The tools have changed.

The principle hasn't.

For decades, retailers have invested in better stores, better websites, faster checkout, loyalty programs, mobile apps and increasingly sophisticated e-commerce platforms.

Now another shift is taking place.

The customer conversation itself is becoming a technology channel.

Voice agents and AI-powered shopping assistants are beginning to move beyond simply answering questions. They can help customers discover products, understand options, complete tasks, manage routine service requests and, increasingly, interact with businesses in a far more natural way.

For larger retailers, this presents an interesting question.

Not simply:

"Can AI answer our customers?"

But:

"What could we achieve if we understood every customer conversation better?"

The retail industry is moving beyond search

Traditional online shopping is remarkably predictable.

A customer visits a website.

They search for a product.

They filter the results.

They read descriptions.

They compare products.

They add something to their cart.

But that isn't necessarily how people think.

A customer might actually be thinking:

"I need something that will solve this problem."

"I'm not sure which product I need."

"Will this work with what I already have?"

"What's the best option for my budget?"

"I don't really understand the difference between these two products."

That is where conversational technology becomes interesting.

Instead of forcing customers to learn how a retailer's website works, the technology can begin to understand what the customer is actually trying to achieve.

Bunnings is already moving in this direction with Buddy, its AI-powered shopping assistant. Buddy is designed to help customers plan projects, answer more complex questions, find suitable products and even work from a photograph of a handwritten shopping list.

This is a significant shift.

The customer isn't necessarily searching for a product anymore.

They're describing a problem.

And the retailer is helping them find the solution.

Shopping assistants could change the role of the retailer

For years, retailers have competed on product range, price, availability and convenience.

AI-powered shopping assistants introduce another competitive dimension:

advice.

Imagine visiting an online medical-products retailer and saying:

"I'm looking for something that will help my elderly father, but I'm not sure exactly what I need."

Or a hardware customer asking:

"I've got a leaking tap. What do I need to fix it?"

Or a furniture customer saying:

"I need to furnish a small apartment and I've got $5,000 to spend."

Those aren't traditional search queries.

They're conversations.

A good shopping assistant can ask questions, understand context, narrow the options and help the customer move towards a decision.

Amazon has also been developing conversational shopping through its AI shopping assistant, now branded Alexa for Shopping, which can answer product questions, compare options, make recommendations and help with product discovery.

The opportunity isn't necessarily to remove people from retail.

It's to extend the expertise of the retailer beyond the limitations of a website.

Customer Experience: The conversation doesn't have to end when the sale does

Retail customer service extends well beyond product discovery.

Customers want to know:

Where is my order?

Can I return this?

How do I use it?

Can I change my delivery?

Is this product compatible?

What happens if something goes wrong?

Traditionally, these questions create workload for contact centres and customer-service teams.

A well-designed voice or chat agent can handle many routine interactions instantly, while routing more complex or sensitive situations to the right person.

That distinction matters.

Automation shouldn't mean removing the human.

Sometimes the best customer experience is an immediate answer.

Sometimes it's a seamless handover to someone who can help.

The intelligence is knowing the difference.

For retailers, this could mean shorter wait times, fewer repetitive enquiries and more time for employees to deal with the conversations where human judgement actually adds value.

The IKEA lesson: Listen to what the AI can't answer

This is perhaps the most interesting retail AI example I've come across.

IKEA introduced its Billie chatbot to handle routine customer enquiries.

Between 2021 and 2023, Billie handled approximately 3.2 million interactions and resolved around 47% of enquiries, generating nearly €13 million in savings.

But the really interesting part wasn't the 47%.

It was the 53% Billie didn't resolve.

Instead of simply treating those conversations as failed automation, IKEA examined what customers were actually asking for.

They discovered significant demand for something more complex: interior design advice.

IKEA subsequently re-skilled thousands of customer-service employees as remote interior-design advisers.

The remote selling channel generated approximately €1.3 billion in revenue in FY2022, representing 3.3% of the Group's total revenue at the time.

That's a remarkable lesson.

The AI didn't create the opportunity.

The customer conversations revealed it.

And that distinction is important.

Customer intelligence could become one of the biggest benefits

This is where I think the retail opportunity becomes particularly exciting.

Most businesses measure calls by volume.

How many calls?

How long were they?

How many were answered?

How many were abandoned?

Useful metrics.

But what if retailers could also understand:

What are customers asking for?

Which products are causing confusion?

