Scott's Thoughts

Balancing Technology and Trust: The Future of Responsible Retail Innovation

• Scott Benedict

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Responsible technology use in retail isn't getting enough attention. While everyone's talking about AI and personalization, we need to focus on how these powerful tools align with customer-centric strategies and ethical governance frameworks.

The exciting potential of AI in retail goes far beyond basic recommendations. Today's technology enables pre-filled shopping carts based on your history, virtual personal shoppers, purchase reminders, and personalized subscription offers—all anticipating your needs based on past behavior. 

We're also seeing innovative approaches to capturing attention during multitasking moments, allowing purchases through social media or streaming platforms. And the merging of online convenience with in-store experiences through virtual try-on, scan-and-go checkout, and store navigation apps creates truly seamless shopping journeys.

Walmart's global tech team recently highlighted their approach to responsible technology use through three core principles. They prioritize customer centricity by improving experiences while respecting privacy, commit to transparency about algorithmic decision-making with internal governance oversight, and build privacy protections from the ground up. 

This approach demonstrates how retail leaders can drive business results without compromising ethics. The future of retail technology isn't just about what's possible—it's about what's responsible. The companies that understand this balance will be the ones that truly transform the shopping experience while maintaining consumer trust.

Subscribe to our podcast for more insights on how technology is reshaping retail while keeping customer needs and privacy at the forefront. Share your thoughts on how retailers should balance innovation with responsibility.

Speaker 1:

Hello everyone, I'm Scott Benedict. You know, one of the things that occurs to me has been missing in all the conversations recently about the impact that new technology like artificial intelligence and data personalization has had in retailing has been about the responsible use of these technologies and how they are used in a way that reflects a strategic alignment towards both customer-focused, customer-centric innovation and ethical guidelines ethical governance, if you will about their use in retail today and moving forward. Use in retail today and moving forward, and a couple thoughts occurred to me. First of all, in terms of how the technology is used, one of the great things that AI and consumer data enables is much more personalized experiences and beyond just personalized item offerings on a website or on a mobile app, but things like pre-filled shopping carts based on prior purchases, or virtual personal shoppers, or reminders of items that are purchased with regularity, and even curated subscription offers, all done in a way that anticipates a customer's needs based on their prior purchase behavior and enhances convenience. That's kind of a neat use of the technology. Also, we know that consumers are multitaskers and shopping may occur in non-traditional ways, like while you're on social media or while you're watching a movie or a tv show on streaming services, and so the ability to make impulse purchases on those platforms is another way that I think is underutilized in modern retail today. Pulling together both online and in-store shopping experiences with convenience technology things like virtual try-on in apparel or scan-and-go technology allows you to check out much faster. Or store mapping capabilities and apps that help you find a particular item or category within a really large store, that help you find a particular item or category within a really large store. Services like fast delivery that either are same day or maybe, in some cases, within the same hours all which are enabled now through technology but underutilized in retail.

Speaker 1:

And one of the things that I think is really interesting is the focus on leveraging technology to make competitive pricing decisions, to give buyers feedback on what consumers think in terms of product quality, and also making sure the data security, the personalized data information about a shopper, is kept in the strictest of confidence. One of the things that I think was really neat a few months ago was a blog post that Walmart's global tech team put out talking about the responsible use of data and technology, and they indicated in this blog post that the company really subscribes to a couple of different principles, three principles, in fact. One is customer centricity the fact that Walmart will use AI to improve a customer experience while respecting personal preferences and personal privacy. Things like AI-driven search or recommendation tools are continuously refined so they deliver better and more relevant results, but without overstepping a shopper's privacy. Second thing is transparency and accountability.

Speaker 1:

In this blog, the company emphasized the fact that they wanted to assure both customers and internal associates understand how and why decisions are being made about algorithms, and that there is an internal governance board, if you will, that oversees AI development, to ensure both ethical alignment and the fact that it mitigates risk that the company doesn't do something for which it would later be regretful of. And then there's a pre-focus, or pre-destiny, around privacy that privacy protections in their technology infrastructure, from the ground up, from the most basic data to the most personal and complex data, that data minimization, secure data storage and adherence to global regulatory frameworks are all part of the strategy. So those three areas, I think, are notable, not only because they weren't required, but how leaders in retail can use it the right way, not only to drive business results, but to also stay adhered to ethical guidelines, and I thought that was kind of neat. That's what I've been thinking about. I'm Scott Benedict.