E-commerce has long existed since the pre-digital era. In fact, electronic shopping traces way back to the 1970s and has since continued to evolve and transform along with the rapid emergence of technological advancements. But naturally, consumer confidence was still a working progress back then as in-store shopping was considered the golden standard in retail. This was mainly because shoppers would rather personally see the items themselves than rely on inaccurate images they see on retailer apps and websites. The gap of visualization has always been a void that retailers try to navigate their way through, especially in providing specificity and precision.

As soon as the pandemic hit in 2020, retailers began scouring for the most cutting-edge solutions to provide customers with the in-store experience in a virtual space. This was an integral part of every company’s survival as health protocols and restrictions mandated physical stores to shut down, forcing retailers to leverage their online presence. This shift called for companies to implement hyper-personalized sales and marketing, holistic product recommendations, and visual search and discovery. 

renovai, a visual AI shopping assistant for lifestyle brands, aims to disrupt online retail by hyper-personalizing the e-commerce experience and adding the required visual context. 

renovai’s Layers of Deep Technology

renovai’s layers of deep technology include a methodology of truly understanding individual products. These products are then divided from categories to archetypes with the help of computer vision. This process allows their team to precisely understand the items that retailers present, enabling them to make these products more discoverable and the tagging more accurate. 

The second layer is understanding customer behavior. From purchase history, and wishlist, to items added to the cart, the nuances of these actions are taken into consideration in creating a unique profile for individual shoppers. This also serves as the design knowledge that dictates the algorithm of the end-users, providing view similar and search similar product and category pages for them to explore further. 

The last layer is the design methodology created by renovai’s in-house design team. The designers are working closely with product and software developers to create bulletproof design knowledge – from understanding the market, and design terminologies, to accurate data collection.

Online Shopping with an In-Store Experience

Through renovai’s layers of deep technology, the online shopping of each customer is transformed from regular e-commerce to a highly visual experience. With the data collected from the end users, renovai’s platform can provide exponentially valuable product recommendations through an AI-based virtual designer. This real-time contextual personalization is key in hyper-personalizing product discovery as if a shopping assistant is present to serve. A shop the room feature creates full-room scenes for set visualization, allowing customers to scale their merchandising vision. Moreover, a 2D inspirational interactive board enhances product-focused display with visually similar and complementary recommendations. 

What’s more, renovai’s visual content creation takes retail to the next level with maximally realist 3D models by sampling a 2D product image; automated 360-degree product gallery images on white or transparent backgrounds; lifestyle image generator that provides context and style around a product without production hassle, and a 360-degree product configurator that shows an item from any angle.

The world of shopping is becoming more and more visual. From customers’ innate vigilance to the digital revolution of tech capabilities, the need for retail brands to hop onto the visual movement is more urgent than ever. With its AI-powered platform and state-of-the-art solutions, renovai positions itself as the leader in retail disruption – overhauling global online e-commerce for retailers and shoppers alike.