Beyond the hype cycle: The tech innovation shaping fashion in 2024

Diaz highlighted the fit recommendation tool. “When you’re buying online from a range of brands, you want to know: how will this fit me? Our size recommendations feature uses an AI model that considers what customers are looking for, what customers are returning, what customers are seeing, what questions customers are asking and the answers they are given — to be able to recommend sizes when customers come to us, for whatever brand they are looking for. And we found that the keep rate is higher when customers follow our advice.”

When considering AI’s role in customer service, Diaz and AllSaints Group CEO Peter Wood both agreed that the tech has progressed far beyond the clunky chatbots of old. “We’ve all interacted with a chatbot in the past and thought ‘oh, no, please, please put me through to a human’,” laughed Diaz. “What we are dealing with now is unbelievably different.”

AllSaints introduced an AI-powered chatbot at the end of last year. Four months later, the AI is handling a third of the enquiries that come in and resolving them, said Wood. “That means the customers that do need human contact are waiting a shorter period of time to get that service. Tech is a huge enabler for us to achieve our strategic objectives as a brand.”

Amazon has launched a beta version of its new AI-powered shopping assistant — named Rufus — in the US. “It’s like having a best friend [that knows Amazon’s selection inside and out],” said Diaz. “You can ask it, what shoes should I be wearing today? Give me a cocktail dress recommendation. What should I give my partner for Valentine’s Day? This is my budget. This is the type of thing this person likes. And it has all the information on the hundreds of millions of products, billions of customer reviews — and is able to interact with you in real-time.”