When text automation really pays off in e-commerce

Automation technology is playing an increasingly important role in the marketing and media environment. It is helping to bundle data streams, send newsletters and publish social media content. And now online merchants are also using software that creates automatically generated product descriptions and integrates them into their shops. What then reads as if it has been typed by a human hand in fact comes from companies like uNaice and was produced with the aid of the software as a service solution from AX Semantics. To generate a very large number of different texts in a short span of time, a corresponding amount of product and customer data on the potential buyer groups is required.

Data basis paired with text concept

The algorithm processes these data and translates them into target group- and channel-specific text according to the trained specifications for semantics and language style. It is therefore hardly surprising that most of the robot-written content is currently created in areas where data is easily accessible. For example, product data that is usually organized in the form of Excel tables, product data sheets or databases is imported into the software via an API.

The structured product data is analyzed by the software. Then you define your individual set of rules including variations for individual words or entire sentences, for example, and generate product texts at the click of a mouse. The finished texts are then sent to the online shop via the API. The richer the data, the more detailed and comprehensive the text concept can be. The quality of the data thus also determines the quality of the text.

The time required for content creation is often lacking

In a recent study conducted by uNaice, in which 152 e-commerce companies were surveyed, more than 70 percent of online merchants stated that lack of time is the biggest hurdle in the field of text production. However, high-quality product descriptions are tremendously important when it comes to informing potential customers and supporting them on their way to their personal purchase decision. And Google is also happy to have suitable content on a landing page. “In total, it is possible to save up to 75 percent of the working time and create better texts for people and search engines,” explains Christian Meyer, Managing Director of uNaice. “The use of a text robot enables online shops to automatically generate individual, unique and SEO-relevant texts in many languages from existing product data within seconds,” adds Meyer.

The possibilities of applying text robots go far beyond conventional product descriptions. Examples of further personalized offers based on customer data are individual e-mails and newsletters with product recommendations, but also text following configuration of a product in the online shop. It is not yet currently possible for text robots to rewrite existing content in an online shop, because inventory content always contains unstructured data. These cannot (yet) be analyzed by the software. “But AI will solve this on the long term,” says Christian Meyer.

Lots of potential for other industries as well

Text automation is a blessing not only for the e-commerce industry, but also for other professions such as doctors, lawyers or civil servants, who spend a lot of time creating texts from recurring text modules and structured data. Intelligent software solutions help free you from typical activities and create time for other, more complex tasks.

The bottom line

Shop operators who want to consistently address the topic of content commerce will ultimately attach importance to product descriptions that are as individual as possible. Such an enhanced user experience is not only rewarded by customers, but also by improved visibility in search engines. It is impossible to master this task manually, especially with a large assortment and low unit prices or margins. This is where text robots come in. Trained by people, they can do a very valuable job, which can give online shops a decisive competitive advantage in the battle for customers.