I know of newsagents today using AI (artificial intelligence) tools in their businesses to save time and provide a competitive advantage. Here are some AI use examples I have seen:
Writing product descriptions and longer form product descriptions is a good use of the ChatGPT AI integration my newsagency software company delivered to newsagents early this year. You put in a few keywords and in seconds you have description text ready for your review or edit.
Managing customer chat for your shop’s website can provide a response to simple to modest queries without labour cost.
Writing an email to a supplier requesting a refund for product that is not performing. By providing ChatGPT some contextual prompts, the AI platform wrote an email making a sound case for refund consideration.
Writing a letter to the landlord seeking reduction in the rent. After providing ChatGPT some business details, the AI platform wrote a good two page letter with economic data that checked out.
Writing disposable social media content. If you have a product image and some keywords, AI could generate cohesive sentences for you in seconds.
Giving employees broader experiences and thereby making working in the newsagency more interesting. Let them show you what could be possible.
Finding new product category opportunities.
In some of these examples, the key to successful use is rooted in the prompts you feed to AI. It can take considerable experience to land results that are genuinely useful to you. Equally, you can botch this, get bad output and think AI is useless, which would be a mistake, of course.
There are other uses of AI already in systems and other tech in use in businesses, including in newsagency businesses, just under the surface. I could list some other uses of AI but I won’t for commercial reasons.
While it is appropriate to be cautious in using AI, generating content and other results for review is itself a time saver for any newsagency business.
I think every retail business should be using AI in at least some parts of their businesses today. It makes sense. Even as a starting point. Take the rent reduction email request. While anyone could write the email, that AI generated in seconds was well structured and provided a basis for quick review, tweaking and then sending – all in a minute or so, saying maybe half an hour.
I think what we will soon see is more cost-effective shop floor bots that can answer questions, price products and provide customer service beyond what we expect today. We’ll also hear them answer phones in shops too. Yes, all of the things will come in newsagency businesses.
Where more benefits will flow is in areas like buying where, too often, emotion gets in the way of good business decisions.
While there will be some in local small business retail who resist a greater reach of AI, soon enough it will be like the fax machine was a year or so after launch, an everyday part of business.
While, for sure, there is plenty to worry about with AI, especially in military and policing settings, there are so many other uses, like in newsagency businesses, where we can benefit and improve what we offer our customers.