Shopify expands access to its AI-powered Sidekick to attract customers

Canadian e-commerce company Shopify on Monday made its AI-powered tools including AI assistant and image generation tool, Sidekick accessible to more users to increase its appeal to more customers. These tools can make product suggestions like color, size, and style.

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The initiative is also meant to boost revenue growth for the Ontario-headquartered firm. According to the company, customers can now access Sidekick’s editing tools on their mobile devices to enhance images used in promotional material “including emails.”

Shopify releases an array of updates

Previously, the feature was only restricted to editing images online. However, the firm announced at its biannual product event that it is opening access to more customers with more AI features to attract its appeal to the market.

Sidekick is a support chatbot helping merchants with queries and insights on customer behavior. Launched last year, the tool also allows merchants with stuff like discount codes or blog suggestions. The tool has been in beta since last year and has more than 2,000 users.

Shopify also unveiled about 150 AI updates to create a more integrated platform. Shopify president Harley Finkelstein said this will allow merchants to enjoy a seamless experience scaling their business.

AI-powered updates to boost business

Shopify experienced significant growth during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns when customers were forced to turn to online platforms. However, economic headwinds like inflation and depressed consumer spending affected its key “user base of small to medium-sized businesses,” according to a Reuters report.

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Last month, Shopify indicated plans to increase investment towards marketing initiatives after projecting a depressed quarterly revenue, the slowest in two years. This saw the stock drop to a six-month low wiping off C$25.25 billion in market value on the day.

But, with the new updates, the e-commerce platform anticipates to turnaround its fortunes by attracting more customers and boosting earnings.

One update includes an AI-powered tool that will give suggested replies for customer chats coming through the Shopify inbox. According to The Verge, these replies are currently just suggestions “meaning merchants will have to be the ones to finalize and send a response.”

Cryptopolitan reporting by Enacy Mapakame