Agenda-setting intelligence, analysis and advice for the global fashion community.
BoF’s latest white paper, The Future of E-Commerce, Powered by Generative AI — in partnership with Zalando — explores how business leaders can effectively integrate generative AI (gen AI) into their workplace, to both increase consumer engagement and streamline employee workloads.
Gen AI and other next-generation technologies have the potential to automate workplace activities that take up 60 to 70 percent of employees’ time, according to estimates from management consultancy McKinsey & Company.
However, when implementing new systems and tools, businesses and their leaders must navigate a range of challenges, from a workforce potentially reluctant to adopt the technology to the rapidly evolving regulations and ethics surrounding this developing space.
“Gen AI is a great tool and advancement for our industry,” says Tian Su, vice president of personalisation and recommendation at Zalando. “However, it needs to be used purposefully, respectfully and responsibly.”
Within this paper, BoF explores the critical preliminary work required to prepare the workplace and employees for this new technology. It also examines what retailers must consider from a legal and ethical perspective, to implement the technology in a responsible and safe way.
Download the white paper: The Future of E-Commerce, Powered by Generative AI
Building the Right Foundations for Gen AI
Before retailers look to implement gen AI tools and solutions across the e-commerce value chain, organisations and their leaders must first carefully evaluate how and where to integrate such tools. Business leaders must ensure the workplace and employee base are ready to embrace what will drive substantial organisational change.
For example, it is critical that employers do not assume that their workforce fully understands what gen AI is, its distinction from predictive AI, the tools available to use, and how it adds value to workflows and systems.
“It is the responsibility of the executives to not only properly educate themselves on fashion technology and how it can be used, but to trickle down that education to their employees,” says Jessica Couch, a retail tech expert and founder of Looks.Ai, an AI-powered peer-to-peer shopping platform.
Within this section of the paper, BoF explores the preliminary work e-commerce businesses need to undergo to introduce gen AI, including how they should:
- Inform and engage employees on the gen AI opportunity
- Ensure leadership buy-in and employee engagement
- Identify the key pain points to solve
- Balance employee and consumer needs
Understanding the Business Ethics and Responsibility
The speed at which gen AI is developing has prompted widespread concern around how to effectively regulate ever-evolving technologies.
A 2024 Reuters Institute survey of 12,200+ individuals across the UK, US, Argentina, Denmark, France and Japan found that, while almost 50 percent of respondents believe gen AI will have a large impact on retail, nearly 25 percent of them do not trust retailers to use the technology responsibly.
“This is a business that’s about trust and if you get this wrong because you get your AI wrong, then you have a negative impact and you lose your customers, you lose your partners,” says Jan Wittrodt, director of privacy, AI and technology law at Zalando.
Within this section of the paper, BoF explores ethical and responsible ways in which gen AI should be embedded into an e-commerce business. For example, retailers should:
- Keep a human in the loop
- Be transparent to build trust
- Mitigate bias by human and data-led diversification strategies
- Ask the right questions — internally and externally
Read the full white paper: The Future of E-Commerce, Powered by Generative AI
In this white paper, BoF also explores gen AI use cases from Zalando on leveraging large-language-models (LLMs) to enhance the customer experience with virtual assistants and chatbots — and how image-generating tools can also provide businesses with new means to maximise creative output and content displays.
This is a sponsored feature paid for by Zalando as part of a BoF partnership.
