What's Up with Tech?
Tech Transformation with Evan Kirstel: A podcast exploring the latest trends and innovations in the tech industry, and how businesses can leverage them for growth, diving into the world of B2B, discussing strategies, trends, and sharing insights from industry leaders!
With over three decades in telecom and IT, I've mastered the art of transforming social media into a dynamic platform for audience engagement, community building, and establishing thought leadership. My approach isn't about personal brand promotion but about delivering educational and informative content to cultivate a sustainable, long-term business presence. I am the leading content creator in areas like Enterprise AI, UCaaS, CPaaS, CCaaS, Telecom/5G and more!
What's Up with Tech?
Revolutionizing Search: Algolia's AI-Driven Innovations, E-Commerce Evolution, and Industry Leadership with CEO Bernadette Nixon
Interested in being a guest? Email us at admin@evankirstel.com
Unlock the secrets behind AI-driven search capabilities with Bernadette Nixon, CEO of Algolia, as she takes us on a journey through the company's impact on industries like e-commerce, media, and SaaS. Learn how Algolia's mission to simplify the search experience has evolved, employing artificial intelligence to understand user intent and deliver personalized recommendations, surpassing traditional keyword searches. Bernadette delves into the transformative potential of generative AI, promising more intuitive and conversational shopping experiences. Discover how Algolia transitioned from a mobile-focused startup to an industry leader in AI search, serving over 17,000 customers.
Experience the latest innovations in e-commerce, including the pivotal shift from monolithic systems to composable architectures driven by APIs and headless e-commerce. Understand how strategic search functionalities and journey mapping are revolutionizing customer engagement, especially for complex purchases. We also celebrate Algolia's recognition in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for search and product discovery, while unveiling future plans centered on AI innovation and a robust merchandising studio. Closing on a personal note, Bernadette shares insights on balancing work and family commitments, offering a heartfelt conversation that resonates universally. Join us for an episode packed with groundbreaking ideas and personal reflections.
More at https://linktr.ee/EvanKirstel
for being here. Fascinating topic search, not what we think of typically in the enterprise, but a really relevant and important topic, particularly in this world of AI. Before that, maybe introduce yourself, your mission and the team at Algolia.
Speaker 2:Sure, absolutely so. Bernadette Nixon. I'm the CEO of Algolia and have been for just over four years now, and here at Algolia, we are an AI search company, and our purpose in life what makes us get up in the morning is enabling people to find what they're looking for without foraging.
Speaker 1:Well, that's a very simple mission statement. I love it. Maybe a little bit more color on some of the core problems and challenges your AI search solution is addressing in the enterprise.
Speaker 2:Yeah, for certain. So we have broad applicability. So we have the honor of serving about 17,000 customers in a broad range of verticals. Yes, so I would say that the top vertical that leverages us is the e-commerce space, or retail for omnichannel search. After that we have media companies that use us as well. As then, I would say our third largest vertical is other SaaS companies like ourselves that choose to embed us as search as they're building their own products instead of probably building it from scratch with open source.
Speaker 2:But the problem statement, no matter which vertical you're in, what you're trying to do is you're trying to enable people to find what they want. So, if you take the e-commerce use case, for example, everybody knows the search bar. If you bought anything online, then your highest intent moment as a company, as a brand, as a retailer, to capture somebody is when they're in the search bar, because that's when they have the highest intent. They know what they're looking for and you want, know, you want to convert them.
Speaker 2:But the interesting thing is that search actually powers a whole bunch of other stuff on a commercial on an e-com site, for example. So I'm looking to be inspired and find a new handbag. Well, I'm not going to be in the search bar. I'm going to be looking at their collections, their winter collection, their spring, maybe what's on sale, all of those pages they are merchandised, probably personalized to me, versus if you went on there to find something. And so all of that merchandising that is done on a collection page, on a product detail page, the recommendation carousels, all of that is also powered by search, whereas I don't think people think about that. They just think about the search bar. But it's so much more than that these days.
Speaker 1:Indeed, and AI and Gen AI has overwhelmed us all in the tech world, but it's also shaping the future of search. So what role do you see AI playing today? What role are you playing? And moving forward.
Speaker 2:Sure, because of that, it's a great time to be in search, because it's sort of on the tip of everybody's tongue what's new? What, in addition, can I do now? So AI plays a big role for us because we are the only search engine on the market that is end-to-end AI at every important layer of our technology, and so, for example, we've all been trained to search for blue top, hawaiian shirts, khaki trousers. That's keyword search. We've been sort of indoctrinated over the past 20-25 years to search like that. But it's, you know, with the advent of new technologies like chat, gpt, we are finding that people's the number of words that people are using in their search queries is is getting longer. Uh, and that's because we want to be able to search like we think.
