Building Customer-Centric Experiences Across B2B & D2C with Joseph Sharplin

Speaker A: Uh,

Speaker B: welcome to this episode of the Customer Centric Retailing podcast. This is Anil Patel, Founder and CEO of hotwatch Commerce. In this podcast we discuss E commerce, omnichannel technology, pre order management, brick and mortar operations, retail culture, innovation and how all these elements come together to create customer Centric retailing. Join us to hear the brightest minds in the retail industry share their experiences and thoughts on the most relevant topics today.

Speaker C: Hello everyone. Welcome to the Customer Centric Retailing podcast. Today we have with us Joseph Sharplain from um, Ascolar. He's the head of E Commerce. Hey Joseph, how are you doing today?

Speaker A: I'm good. Really nice to meet you and it's a real pleasure being on the uh, podcast. Thanks for having me.

Speaker C: Yeah, amazing. It's like uh, I've been uh, talking to a lot of uh, folks, folks in retail space and retail consulting. Uh m. I'm m really excited today because I have something new to talk about with you. Um, at the same time I was looking at your profile and uh, uh, something interesting I saw was you are now head of E Commerce. Generally I've seen people start their career as in the sales, somewhere in the sales or somewhere in the marketing kind of thing, but I see yours more from a product designer and that. So I'm curious about your uh, career path, how you started and how you got here.

Speaker A: Yeah, um, it is a little bit left field. So um, yeah, out of uni I was doing uh, graph design. I studied graph design at university and worked in a graph design for signage companies and then quickly got into apparel, um, and have been in apparel ever since down here in New Zealand. Um, but you're right, it was always in either a product uh design space or working on the actual prints themselves to go onto garments. So more from that. Yeah, graphic design, product design space. And I joined as color just over four years ago, um, in the product design space and was working on the garments themselves and working with the team. Then got moved into the head of design role. Um, and you know we were, we were working on lots of new styles and bits and pieces for AS Color. And then about two years ago um, an opportunity came up where our E commerce manager went on maternity leave and there was basically um, you know, work needing done in the space and at the same time we were kind of winding down on product design. We'd got the range to a pretty healthy point and we weren't wanting to put more new styles into the range. Um, so our CEO, uh, Clive Ormerod turned around and said hey, do you want to. Do you want to give E Commerce a try? And um, it kind of sounds, you know, it kind of sounds a bit, it obviously sounds funny, you know, even, even as I say it myself. But um, I put my hand up and just jumped into it and kind of cut my teeth on it and yeah, just uh, that, that's been the last two years basically working in E Commerce for as Color and uh, shortly after that got moved into the head of E Commerce role and Laurie, our E Commerce manager's back and it's um, yeah, uh, it's been kind of all go ever since.

Speaker C: Awesome. Awesome. This is great. So like you know, there are two different worlds, very different. The uh, E Commerce. Being head of E Commerce you got to know a lot about like all these analytics and marketing and I don't know, there are like tons of vocabulary, new vocabulary to go for. How did you work with that? It must be a challenge.

Speaker A: Yeah, to be honest, it was a real challenge, but uh, a really awesome challenge. I mean I think, you know, for someone like yourself or someone who's been working in E commerce and the digital space for years or their entire career, um, there'll be a level of knowledge that uh, to be honest, I don't have yet. Um, but the things I found that helped me coming from the product design space into E commerce was some of the fundamentals around attention to detail. Um, it was good coming from that uh, product space, uh, into an apparel E commerce space because you can approach things like um, your on site merchandising and how you present product on the site. Um, so there are benefits from that perspective. And then I think another side of it, which you'll be very aware of as well is a huge part of it is relationships and working with your partners and working with your tech stack partners and your platform partners and all the different people internally and externally who touch on E commerce or the website you're working on. So the relationship pieces I see as a huge part of it and often you're relying on the expertise of someone else who is really good at that integration or um, that app or that tool you're using on your site. Um, and uh, a big part of it is just having that really good relationship with them and almost using that network of people as ah, an extension of your team. Um, you end up with this massive global team who are based all over the world which is ah, pretty amazing. So um, yeah, I felt like I had some things kind of um, in my tool belt that helped me from the relationship side of it and the attention to detail side of it and the kind of the methodical way in which you have to um, in which you have to work in E commerce, that kind of applied to product design as well. Very methodical and um, technical in a sense. So um, yeah, but outside of that it's just been hard and fast learning, you know.

