AI can’t save 618 either.

AI cannot help 618 either.

“Rolls” is the most intuitive feeling that many people have for this year’s 618. E-commerce platforms, consumer brands, and technology companies have all rolled up AI. Each of them has applied AIGC, ChatGPT, large language models, and other technologies in different stages of product production, promotion, and sales.

“The anchor in the live broadcast room is AI, and you can customize an exclusive digital person for 200 yuan, saving a lot of money”, “Customer service does not need a real person at all, AI customer service can solve 70% of the problems”, “AI shopping guides have better effects, and they can accurately push the products needed by customers by “crawling” customer’s digital information”, “Products designed by AI have been launched”…

Before 618, Taobao, JD.com, Kuaishou, and Baidu were “rushing” to lay out AI customer service and AI shopping guides; brands such as Yili, Wong Lo Kat, Zhong Xuegao, and Zhou Heiya launched AI packaging, AI advertising, and AI formulas.

618 has ended, but from the current market feedback, the involvement of AI is visibly deep, but the effect brought by AI seems not significant. No brand has achieved a breakthrough thanks to AI, and the 618 that couldn’t be rolled up seems to have failed to reverse the “decline” with AI.

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01 E-commerce platforms start an AI “competition”

Before the big promotion, major e-commerce platforms, apart from offering discounts to merchants and users during 618, are also telling stories about AI.

Jingdong took the first shot for AI. On May 22, JD Cloud (JD’s technology brand) launched the “Free Digital Person Live Room Gathering” plan. During the promotion period, “AI anchors” and “digital avatars” were created for some JD stores. At the same time, JD Cloud launched ChatJD based on ChatGPT to deploy intelligent dialogue customer service.

Taobao followed suit. On May 23, Taobao Tmall launched the “AI Ecological Partner Program”, applying AI to store opening decoration, creative product image, marketing planning and promotion, content organization and creation, and providing intelligent generation services for merchants in the content, data, and customer service fields.

Kuaishou also announced that it will use AI technology to provide merchants with search summary functions, and use AI to empower the creation of commodity copywriting, pictures, advertising scripts, and video effects.

It is worth noting that Baidu also rolled into 618 with AI this year. At the launch of the “Baidu 618 AI Shopping Carnival” investment conference, Baidu stated that the newly launched e-commerce brand Baidu Optimal will launch new AI features such as virtual shopping guides, AI purchase lists, virtual live broadcast rooms, and AIGC seeding.

After trying out, it was found that compared to other e-commerce platforms, Baidu Youxuan’s AI application is more reflected in product recommendations, price comparisons, and shopping guide customer service. When users search for product content, intelligent shopping guides will promptly recommend related products and recommend products from different platforms such as Taobao, Pinduoduo, and JD.

Source / Baidu

From the actions of the above companies, the use of AI by e-commerce platforms currently targets both the merchant and user sides. Ah Zhe, who is engaged in e-commerce operations, introduced that it can be subdivided into four aspects: recommendation engine (providing personalized recommendations using AI algorithms), search optimization (using AI to improve the accuracy of search engines), order processing (using AI to automatically process massive orders), and data analysis (using AI to predict market trends).

He said that compared with other fields that are further away from consumers, the application scenarios of AI in e-commerce are more simple and direct. Using a large amount of existing data, AI can be quickly and completely trained and provide adapted services to consumers faster.

02 Brand: Roll packaging, roll advertising

In addition to e-commerce platforms launching AI functions ahead of schedule during 618, many brands have also joined the ranks of the AI war, launched AI products, and introduced AI packaging, AI advertising, and AI images.

The earliest to try AI was fast-moving consumer goods brands. When ChatGPT became popular, Zhong Xuegao launched a new product series “Sa’Saa” led by AI. According to official information, the product name, taste, and packaging design are all led by ChatGPT and Wenxin’s one-word multi-AI generation software.

More brands choose AI as a design tool and work on packaging.

First, use AI to design product packaging. Yili has launched six AI-designed packaging with Chinese landscapes as the theme. The official said that the series of packaging, from concept to visual design, is all participated or even led by AI; Yongchuang Tianya SuperX also released four limited-edition canned beer new packaging designs, two of which are designed by AI, and two are designed by human designers. There is little difference between the two visually. In addition, brands such as Coca-Cola, Wang Laoji, Anmuxi, and Nestle have also released AI packaging.

