Tell us about the new partnership you have just signed with Marks & Spencer?
The M&S partnership with Preferabli marks the first time such advanced technology has been integrated into a grocery retailing platform in the UK, in this case online for more than 500 stores and on point-of-sale marketing in 20 Foodhalls.
Marks & Spencer see the move into AI as part of its mission to make shopping wine easier for its customers
M&S appreciates that wine can be a difficult category to shop and knows how important it is to find ways for customers to discover new bottles. M&S is licensing the combination of Preferabli solutions that create that discovery.
How did the conversation between the two of you start and what was M&S's initial brief and requirement from you?
Conversations with our clients all start the same way. We ask what specific problems they would like to solve and what efficiencies they hope to gain. While all retailers are looking to sell more and sell better, we’ve found they really do have varying priorities because of their unique brand identities and existing tech stacks. Our solutions are flexible and purpose-built to be deployed independently or together to accommodate their needs.
How did the project develop and what steps did you take to make sure you were delivering what M&S wanted?
Deployments all start the same way too. Nearly all retailers need content, so customers understand their offerings. We provide accurate, consistent and impartial content for every adult beverage in inventory, including how products taste. The next step tends to be discovery tools – and then true personalisation.
We found M&S’s cross-functional team to be very clear and coordinated in what they were looking to deploy.
Can you go through exactly what it is you are providing?
How the Wine Finder tool is presented on the M&S website
We are providing a broad swath of content – including taste characteristics. We are providing our guided recommendations functionality, which works based on taste and so goes well beyond even the most sophisticated filtering. We are also providing our search and discover solutions including our similar tasting products module, so customers can cross over geographies and grapes just the way a human expert can do, only at scale.
How will this look like for shoppers in an M&S store and online - how will they use it?
Our functionalities are as easy to access as they are to deploy. In this case, access is provided to both customers and associates through a hosted web experience which requires neither an app download nor any integration. In-store signage creates immediate engagement with a simple QR code. We made our solutions easy, so retailers just lock and load. The only thing we need to get any retailer started is an inventory.
Can you give some examples of how it will potentially widen a customer's wine choice and their options?
Here are a typical set of questions you would be asked on the M&S website in order to determine the style of wine you will like
Imagine you want a specific trait in a wine, such as crispness. Say you’re also looking for fruit characteristics, such as apples. Let’s go further and say you’re interested in both white and sparkling wines. Maybe you’d also like to identify specific grapes or regions. Our AI-driven, guided recommendations solution can do that using any inventory, on the fly.
The AI Wine Finder will ask customers to refine their taste profiles in order to identify the wines they will like
It finally gives you a list of wines that match your individual taste preferences
Another example. Say you’ve a favourite wine and want to find others that have similar taste characteristics. Our AI-driven, similar tasting products module provides that functionality using any inventory, on the fly. Our Sensorial AI works like a human expert would, without cumbersome and often ineffective filtering.
Have you had to work with M&S's database of wines and then integrate them into your machine learning Wine Finder tool?
Our platform can read in any stream of data in any format – including inventories, purchase histories and search histories – and rationalise that data stream to our database. We’ve the most comprehensive data set in the world, with hundreds of characteristics for millions of products. Our brand promise is 100% coverage of a client’s inventory.
How do you see the partnership developing with M&S?
Both Preferabli and M&S are very focused on the customer experience. Indeed, it was such a joy working with the M&S team precisely because they’re so customer focused.
I anticipate that being key to all our work going forward as we so clearly share the desire to connect people with products through individual taste preference in both in-store and ecommerce environments, front and back of house.
This follows on from a similar partnership in the US with Albertsons - what have you learnt and been able to take from working with them to how you have worked with M&S?
Preferabli has signed a similar AI Wine Finder partnership in the US with Albertsons
The best grocery retailers are deeply committed to developing both discovery and personalised recommendations. They know their customers struggle to find all their new favourites amongst highly-curated collections – little-known wines and even proprietary products. Everyone benefits when software can bring people and products together in a truly personalised way.
Do you have other similar projects in the pipeline?
We’re already working with most of the leading grocery retailers in the US and the UK, and increasingly retailers in Europe as well. Our platform covers wine, beer, spirits, RTDs, sake and food, including cheese. So too do these grocery retailers, and they’re looking for software that truly covers the category so they can work with one technology partner.
We liaise across their teams – including marketers, buyers, merchandisers and technologists.
Anything else to say?
Yes. Our food and recipe pairing solutions have been released, and we’re finding tremendous sales lift with all the grocery retailers that have those functionalities in place. We find these modules particularly powerful when grocery retailers are looking for increases in average order value and attachment ratios. After all, food and adult beverages often go best together.
* You can find out more about Preferabli and the personalisation services it offers at its website here.
* Preferabli is a commercial partner to The Buyer.