Speaker C: Yeah, that's true. And I think you know, um, on the other thing I could see is uh, you have product, product uh development, product knowledge and you understand your customers so much. Uh, I think like you said, you know, giving that, delivering that experience on the E commerce, uh, you have that idea like what exactly you want, what exactly your customers want. And then um, like you said, partners come in and help you out, uh, getting that delivered. But you know what you want. So it's uh, the communication is relatively easier because you can tell them what you want and then because they are experts at the, at their own domain, they can deliver on what you want. Your requirements are. So that's pretty amazing. Yeah.

Speaker A: Cool.

Speaker C: That's really good. Yeah. So, well you know, coming to as color, uh, you are in B2B space as well as D2C space. Uh, that's a really good combination. And so uh, like you know this both operating together, especially both working through the E comm as well, uh, it could get a challenge. It becomes a challenge in itself. It brings its own complexity. Tell us about uh, how do you manage those two together and what kind of challenges uh, do you see? Uh, generally.

Speaker A: Yeah, um, so I think uh, starting with a platform that can handle both use cases is really important. Um, we're on BigCommerce as our platform who um, who I feel have always had kind of B2B uh front and center as, as their um, you know, as, as they're kind of, I don't know, I don't know what you call that. Their, their hero suite of products are all, and their functionality is all generally based on B2B and, and, and now they're working on the DTC part of it and that's kind of growing for them. Whereas you know, um, I'd say in my experience, you know some, someone like Shop fire is probably DTC first and now they're working on the B2B side of it. So being on BigCommerce and having that strong suite of B2B functionality natively built into the platform is um, awesome. It gives us some really great tools to work within that B2B apparel space straight away, um, in terms of the site itself in the UX, when you come to an AE scalar site, uh, it looks very retail Y or D2C um in terms of the look and feel, the aesthetics of the site, uh, the way we shoot our products, um, the PLP pages and the PDP pages. It gives a very uh, DTC feel to the site. But that was very intentional because we wanted the experience for both DTC and B2B to be a premium experience. Um, we like the idea of people enjoying being on the site, um, enjoying browsing the product. Um, we control DSC and B2B via customer groups out of BigCommerce. So when you log into our site as a B2B customer the UX ultimately stays very similar. Um, but we inject a couple of um, B2B specific tools um, to help the B2B customer kind of navigate the site and add things to cart quickly and efficiently checkout fast. But it's very similar between the two. There's not too much that kind of differentiates the two. So um, yeah ultimately I think it's about um, enjoying being on the site, being able to find what you're after fast at its cart and check out fast, um, with as much kind of automation and support along the way. So I think for both a D2C and B2B customer, the relevant points, um, and that's how we've, we've kind of always approached that.

Speaker C: Now this is, yeah this is interesting. Uh, more recently you mentioned BigCommerce. And more recently uh, I had opportunity to work with retail, ah, um, who is like you're doing B2C and B2B B2B and B2C uh at the same time. Uh, so I totally get it when you say the platform that is BigCommerce which is a platform designed to do B2B and complex kind of order processing. And at the same time you can also do uh, B2C kind of like a simple, straightforward ah, E commerce experience. Um and uh, I have my own experience working with them with uh, the client and I can clearly relate with what you're saying uh, because we implemented uh their fulfillment system through their warehouse and all that. And so I worked with the whole integration and all that. Uh, so I could see the flexibility of their order capturing process and the details you can add into orders that helps us uh, to route the orders in the proper direction and get it fulfilled. Yeah because like when you are getting both B2B and B2C orders through the same channel, the uh, order routing becomes very important. Uh, otherwise your fulfillment Systems, they get confused or uh, their efficiencies drop when you give B2B order and B2C order mixed up together. Because, you know, they are very different in nature when, when it comes to processing.

Speaker A: Definitely.

Speaker C: Yeah. Cool. So, yeah, you know, starting from New Zealand, uh, as, as a company and then going all globally. And I believe you are, like you said, you know, you work uh, through the global distribution channel. Uh, tell us about like, uh, how are you able to do all that? Because again, you know, it's the same thing. Uh, uh, being in New Zealand and then, uh, ability to sell in Europe, uh, and then in America and all that, uh, that could be a challenge itself, especially with like managing inventory across all these distribution centers and getting orders processed through that. So I'm sure there is some secret sauce going on there.