What questions keep appearing?

Why are customers returning products?

What information is missing from the website?

Which products are customers struggling to choose between?

What are customers asking for that you don't currently offer?

That information already exists.

It's arriving every day through phone calls, chats, emails, reviews and support interactions.

The challenge is turning those conversations into usable intelligence.

A voice agent can potentially become more than a customer-service channel.

It can become a listening post for the business.

And that could influence product decisions, website content, training, marketing, sales and even future revenue opportunities.

Always available doesn't mean always automated

One of the simplest advantages of voice agents is availability.

Retail doesn't always operate neatly between 9am and 5pm.

Customers shop when it's convenient for them, not when you're ready.

They may have a question at 8pm.

They may need help on a Sunday.

They may be researching a product after work.

An always-available voice agent can provide an immediate response, capture an enquiry or collect information for follow-up when the business is closed.

That doesn't necessarily mean trying to complete every interaction automatically.

Sometimes the most valuable action is simply:

Capture the customer.

Understand what they need.

Record the details.

And make sure the business knows someone is waiting to hear from them.

That alone can prevent valuable opportunities from disappearing overnight.

Powerful workflows can sit behind the conversation

The voice itself is only one part of the equation.

What happens after the conversation can be even more important.

A well-designed voice agent should potentially:

• Capture customer details

• Qualify an enquiry

• Recommend appropriate products

• Route a customer to the right department

• Book an appointment

• Create a CRM record

• Trigger a follow-up

• Escalate a complex issue

• Capture a product-return reason

• Identify sales opportunities

• Record customer questions for analysis

• Provide reporting and insights to management

This is where the distinction between a voice bot and a business solution becomes important.

Building something that talks is relatively easy.

Designing something that understands the business, follows the right process, captures useful information and creates a better customer experience is a very different challenge.

The real opportunity for retailers

I don't believe the future of retail is humans versus AI.

I think it's much more interesting than that.

It's about combining the strengths of both.

Technology can provide availability, consistency, speed and scale.

People provide judgement, empathy, expertise and creativity.

The most successful retailers will increasingly look at where each belongs in the customer journey.

And perhaps the biggest opportunity isn't reducing the number of conversations humans have.

It is making the conversations humans do more valuable.

A real-world perspective

I've recently had the opportunity to put many of these ideas into practice.

I've just completed the planning, architecture and build of a voice agent for a large Australian e-commerce retailer.

The business receives a significant volume of customer calls each day.

The initial objective was to simply to answer every call.

But the bigger opportunity was understanding why customers are calling, what they need, what information the business can capture and how those conversations can create better customer experiences and better business intelligence.

It's early days, but it's given me an even greater appreciation of something I've believed for a long time:

Technology should never be the starting point.

The customer is.

The business is.

The opportunity is.

Technology simply enables what comes next.

The future of retail may be more conversational

Retailers have spent decades making their businesses easier to find and easier to buy from.

The next evolution may be making them easier to talk to.

Voice agents and AI shopping assistants are opening the door to a more conversational retail experience—one where customers can explain what they need rather than figuring out how to search for it.

But the retailers that benefit most won't necessarily be the ones that deploy the most AI.

They'll be the ones that understand their customers best.

Because the most valuable information in your business may not be sitting in your product catalogue.

It may be hiding inside the conversations you're already having every day.

A final thought

Before You Invest in More Technology, Understand Your Customer Communication

Before deciding what technology your business needs, it's worth understanding what is already happening across your customer journey.

How are customers contacting you?

How quickly are you responding?

What questions are they asking?

Where are customers experiencing friction?

What happens when a customer needs help outside business hours?

How are enquiries captured and followed up?

What information is being lost between conversations, departments and systems?

And perhaps most importantly:

What are your customers already telling you that you haven't yet acted on?

These are the questions I believe businesses should answer before deciding which technology to introduce.

That's why I developed the Pixelroom Business Growth Assessment™.

It's a structured review designed to help identify opportunities to improve customer communication, customer experience and operational efficiency before recommending technology. The assessment explores the customer journey, enquiries, sales, operations, existing systems and potential improvement opportunities. Every assessment is personally reviewed, with practical observations and recommendations based on the individual business—not a generic report.

Want to understand how your business communicates with customers?

If you're a business owner or senior executive and you're wondering where opportunities may be hiding across your customer journey, you can learn more about the assessment here: Pixelroom Business Growth Assessment™.