Andrew Bialecki, CEO of Klaviyo, tells Worldwide Exchange AI agents will transform customer service into personalized, revenue-driving tools, helping brands reduce discounts and boost loyalty.

Andrew Bialecki, CEO of Klaviyo, outlined how AI agents are increasingly being adopted by brands and retailers to enhance customer engagement and personalize shopping experiences. He described the evolution from traditional customer service to AI-powered personal concierges that can advise consumers, answer questions, and connect them with relevant products.

Bialecki noted that thousands of businesses are already using Klaviyo's AI agent technology, and cited examples such as Amazon's use of AI agents during major shopping events. He addressed concerns about dynamic pricing, clarifying that AI agents are primarily used to help consumers discover suitable products, which can reduce the need for discounts and promotions. According to Bialecki, consumers are willing to spend more with brands that use AI to understand their preferences.

Bialecki: Every brand will have an AI agent as your personal concierge

All right, so talk to us about what B2C software is. It's kind of focused on marketing and helping brands and retailers reach their customers better. But give us a more specific example, like how does this software work? Yeah, sure. So at Klaviyo, we build software for businesses to connect with the thousands, millions, hundreds of millions of consumers that they have. So great brands like Mattel, Glossier, Away Travel, international brands like Castor, the fastest growing sportswear brand in the UK. And it's interesting, so it takes sportswear. I'm going out, I'm gonna play some tennis or some golf or going out for a hike, and I'm looking for what's that perfect product or shirt to wear. With AI, what we're building is the intelligence layer so that every message you get from that brand, or when you visit that website and you wanna maybe chat and understand, hey, what products are right for me, we provide that technology to over 160,000 businesses around the world. Let's talk about adoption. You actually also recently launched an AI agent. How many companies or what percentage of retailers out there just roughly are adopting this kind of technology? And what's the real goal? Is it customer retention? Is it growing revenue? I mean, is it reducing returns? I mean, what's the end game when you're using this kind of software? Yeah, there's a huge shift happening in what we've traditionally thought of as customer service. You know, I write in because I need to exchange a product, you know, all those kinds of use cases. Our belief is that every time you open your phone, you open an app, you visit a mobile site, you even walk into a store, in the future, there's gonna be an AI agent from that brand that's your personal concierge, your personal, you know, advice, you know, hey, what products to try? I'll give you an example. I'm gonna take my kids on some, you know, on a fishing expedition this weekend. I know nothing about fishing. So I went to the local sporting goods store, asked them for help. You know, in the future, that's all gonna happen through an AI agent. And that's what we've launched. And what's great about this is we tend to think about services, you know, kind of cost deflection, you know, how do I solve this problem when somebody has an issue? I think in the future, it's gonna be giving us advice. So I was asking things like, hey, what's a good, you know, fishing pole to get for a seven-year-old? You know, all those kinds of questions now are gonna be answered by businesses. And it's not just gonna be for cost reduction, it's actually gonna be revenue driving. So, you know, we now have thousands of businesses trying out our AI agent. You know, if you look at Amazon Prime Day, I think their AI agent, I think they said more than half of consumers engaged with their AI agent as part of the shopping experience. And part of our goal is to democratize that technology so that every business can have, you know, a personal agent for every single one of their consumers. Let's talk a little bit more about that. We've seen a lot of retailers in the last year or so use what they call dynamic pricing, basically using AI to figure out where demand is and maybe lower prices and increased prices. I do have to ask you, is this software gonna make things more expensive? Like, will this AI agent be able to figure out how badly I need that fishing pole for my trip? And maybe it's more expensive as opposed to being on sale. Maybe bad for the consumers, but potentially, as you said, more revenue for the actual retailers themselves? Yeah, not so much dynamic pricing, but what we've found is that what AI, what people love about AI agents is they can discover products, especially with businesses that have deeper catalogs. They can find the products that are relevant for them. So actually, instead of having to resort to discounting and promotions to get customers into the store and to buy either online or actually in the physical store, if they can connect them to the right products, and consumers value this understanding who they are. When we polled consumers, I think 60% or 70% have said, hey, they're willing to spend more with brands that know who they are. So actually, we look at AI as a way to personalize the experience, actually produce more value, which reduces the need for discounting.

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