Speaker A: Yeah, definitely. So we were founded in uh, 20 years ago this year actually. This year's our 20 year anniversary. So, um, our founder, Larry Railton, uh, founded the business in Auckland, New Zealand. Um, and obviously it started very small. You know, uh, he had a friend who was in a band who was after some blank T shirts to print their band logo on. And he was struggling to find a good quality T shirt to do that on. So Larry thought, all right, I'll give this a try. I'll start a business. And um, you know, from there, uh, we grew in New Zealand, um, and then started expanding into other countries. So we went into Australia, um, the US and UK and then late last year we opened our fifth global website in Europe. Um, and then servicing those five websites across the globe, we have six distribution centers. We have one in New Zealand, one in Australia, two in the US UK and more recently the European distribution Center. So each big commerce, uh, site or each website is directly connected to the distribution centers and warehouses within that country. We supply, um, out of the same factories and uh, supplies to all of our global warehousing, uh, network. And then orders are fulfilled, um, out of those warehouses. So yeah, it's just been, um, it's been a bit of a, the company's been on a bit of a growth path, um, over the years. And now, I mean we service um, you know, out of those distribution centers and websites. I don't know what the percentage of, um, the planet would be, but a pretty chunky percentage. We can go to a lot of countries across the globe, which is, which is amazing. So opening more doors for shoppers.

Speaker C: This is a really, uh, big logistics, uh, puzzle to solve. Uh, so how do you see that? Because again, uh, you have to deliver the item with the cost efficiencies, cost of inventory and all that. So tell us about uh, how, how your, this whole logistics math works out.

Speaker A: Yeah, it's not a, it's not entirely my area of expertise, Larry.

Speaker C: Oh, okay, no worries.

Speaker A: Yeah, but I'll give you a bit of um, I'll give you a bit of background, some high level, uh, I can give you some high level info. So Larry, our founder, he, he is still um, placing a lot of the orders and overseeing that with his planning team. And then our logistics, uh, head of logistics JC he's basically running all the, all the global warehousing distribution networks. Um, and our IT team is obviously heavily involved as well. But ultimately it's economy of scale, ordering out of um, our factories and suppliers and then delivering globally, uh, to each of the um, warehouses. So I think when you're in the uh, black apparel space and you're ordering at those kind of volumes and then distribute, distributing that uh, stock globally, um, that allows you to obviously, um, enter those markets at a good price point and be competitive with other wholesale apparel brands out there. Um, the other thing I'd kind of add to that is getting your stock levels right is massively important when you're dealing with businesses and B2B businesses who require a lot of stock, um, and often very fast. So I know Larry and the team have spent um, years and years perfecting this and working on this and um, really honing in on the stock levels that each country requires. And if we're going into a new region, what does that stock in that country look like? So like you said, massively complex. And then I see, uh, my job and my team's job, um, in terms of how we present that stock on the website is as you know, conveying that stock availability, conveying uh, information on where that stock comes from, how fast it can get to the customer, um, and then just ensuring that that kind uh, of ordering and checkout processes as smooth as possible. And um. Yeah, so like, you know, there's so many things that flow into this but uh, and it's complex. It's complex.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker C: So like you know, uh, in the B2C world, we always talk about the time, you know, time, delivery time and uh, customer wants to know if, how soon they can get the item, uh, in their hands after they place the order. Um, tell me about like a B2B world. Is it like a similar psychology working or is it like a little different? Uh, and in that case like how you as the E Comm Head of E. Com. How do you play with all that? Because like uh, I mean like you know, safety stocks for maintaining a safety stock of like 10 or 20 is I can understand but like for B2B orders that's a lot. Uh number of orders are big, orders are big. So safety stock playing with the safety of stock and all that could be challenged. And then there is this uh, all this tension between the E Comm where they are trying to sell more and the logistics where they had to fulfill as fast as you can sell um, and keeping track of ground realities and how orders are fulfilled. Um, so there's a lot of tension going on there. So uh, how do you play into this and what's your secret there?

Speaker A: So we kind of pride ourselves on delivering fast for our customers and then having the stock available for them to place an order and get it quickly. Um, we communicate on our, throughout our site, on our uh, on our kind of secondary pages and on our PDP pages etc. Um, options to get your order fast. So whether it's same day dispatch and you have to order by a specific time, um to the shipping methods we display at checkout. So we will show expedited shipping methods, um, urgent shipping methods depending on the region. So down here in NZ we aim to get all orders out on the day they're placed. Um, and we work with uh, New Zealand Post down here as an example um, to get those orders to customers really quickly. If customers are ordering massive amounts of stock and it needs to go out on pallets. M We offer similar services and we'll work with freight companies who specialize in pallet delivery uh, to again get those orders to customers fast and then if customers need things massively urgently, um, and a use case of that would be, let's say you have uh, Sony Music who require X amount of T shirts for some band merch they're doing for an artist and they need that the next day or the day after that. We'll work with our um, our local uh, carrier network to, to ensure those shipments get out fast. So um, we display the stock on the, on the website when it flows into our warehousing. Our team does a brilliant job on working with those carriers and our kind of local networks to get orders out fast. Um, yeah, often people don't want to wait. Right. Both D2C customers, people, people want their orders fast so we try to give as much visibility and communication of that on the website as possible.

