Target’s A.I. chatbot has a particular angle to it: it helps shoppers find gifts by describing the gift recipient. Target Gift Finder represents a trend that has been growing in recent years, which is incorporating conversational A.I. into the online-shopping experience. Business owners looking to implement conversational A.I. into customer-facing operations should take note of the strengths and weaknesses of Target’s A.I..
The Five Most-Key Takeaways from This Blog Post
- This can obviously be useful for surprise gifts or gift requests that are not specific products (e.g., “a black jacket” instead of a specific North Face jacket).
- It may be easy to think that many shoppers who may be looking for specific items may not have much use for this tool. However, this could be like an alternative to regular searches on the Target website, as it can quickly answer the question of whether a certain kind of product is in stock or not.
- You can find a short video demo of this feature on this page. Likewise, if you have a Target account you can try the feature out for yourself. To add some personality to the chat, Target has an animated earmuffed mouse.
- When you click View Gifts during a chat, you are taken to a search-results page on the Target website with several categories related to your query. These should all fall within your budget.
- The A.I. is not really perfect, and perhaps best for finding categories of products rather than specific items, because specific questions like “I need the most-expensive cat toy available” will just bring you to a page of pet toys rather than just showing you the most-expensive cat toy.
The Significance for Business Owners
Searching for items with chatbots is becoming increasingly popular, and business owners must consider the implications of this.
Particularly important to realize is that you need to have an S.E.O. (or A.I.O.) strategy that involves conversational descriptions of items that could match with how a searcher may describe a sought-after item in conversation with a chatbot.
A Not-Too-Conversational Chatbot
The current issue with Target Gift Finder is that it is not all that conversational, despite being a chatbot. It mostly just directs the user to ordered product pages where the user can then scroll through.
Conversation from the chatbot, then, is kept to a minimum. The chatbot is quiet as a mouse with earmuffs, which may be why a mouse with earmuffs is the “character” of the chatbot.
But let’s assume that Target will get better with conversational search in the future.
That assumption is fair to make and realistically the limited conversation of this chatbot may be more of a tactic to hedge against hallucination or poor personalized recommendations.
In other words, it is likely not a technological deficiency as to why Target’s chatbot is so limited in speech and too broad in recommendations, but is rather just branding concerns.
But regardless of where Target Gift Finder is now and is headed, the reality for business owners is that conversational search is already here in the form of A.I. like ChatGPT connected to e-commerce vendors and Amazon Rufus helping shoppers find items.
Conversational Search Is an Evolution of Search
Conversational A.I. in online shopping may seem like a novelty, but a good perspective to take on it is that it is like an evolution of search.
“Conversational search” may be a good term for Target Gift Finder because at the end of the day the A.I. is like a more-interactive search tool leading users to product pages.
Within the narrowed boundaries of the Target catalogue conversational search can be a good way for people to identify products with a category.
And for major retailers like Target, it can lead to more sales because the “conversational” part of conversational search can make things feel more personalized, even when the conversation is not too expansive or creative on the part of the A.I..
The Last (But Not Least) Key Takeaway from This Blog Post
Honestly, the Target Gift Finder feels undercooked, at least at that time of its testing by the writer of this blog post. The biggest issue here is that it mostly just directs users to pages of many products rather than helping narrow down search to fewer and fewer items.
Other Great GO AI Blog Posts
GO AI the blog offers a combination of information about, analysis of, and editorializing on A.I. technologies of interest to business owners, with especial focus on the impact this tech will have on commerce as a whole.
On a usual week, there are multiple GO AI blog posts going out. Here are some notable recent articles:
- For Businesses and Other Organizations, What Makes a Successful Chatbot?
- IBM Watson vs. ChatGPT vs. Gemini: How Will Each Affect Search Engines?
- Using A.I. to Find Resources for Business Owners
- How Would Restricting Open-Source A.I. Affect Business Owners?
- The EU’s A.I. Act Has Become Law: The Implications for Business Owners (Especially American)
In addition to our GO AI blog, we also have a blog that offers important updates in the world of search engine optimization (SEO), with blog posts like “Google Ends Its Plan to End Third-Party Cookies”.
GO Deeper on Substack!
If you want to get a bigger-picture view on where A.I. is and is headed, then check out our Substack to learn about emerging and dominant themes in the A.I. industry that affect all kinds of businesses!
