The Entrepreneurs Council: how founders are embracing artificial intelligence

Before implementing AI, there are a series of considerations to contemplate.

First, clearly define the business objectives and strategic goals you aim to achieve through AI implementation. Not every opportunity to leverage AI is a worthwhile one. You should consider a rigorous cost-benefit analysis to determine if the contribution margin from AI in a specific instance outweighs the implementation costs and potential business disruption from taking on the project.

The build-out of software and even customization of off-the-shelf SaaS products is often time-consuming, very expensive and bears a very real risk as it may not always work in the way you anticipated. This leads me to underline one of the greatest risks – your vendors. It is of critical importance to be thorough in your diligence of the prospective developers and software providers who are going to support development and implementation of your AI strategy. Take the time to collect references and speak to companies who had similar goals and successful deployments. Learn the fundamentals about the technology stack, AI algorithms, tools and platforms offered by each vendor, as well as their expertise in AI, machine learning and data science.

AI is a new and blossoming industry, but your business cannot afford to be the first customer, so work with seasoned veterans who have a great reputation and a track record of execution.

As a membership-based e-commerce platform, we are always seeking innovative ways to improve our members’ experience. When integrating AI, we look at it first and foremost through that member lens: can we provide a better experience for them if we roll out this AI-enhanced tool? Ultimately, our long-term business success is intricately tied to the value we deliver to our members, making healthy and sustainable living easy and affordable.

For instance, we recently introduced an updated customer onboarding experience leveraging AI, where members answer a short questionnaire and receive personalized product recommendations in their cart that they can then customize. This not only streamlines the shopping process but also fosters a more economical and sustainable shopping experience, encouraging larger basket sizes and ultimately a reduced carbon footprint per order.

Ensuring that AI tools enhance rather than detract from the core member experience requires extensive iteration. We’ve invested heavily in user testing and feedback mechanisms to continually refine our AI algorithms to keep learning best practices that our members benefit from. Fortunately, our efforts have yielded promising results: we are seeing high member engagement and repeat order rates when using our AI tools. Staying vigilant and committed to addressing any potential obstacles that may arise is critical – but with AI and machine learning, we can quickly learn, iterate and pivot to the next best strategy.

It can be difficult to appreciate that through the development of technology, we no longer have to perform the most mundane tasks. The reality is that most employees don’t want to do tedious, manual work. It is in everyone’s best interest to find cost-effective ways to scale manual work through machines, and that has informed many of our AI-driven tech expansions.

AI investments first require a deep understanding of the strategies used in the highly regulated automotive, pharmaceuticals and insurance industries we work with. Once we understand our customers’ challenges, we can offer them a product market fit and utilize AI investments to properly gain efficiencies using our technology.

Evaluation must include understanding how to serve your customers using AI. I believe the best use of AI is not done broadly but is more focused within the verticals or industries that your company serves. For Constellation, our unique skill set is best served working with highly regulated and complex industries.