Amazon continues to experiment with ways to use AI to improve the shopping experience, resulting in the release on Tuesday of a new feature within its Alexa for Shopping AI assistant called “Update Me When.” This latest addition allows you to send personalized notifications to consumers when something new or relevant happens that could lead to a purchase.
For example, Amazon suggests people can use the feature to track when their favorite brands launch new product lines, when new seasons of their favorite TV shows end, when their favorite artists announce concert tours, when the authors they read release new books, when technology companies release new products, and more.
The introduction is one of several AI-powered shopping features Amazon highlighted Tuesday, many of which signal broader changes in the company’s AI strategy. Until now, Alexa has primarily answered questions directly from shoppers about products. You can now predict that something might prompt a shopper to buy before they even think about it.
Initially, consumers will have to set up these alerts directly, but it’s not hard to imagine a future where Amazon automatically generates alerts or suggests alerts to which shoppers subscribe as they browse their favorite products.
The most useful of the other Alexa for Shopping features is the existing price tracking feature where you can ask the assistant to alert you when a product reaches a certain price or a certain discount percentage. This feature also allows you to automatically purchase items that meet these criteria, if desired.
The retailer also uses Alexa to source personalized deals, create shopping guides, create carts with past purchases, track product pricing history, display AI summaries when searching for products or on product detail pages, transcribe handwritten lists to add items to cart, compare items, and more.
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