To anyone feeling like the rapid advances of Gen AI is like living in the Wild West, The European Union's Artificial Intelligence Act (AI Act), passed on 13th March 2024, will come as a welcome relief.
The Act has, however, received some criticism for a variety of reasons, including perceived limitations on technological innovation and concerns about how exceptions for law enforcement might lead to intrusive surveillance. In their view, the Act could slow the pace of advancement in AI.
While there is more work to be done, 15gifts welcome the Act's fundamental principles. Reducing risk, increasing transparency, and protecting consumer rights, mirrors 15gifts' commitment to developing a virtual sales advisor that prioritises human elements and ethical considerations. Providing clear ethical boundaries fosters consumer trust - a core objective for 15gifts when we implement the guardrails that will prevent chatbots from going rogue (think DPD’s poems or Air Canada’s recent court case).
The latest Huawei handset releases have sparked a shift in China’s consumer market - favouring local purchases over iPhones. With suggestions that the latest iPhone handset doesn’t build much on the previous model, those faithful to the brand are happy sitting tight on their current phone.
In the first six weeks of the year, the iPhone saw a 24% decline in unit sales vs the same period in 2023 - the shift in emphasis to a local competitor was evident with Huawei seeing a 64% increase in unit sales.
There also appears to be some wavering interest in Apple handsets across the industry, with UK and US 15gifts engine users 8% less likely to be set on purchasing an Apple handset.
All eyes will be on the release of Apple’s next offering and whether they’ll be able to harness the recent leaps in AI and other tech to revive their seemingly dormant loyal customer base.
UK mobile users satisfied with network speeds of just 1-5 Mbps
Mobile network benchmarking specialist GWS, recently surveyed 2,951 UK mobile users. They discovered the ‘sweet spot’ at which consumer demands for network mobile speeds match what operators deliver, sits between 1-5 Mbps. Speeds in this ‘everyday’ range allowed the majority of UK mobile users to perform most of their mobile activity.
Although UK mobile networks, on average, can provide throughputs averaging 45Mbps, more than ten times higher than the ‘everyday’ range required, GWS were clear in their sentiment that customers just need a high enough speed to complete the activity they are doing.
Here at 15gifts, this demand is supported by insights from our guided selling engines, which showed in Q1 2024, 68% of UK consumers did not deem a 5G compatible phone as an essential requirement for their purchase.
Marketing strategies are increasingly focused on personalisation and using as much data as possible to reach the right person, at the right time, with the right message.
However, this “rarely factors in the true costs of collecting that data” and, as this article suggests, sometimes less is more. This can especially be the case in the Telco industry with the limited data available to truly achieve personalisation for acquisition journeys.
Would broader targeting to reach more potential customers be a better use of budget? Once these potential customers have been driven to the site, our engine can then take care of supporting them to find the right product.
How do consumers truly feel about AI powered sales assistance?
15gifts' UX Expert shares insights from recent user interviews, unveiling the key challenges faced during their recent telco purchasing experience, and their sentiment towards AI support.
That's a wrap for our first newsletter! Stay ahead of the curve with 15gifts as we explore the latest insights in guided selling and ecommerce trends. We value your feedback and would love to hear your thoughts to help us improve.
Nathan Higgins
Head of Customer Success
15gifts
15gifts.com, 15-19 Dyke Road, Century House, Brighton, East Sussex BN1 3FE, UK, +44 1273 021 000
