard calling out a sing-song “OK, Google!” (or their chosen wake word) followed by a request to play a movie Netflix or have their smart speakers put on a chill-out playlist.

Smart home enthusiasts: Amazon Alexa

Though Google Assistant does have some smart home capabilities, it’s Amazon’s Alexa that really steals the show in this regard.

The phone app does allow some control, but really you need an Amazon Fire or Amazon Echo device to really make the most out of this digital assistant. In fact, it’s this lack of functionality across devices that holds Alexa back from the smartphone popularity of Siri or Google Assistant.

From your phone, you can control other Amazon devices, play music through them, and the like. But once unlocked, Alexa’s true capabilities shine.

If you have smart locks, you can ask Alexa to lock your doors. You can get her to talk to cameras set up around your home. Guard mode sends you notifications if Alexa hears certain sounds like fire alarms or breaking glass. Smart thermostats can cool and heat your house at the drop of a hat.

What’s more, you can team Alexa with Amazon’s other offerings, like Audible. Stuck in the bath with nothing to do? Alexa, play I, Robot.

Alexa’s functionality is truly impressive, and probably what our forebears imagined when they were thinking of the future.

For PCs: Cortana

You will find Microsoft’s Cortana on any PC or laptop with a Windows 10 subscription. Cortana can read information throughout your computer and the internet, opening up a world of usefulness. It can combine its knowledge of your calendar and map apps to let you know when it’s time to leave for appointments—a pretty useful function if you’re chronically late to things.

It can use natural language searches to find files on your computer. So if you ask for “pictures from June 2021” you’ll be presented with a selection.

This is rather a lot more helpful than the blank stare you get from a typed request using the same words, even though the computer is perfectly capable of categorising files into such categories.

With the entire internet at your fingertips, you don’t have to open a new webpage to figure out what on earth four cups of flour is in actual measurements. You don’t have to navigate to delivery sites to track parcels. You don’t have to go through a search engine to find the weather.

All of these instances can just be typed or spoken into Cortana, and you’ll get the results in an instant.

As attached as we are to our mobile devices, we do spend the majority of the work day on a PC.

Are AI Assistants the future?

Whether you’re in charge of a business or simply trying to become a bit more organised, AI Assistants can alleviate the workload.

No more relying on Wikipedia, you’ll have the whole internet’s worth of reliable sources to back up any arguments.

Plus, the dictation feature means you can send text messages on the go (though not whilst driving—the laws still apply). Though we laugh about the voice recognition mistakes, they’re actually pretty few and far between.

For ecommerce businesses, it can be less about the technical interface and more about how the assistant app aids their end-user: their customers.

That might be through anticipating their needs proactively and sending messages to support them through the journey. It might look more like analysing visitor traffic to allow the company to discover what’s working in terms of lead generation and what isn’t.

And they can also be used behind the scenes: Finance departments can streamline invoicing, HR can make onboarding a joy, and data mining can be done in seconds—rather than hours.

Why not embrace the future today?