Speaker C: Yeah, actually no, uh, again thanks. Yeah, um, thanks for uh, this information. So B2B customers are not any different. They are same humans who buy on B2C. And so the urgency of delivery is similar. They wait till the last moment, uh, and place the order. And now they know I need this item tomorrow or day after. I cannot wait for longer. So that's very human.

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, 100%.

Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. So like, you know, um, um, with this, uh, apparel business being so competitive now, uh, with the blanks you're uh, and your business, there's. Do you see, um, is that as an advantage versus a like a designer product versus, uh. Or is it like, because, uh, it's blanks you are having. You have like a really good heavy competition. And how do you see that E commerce space you had in, uh, working? Is it like in your favor or is it against or how are you working with that?

Speaker A: Yeah, it's an interesting question. So you definitely have a, have a, I'd say a strong subset of retail or D2C or B2C shoppers who just, just like. And want blank apparel. Um, similar to say, the shirt you're wearing or, um, you know, just good quality, solid basics for everyday wear. Um, so we, you know, we have retail customers who love that about us. Specifically, there's nothing on the garment. It's very easy to wear. It's not a, It's. It, you know, we, we cater for multiple fits and, and, and um, men, uh, women and children. So we have a wide range. Um, the offering is pretty universal and we focus on, on the basics and, and kind of timeless designs that won't go out. Ah, fashion, they'll, they'll always be around, um, classic T shirts and pants, jackets, uh, sweatshirts, etc. So, you know, rather than chasing trends and, and kind of being at the, I'd say the mercy of kind of seasonal trends or global trends and fashion, you, you kind of play this, um, game through the middle.

Speaker C: Right?

Speaker A: Uh.

Speaker C: Hm.

Speaker A: You know, basics that everyone needs, um, at any point in time and are very easy to wear and will last. Um, then from the B2B side of things, um, I'd say straight away, there's tons of competition. You're right. There's huge global blank apparel companies who are, uh, far larger than us. And it creates, uh, an awesome challenge in the market. So when you're going into the US Market and trying to sell a T shirt and you're in the land of the T shirt, you know, you're, you're, you're in the country that I think designed the T shirt, you're going to come across, you know, I don't know, thousands of competitors, some huge, some small. But that's where I think having a, ah, having a, know a strong, a strong point of difference in your, in your, in what you're trying to achieve as a brand. So for, for us, we very much see ourselves as the provider of premium blank apparel. Um, our pricing in the B2B space can be a little bit higher than competitors, for example, but that's the space we want to play in. Um, we're not interested in races to the bottom in terms of pricing. But then on the flip side of that, you have the benefits of kind, um, of quality blanks that will stand the test of time, that'll print on beautifully, that'll last wash after wash, that'll stick around in your wardrobe for a little bit longer. Um, so yeah, it's a balancing act. But I think when you stay true to your guns and stay true to what you're doing and um, you obviously use tools of your exposure like marketing and all of these important things, uh, from a business perspective, yeah, you kind of cut out and find your niche in that market and cut out your piece of that pie and um, work on relationships with customers and relationships with our B2B customers. And yeah, uh, we're seeing some good growth in the US and other regions. So a lot of competition though. Like you said, a lot of competition.

Speaker C: Yeah, now I get it actually. You know, it's like, uh, I observe and I can see. Uh, I like to go shop at Uniqlo here and in for a reason. It's like because it's blanks. They don't have any logos there. So now I can relate why I go there and why I would actually go shop at as color as a B2C customer. So that really makes sense.

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We don't have Uniqlo in New Zealand. Um, uh, yeah, the closest shop is in Australia. So you gotta, you gotta, you know, you gotta take a little trip to get to it.