CC, a food packaging designer, introduced to Kaiboluocaijing that AI-designed packaging is also the application area where brands currently use AI the most. Using AI text and image generation software such as ChatGPT, Midjourney, and Blockingckage Design AI for product design, it meets the visual production needs and consumer needs of younger and more fashionable. More importantly, the advantage of generating images intelligently is that it is fast, has a high degree of fusion, and is highly innovative. It can generate enough alternative plans in a short period of time.

CC believes that AI-assisted product design will be the future mainstream.

Next is using AI to design ads. During the 618 shopping festival, Baidu’s AI painting tool, Wenxin Yige, partnered with JD.com to launch the first AI offline advertising in the e-commerce industry. It also released text and image “college entrance exam blessings” advertisements in collaboration with brands such as Zhou Hei Ya, Wang Lao Ji, and Xu Fu Ji. Wufangzhai combined AI with traditional culture to launch video ads.

Yuzi, a creative planning assistant at an advertising company, explained that AI can participate in the entire process from market research and data analysis before product launch, packaging design and naming during product production, to product promotion after launch. “Ask AI when in doubt; ask AI when there are no clues to the plan; ask AI when there is no inspiration for copywriting.”

Yuzi added, “Compared with the solutions given by designers, AI advertising saves 30% of costs and 70% of time, which is very suitable for shopping nodes with tight schedules and urgent tasks.”

03 618 Volume AI, the effect is not good?

Unlike technology companies fighting AI, whether it is an e-commerce platform or a brand, the purpose of rolling AI in the 618 shopping festival is not only to create gimmicks to attract attention, but also to reduce costs and increase efficiency. But how effective is it?

Take this year’s 618 hotly debated “AI anchor” as an example. Many live broadcast rooms are using “digital people” to sell products, and “digital people avatars” that can be customized for 200 yuan. Because it can broadcast 24 hours a day without worrying about the host’s “collapse”, this is seen as a high-cost-effective form of product sales. The quotation given by a digital person production company shows that the current cost of customizing an AI anchor on the market is around tens of thousands of yuan for a one-year period of use. In this way, compared with real-life anchors, AI anchors do save money.

But in terms of current market acceptance and the limitations of AI anchors themselves, saving money does not necessarily mean “useful”.

Although the trend of AI anchors is blowing up in live streaming with sales, it is still a minority that has actually landed in live broadcast rooms. Moreover, most AI anchors have problems such as single expression, mechanical language, stiff movements, and poor interaction, and the number of fans watching is limited, and the driving effect on GMV is even more limited.

From the perspective of increasing efficiency, the efficiency brought by AI to e-commerce and brands is not particularly obvious.

“In the short term, the capital market’s attention to AI has soared, and the synergistic effect of AI on e-commerce, brands, and merchants is obvious, especially for head platforms, which can bring a new wave of traffic based on early AIGC content and data pools.” Xiao Kai, who focuses on e-commerce investment, explained, “But in the long run, the application of AI by e-commerce platforms is still in simple dialogue and algorithm recommendation, and the difference from the technologies that have been available before is not significant.”

In addition, consumers’ limited perception of AI products in 618 is also related to the limitations of AI and the inability of products to land.

Kai Bojiao Finance tried to use several AI drawing software at home and abroad to design product packaging, and found that there are problems including: AI’s insufficient understanding of detailed vocabulary; designers need to train for a long time; AI design is mostly flat maps, and 3D effect maps have poor effects; text deformation and distortion, etc.

Designer CC added that the current AI-assisted software still cannot reach the level of finalization. AI-designed packaging, advertising, and copywriting may not even comply with advertising laws and design regulations, posing considerable risks.

There is no doubt that the hot AI has injected new energy into this year’s 618, and various parties’ “crazy volumes” reflect the trend of AI entering the daily lives of the public. However, in the wave of AI, who can take the lead is important, but who can take every step well is more important.

618 not only needs a shallow “packaging” of AI, but also whether AI can bring further innovations to the next 618, or stop here, or is unknown.

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