What is the conversational web and how it powers the next-generation user interface?

The conversational web refers to a new approach altering the way customers interact with an organization and creating the next generation of customer experiences. It is starting to provide significant opportunities, along with some challenges, to the industry. According to an IBM report, there is a growing interest in the speech, language, and human-computer interaction (HCI) scientific communities in creating a conversational interface to the web. Conversational interfaces have garnered a huge hype in the last few years, for good reason. They mimic a conversation with a real human, where users interact with a machine in the same way they communicate with a human.

Earlier, most businesses' operations were based on the Mass Production model to ensure the quality of product and deliver it to the customer at scale. However, today this model has no longer useful for gaining a competitive edge as consumers have more choices than ever in all product categories such as retail, finances, software, and others. Today's business model has substantially turned to a hyper-personalization approach thanks to recent technological advances. This novel approach to customer interaction makes it easier for businesses to interact with every customer uniquely as an individual and design a customized experience for each one.

With the conversational web, a company can have access to their prospective customers' interaction history, their shopping interests, and others that help customer service agents as well as business leaders in effective decision making. As a rich and immersive place, it also creates positive and hyper-personalized experiences.

Here are some hyper-personalization use cases in companies.

Netflix

Netflix, the world's leading online video streaming company, works diligently on delivering its users a unique customer experience. The company continues reinforcing its recommendation engine, using machine learning algorithms and data to enrich its personalization mechanism. One best instance of how Netflix does this is a number of landing cards or thumbnails that it creates for a specific movie or TV show.

Amazon

When it comes to personalization, Amazon leads the way here too, dominating the retail landscape. With its massive inventory and distinct membership options, the e-commerce giant has capitalized on the way shoppers interact with its website. Amazon also creates a personalized homepage for each of its customers based on their historical shopping habits, Wishlist, and shopping cart.

Starbucks

Starbucks uses a real-time personalization engine that produces individualized offers for their customers based on their previous behavior and preferences. The company derives this data from its loyalty app that helps it understand each of its customers' needs and habits. And with that data, Starbucks sends customers personalized emails with deals and updates germane to them.

O2

O2, a leading telecommunications provider in the UK, is another brand performing hyper-personalized marketing. The company utilizes customer data to deliver customers personalized ads with tailored messaging. O2 extends its personalized marketing campaigns to video ads, producing over 1,000 versions of a video with messaging varying in real-time according to the users' devices and locations.

Furthermore, as the interest in creating a conversational interface to the web is on the rise, some of the conversations are already driven by AI such as Slackbot. It is expected that the conversational web will see an incredible uptake as businesses lean to deliver enhanced and customized customer experience.