Speaker C: But yeah, but like a similar, a similar idea. So like, I think it could be an inspiration for you, uh, for it could give you a reason why you should have a, even like a retail stores, uh, at least in some high traffic, touristy areas or something. I, I don't want to give you suggestions on business. You are, you know it better. But yeah, but I do agree, I see uh, the reason why people would go for blanks because there is a reason why I go to Uniqlo. The same thing. Uh, also similarly, like, you know, Uh, I like what you said. Staying in the middle and not getting into that fashion thing. Um, again, with the economies growing all over the world, something that actually worries me is that we as a consumers continue to buy stuff, um, and our closets are full and getting fuller. So, um, now I think there is a, uh, there's this whole wave or there's a thought process in the society where people want to buy good quality stuff and want to stick with it for some time, use it for long. Uh, and in those cases, buying, uh, timeless things is important because you don't want to, like, be irrelevant in like a year. Instead, you just buy something for winter. You just be, uh, able to use it through all the few years, a few more seasons and stuff, and maybe similarly for summers or springs or whatever. So that makes sense. And also, like, you know, you don't have that guilt thing. I'm sure Larry is, uh, so good, feels good about that. You know, his business is not creating more garbage in the world.

Speaker A: It's such an interesting point. You know, I think, um, I used to work for a company down here called Icebreaker. They're a merino company, so their whole brand ethos was based on sustainability and natural product, natural fibers. Um, but I remember the owner of that business coming in and chatting to us and he said, look, it was interesting what he said. He said, basically, the only way we can be truly sustainable is if we close shop and stop selling stuff. Because, uh, when you are selling anything, there's, uh, a footprint. Right? So I think when you're in business, it's good to be aware of that. And then it's also good to kind of do the best you can in that space. Whether or not that's looking, um, at, uh, how much plastic you're using in the supply chain, um, the health of the factories and the suppliers you work with overseas who make your product, um, partnering with, um, kind of ESG companies and sustainability companies who are offsetting some of that footprint. And then for us, you know, a big piece of the puzzle, which you mentioned was creating product that isn't just going to break down in the wash or shrink or go out of shape and will last wash after wash and hopefully stay in your, uh, wardrobe for years, um, and never, never go out of fashion. So, yeah, you're touching on our ethos, which is, which is awesome.

Speaker C: And this is all we can do. You as a fashion, uh, or apparel company, this is what you can. Best you can do is produce item that holds that, you know, works for the. For the consumer for longer time period. Now it's up to the customer to choose if they want to buy 10 or 100, if they want to go every season, they want to go buy new stuff every season and throw and dump it or not. But it's not businesses to think about that's responsible. That responsibility lies on the customer side. Um, on the business side like you said, you know, we have to make sure we monitor our supply chain. We monitor like, you know, the product is really good, that it can be used for years. So. So you're doing good there.

Speaker A: Yeah, I love that, I love that we're aligned. Yeah.

Speaker C: Um, so like, you know, uh, this is definitely interesting conversation and I can keep going on and on with Just to bring this podcast to the end. One, uh, final question I wanted to go talk to you about is like we are in the tech world and E Com is all about new technologies and they're like always new things. Coming up, tell us about your uh, point of view on how you see all these emerging technologies, what you think, uh, is coming up next and you, what is it you're excited about? Or is there some kind of a preparation or something we should be doing about it?

Speaker A: Mhm. Yeah. I mean it's hard to answer uh, this question without saying AI. Right.

Speaker C: I feel like yes, that's exactly what I wanted you to say.

Speaker A: So I mean that feels like probably um, I mean the most monumental change and not only probably E commerce and what we're doing in the tech space, but uh, kind of from a, from a cultural perspective too. I mean it feels pretty monumental. And I think if I went back, say two years ago, I was quite skeptical at the time because there was a lot of noise about AI, but it felt like there weren't many practical applications of it. So I was hearing you're hearing that buzzword a lot and you're hearing it kind of used in this marketing sense. But then you look at how it was being used and it felt kind of clunky. Obviously it was brand new and all of these partners were, you know, it feels like a bit of an arms race in terms of who can, who can kind of harness the power of what AI can do in a hyper practical way and I guess commercialize it and use it as a tool. And um, I just think it's moving so fast and you know, the conversations we've been having this year with our um, say SEO partners and marketing partners around. Okay, what does SEO mean now? How you know, is Google relevancy important? Do we need to be focusing on OpenAI and chat, GDP and perplexity and showing up in channels we've never thought of like, like WhatsApp and Pinterest and TikTok and how AI plays into that. And how are you going to be discovered in this kind of new landscape where like 5 years ago people just go to Google, right? It was Google kind of Google or nothing. Um, now product discovery or discovery of kind of anything is happening in all these different ways, um, on all these different apps and different channels and different feeds and different marketplaces. And it, yeah, it feels like you've got to be in that mix because I guess in order to stay relevant and to stay kind of visible and, and searchable and I guess findable by, by your, by your customers and by the consumer feels, um, important, I think, I think that's really important. And um, yeah, I don't know, I'd love to hear your take on that because that feels, that feels like the biggest one for me. And then also how AI is kind of starting to impact some things I'm seeing in E commerce, like um, AI powered merchandising of your PLP pages or um, obviously there's this customer, uh, service bots and um, servicing information on your site or comparing uh, products against each other. And there definitely feels to be more and more practical applications of that new, um. I don't even know what you call that new tech, I guess. Um, but yeah.

