The artificial intelligence (AI) revolution that has swept the world over the past nine months reached deep into the business world this week, promising a revolution in sales and customer relations management (CRM).
The world’s biggest annual software conference, Dreamforce in San Francisco, hosted by global CRM leader Salesforce, saw the launch of a “conversational AI assistant” called Einstein Copilot. In effect, it is the sales and CRM equivalent of ChatGPT, the “generative AI” chatbot launched by OpenAI at the end of November last year.
“There is no question that this AI opportunity is going to change everything and probably anything, and for all of us,” said Salesforce co-founder and CEO Marc Benioff in his Dreamforce keynote address on Tuesday.
“We can see we can have higher levels of customer success and productivity, and growth and transformation, and strategy with this new technology. It is going to radically change our landscape. Everything is going to shift at the same time.”
Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, joined Benioff in conversation on stage the next day and reiterated this view. “In the same way that the internet and then mobile seeped in everywhere, that's going to happen with intelligence.
“Right now, people talk about being an AI company. There was a time after the iPhone App Store launched when people talked about being a mobile company. But no software company says they're a mobile company now because it would be unthinkable to not have a mobile app. And it'll be unthinkable not to have intelligence integrated into every product and service.”
Case studies presented during Dreamforce ranged from the American Automobile Association (AAA) to Heathrow Airport, which says it uses digital technologies to create personalised experiences that increase customer engagement and revenue
The Einstein AI platform has been under development at Salesforce for a decade, and in recent years has been used as a predictive tool based on data analytics. Earlier this year Salesforce launched Einstein GPT, leveraging the ChatGPT generative AI model. Copilot is a significant evolution of this approach and is expected to boost productivity by assisting users within workflow, enabling them to ask questions in natural language and receive relevant and trusted answers that are grounded in a company’s data. This is expected to help companies improve productivity, drive revenue and create personalised experiences for customers on a mass basis.
Rahul Auradkar, Salesforce executive vice-president and general manager for Einstein, told Business Times there were Copilot variations for every business function: “Think of Copilot as anything that is an adjunct to a human, in that it's helping humans do better tasks. Across the board, Copilots are giving significant value to our customers, whether it is in sales, service, commerce, marketing or insights.”
Case studies presented during Dreamforce ranged from the American Automobile Association (AAA) to Heathrow Airport, which says it uses digital technologies to create personalised experiences that increase customer engagement and revenue.
South Africa’s Standard Bank participated in a session on “building an agile, secure company”, while US-based Esquire Bank said it transformed its marketing organisation into a high-performing content marketing team by leveraging AI and personalisation for hyper-targeted marketing.
In the same way that the internet and then mobile seeped in everywhere, that's going to happen with intelligence
— Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI
PepsiCo said it was using it to build better account plans, increase forecast accuracy and develop more strategic in-store activations.
During a press briefing, Business Times asked Benioff for his response to a common view that emerging markets are not ready for AI due to infrastructure, skills and education limitations. “Well, I think no-one is ready for AI,” he said.
“You're not alone. Every economy is really just wrestling. But then you realise that when we talk about education, the opportunity to provide highly customised, highly personalised, great education for every student, this is like a great threshold moment in the world of education.
“That's a great opportunity for Africa. But that's a great opportunity in San Francisco too.”
* Goldstuck is founder of World Wide Worx and editor-in-chief of Gadget.co.za
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