There was a time when the phrase "text me" meant something personal — a friend, a spouse, perhaps a teenager asking for money. Amazon, it seems, would like to be added to that list.
The company is introducing a feature that allows customers to text its AI shopping assistant, effectively turning the text message — that last refuge of human-to-human communication — into another surface for commerce. The option is available by invitation only to a small group of United States customers, with plans to expand in the coming weeks.
"Customers often jot down what they need the moment they think of it in their notes, in their messages, in their group chats," said Rajiv Mehta, vice president of conversational shopping at Amazon, in a statement. The implication, left unstated, is that Amazon would prefer to be present in all three.
The feature will also serve advertisements, which should surprise no one who has followed Amazon's steady transformation from a retailer that happens to sell advertising into an advertising company that happens to sell products. (The distinction may be academic, but the revenue is not.)
For Amazon, the texting assistant represents another step in what has become a multiyear effort to insert itself into the customer's decision-making process as early as possible — ideally before the customer has decided to buy anything at all. The company's AI shopping tools, which began as voice commands to Alexa devices, have expanded to include visual search, conversational chat, and now the humble SMS.
Whether customers will find it convenient or intrusive to receive shopping suggestions in the same place they receive birthday wishes from their mothers remains to be seen. Amazon, for its part, appears confident they will not mind.
Original story published in adweek.com: "Amazon is Letting Customers Text Its Shopping Assistant"