Appier Group Inc (TSE: 4180), Appier, an artificial intelligence software-as-a-service (SaaS) company, today announced Appier’s future footprint in digital marketing and the highlight of conversational marketing on the IDC podcast, available in English. 

Dr. Chih-Han Yu, CEO and co-founder of Appier on the podcast led by Dr. Chris Marshall, AVP for IDC Asia Pacific, shared his insights about how AI advances the data-driven marketing transformation and how conversational marketing can play an important role in the future of MarTech. Dr. Yu also explained how AI has changed the digital marketing world and what AI developments have been made since Appier was established in 2012. The pandemic has fundamentally altered people’s lives as most activities have moved online, hastening the accumulation of data and the urgency of data unification.

According to IDC, it is predicted that 80% of Asia Pacific organizations will prioritize investments in digital tools to augment physical spaces and assets with digital experiences by 2023 as they accelerate their journeys to becoming a future enterprise.

Pivoting customers via social media engagements will come in due course

Social media has in recent years become a go-to space for brands to engage, advertise and sell. With the trend of young generations getting used to interacting with brands via chatbots and instant messaging tools, Appier suggested navigation of customer journey is not enough; brands also need to rely on real-time conversations and interactions to differentiate users’ motivation and predict their next step.

Since Appier has incorporated BotBonnie, the conversational marketing solution, into the company's full-funnel AI marketing solution in 2021, Appier has worked more proactively with advanced AI technology that enables customers to tackle all aspects of the customer journey in one stop. Combining AI and data analysis expertise with conversational commerce means Appier is available to help customers achieve a comprehensive understanding of their users and use those insights to interact with them directly. 

This integrated service offering makes it possible to have a distinct advantage as digitalization and conversational marketing gather momentum. In the podcast, with a comprehensive understanding of customers, Dr. Yu reveals the company's goal through conversational marketing.​​

Beyond Conversation: The vision and future of conversational marketing by Appier

With the innovation of AI progressing and the application of conversational marketing has been broadened, Appier believes that in the future, chatbots can be more naturally interacted with. 

Dr. Yu said, “You just type anything you want to ask and as naturally as you ask your friends for some advice, the chatbot can provide information to you.”

In Appier’s vision of the future, brands and e-commerce will no longer be viewed as places to sell products. Brands can actually understand customer needs earlier and customers can get more information even before their purchasing motivations are triggered. 

“It will become very interesting what we call expert inquiry, natural interacting treatment, as well as the shopping experience merging with the consulting experience as well. That will be the future that we are imagining” he concluded. 

The IDC podcast episode is also available on Appier’s YouTube channels.