Speaker C: So, uh, where I see, in my personal experience, I've been using AI a lot. I travel. So for example, if I'm looking for Airbnb, uh, now before, back in the day I was go Google the location and then maybe, you know, then go look up in the Airbnb. Now what I do is I tell GPT and it knows my profile because I've been doing it for some time. So I tell them, you know what I'm looking. I want to find a place in the United States for this month, during this month. And it would go help me because it knows what kind of places I want to go and then it will go help me find, uh, the Airbnbs in like a big geographical region like on the east coast. Or if I say I want to stay within this time zone and things like that, it will do that. So what I'm trying to get to is like, you know, the AI tools are becoming our assistant. They are helping us to do what we want in our case here to buy something. So imagine this, your B2B customer, the person who would otherwise place Order with you. They are brainstorming idea of like, hey, you know what? This season we are launching this particular uh, new music album or whatever and we are thinking about the T shirt idea or apparel idea and they start brainstorming this with GPT. Right, right. Some, whatever, it could be cloud or a, uh, over chat GPD or whatever. And then the conversation will slowly come to a point where it would say, do you want me to suggest you some brand, product suppliers or something like that? No, GPT will always give you a prompt. Uh, so I think very quickly the brainstorming session with AI becomes a buying shopping experience, uh, with AI supporting it. So now AI knowing about your products, every detail about your product is very important. Uh, now what kind of detail would be there? So like how we do, what do we do? We are going to talk to AI about like, hey, I'm looking for a sustainability supplier, I'm looking for this or that. So something that is very hard for B2C customer to actually go consume all that content from your blogs because they're not going to read it. Uh, so they are going to do some homework or some influencer going to tell them that as color is a really good vendor and all that and then they will remember and they'll go to your website. But chat GPT will do it for them and say, you know, this company is really good in this, this, this way and it goes with your ideology, so you should go shop with them. So they are now, GPT would now become an influencer to say.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker C: So in that. So I think I'm excited about this part of uh, AI, uh, where how it's going to impact our buying experiences.

Speaker A: Totally, totally. I'm the same. It's uh, yeah, it's, it feels like a real shift, right? Like a real shift how we, how we do things. Um, right.

Speaker C: So that also means that, you know, back in the day we were doing SEO and all that for human. Now we have to do content for AI. Ah, we still have to do content, but it is. The AI is going to read it.

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's such a good point. It's like an organism, right? It's like another life form almost.

Speaker C: Yes, yes. And I think what something we need to be, uh, aware of is that more and more content writing is now being done by AI. This is where I think, uh, uh, the catch is if we use more AI to do content writing, then probably we will miss the point. Uh, because AI may not get everything that we want it to. So we should see our content on our website as a training, as a tool to train AI. So see ourselves as a AI training company.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: Uh, as a, uh, SEO marketer, the marketing department of B2, uh, all these retail or any kind of selling, they should be thinking themselves as a AI, AI engine training company. So they should be thinking about how can I train this AI about my products.

Speaker A: Gotcha. Gotcha.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker A: Um, yeah, Such a good point.

Speaker C: Yeah. Cool.

Speaker A: I like that analogy. I like that analogy. It's like m set up your sites almost how you would like to be discovered or talked about by AI when it crawls your pages. Yeah, yeah, I like that. Cool.

Speaker C: So. Well, you know, this was great talking to you. Thank you very much, Joe.

Speaker A: Thank you very much. Yeah, really appreciate being on.

Speaker B: That's it for this episode of the Customer Centric Retailing Podcast. If you like what you heard, you can subscribe on Apple Podcast, Spotify and Google Podcast. Please rate and review and recommend to a friend or a fellow retail fanatic. This podcast is presented by HotWorx Commerce.