Speaker 2:So I want an outfit for a summer wedding in Provence, france. You know that could be something that I would look for. Well, you know you need AI to be able to understand and intuit what I'm looking for. I'm going to be looking for a bright, summery outfit where there's probably not a lot of air conditioning, and something that's a bit fancy, because it's probably going to be a little bit upscale. So I don't put any of those things in my search query. But that's what AI is able to infer, and what we like to say here at Algolia is that the whole search market has really moved from purely matching keywords to really understanding, understanding my intent as the person that's searching, and then being able to understand that intent and present me with the best results and a whole bunch of other recommendations. If you bought this, then you're likely to want to buy this, or here are some other products that look similar, for example, and personalized recommendations for you.
Speaker 2:So AI is playing a big role in the search market today and I think that role will only increase. And if you think about generative AI, then I think where that's going to have the largest impact is with the discovery process. So more as you're browsing and as you're looking to search for something, maybe you can't find, you've done three or four searches and you've not clicked on anything in particular, and then you could have a generative, conversational shopping experience that could guide you and might be able to present you with buying guides, shopping guides or product comparisons to help you narrow down what you're looking for. Oh, you're looking for a TV. I see you haven't found anything that fits the bill yet. Are you looking for gaming or streaming? Oh, I'm looking for streaming, then you might want to consider these couple of options. So I think AI has a significant impact in search and I think Gen AI is also going to have a significant impact in the discovery or the browse part of what we do as part of a customer journey, for example.
Speaker 1:Well, great opportunity for online consumers and 17,000 plus enterprise customers. That's quite a customer base. What set you guys apart in this pretty crowded world of search and discovery?
Speaker 2:So, when we started, we started perfecting our art in the mobile space and going back to 2012, 2013, 2014,. Around that era and you know, I don't know about you, but my mobile phone didn't look, you know, quite like it does today with the power that I have available. So, as a consequence of that, we were always blazing fast from day one. So being fast is definitely one of the things that differentiates us, and you might say, well, fine, but didn't you crack that a long time ago? Why are you still talking about that? Because being fast in a world of AI is now, you know, a whole different ballgame that you also have to conquer, and I'm pleased to say we've been at it now a couple of years and at the core of our technology. I'm pleased to say that we have conquered that.
Speaker 2:So, being fast and also what I like to call global speed at scale so it's not just the 17,000 customers, but those 17,000 customers generate almost two trillion searches on our platform a year. Now, anything with a trillion sounds pretty good, but what does that really mean? Well, if you take I mean, forget Google for a moment but if you take the next five public search engines Bing, yahoo, baidu for China, yandex for Russia, duckduckgo for folks with privacy concerns. We have four times their combined entire volume on our platform in a year. So I would say global speed at scale and the speed, not just the speed of the search results, but the speed at which you can deploy and start using us. So, amongst other things, those are some of the things that set us apart.
Speaker 1:Fantastic and talk about your use in the enterprise for organizations, large organizations that might be globally distributed. How are they using you today and what are some of the values of not foraging, as you say, on intranets and other things for content?
Speaker 2:things for content. Sure, the part of the enterprise that we tend to be used in is for anybody that is customer facing. Now that could be in a retail setting. It could be in a financial services setting, whereby they're trying to establish whether Evan has all of the right. You know they need to cross sell too, so do you have all of the right financial products from you know a JP Morgan's Chase or a Morgan Stanley, for example and so their wealth managers could look at you, know what are you using product wise, and then they could be presented with the right information at the right time when it really counts and be able to present that information to you as a potential customer. So that's really not dealing with anything to do with online commerce, but it's to do with an individual who is still servicing a customer, and that's a really important segment for us, because we believe that speed is of the essence in those customer interactions.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, it's absolutely true. I think we can all and have all experienced that firsthand Talk about your role in e-commerce. That's a big marketplace for you and things like APIs are taking off headless e-commerce. What other trends are you seeing there and how do you play into those?
Speaker 2:Sure In e-commerce in particular, although it's in other sectors as well. But it started off with a headless trend of disintermediating the front end experience from the back end stack, and now it's really evolved into composable architectures and we have been an API product since day one, been an API product since day one, and so we're an absolute shoo-in to anybody that is moving from more of a monolithic or an old tech stack into the composable world. That's really important. It enables you to change things on the front end for your customers, whether those are internal or external customers, and without having to go into the bowels of the back end. So being an API first product enables us to be ideal in that kind of situation.
Speaker 2:But the other interesting part about the composable movement is there are still some large enterprises out there that have the big monolithic stacks and although they have mentally made the decision they want to go composable, they know that that's going to be a multi-year journey because they may have so many different businesses or brands or countries or regions that they're servicing, and so search is a great way for those companies to really put their tip in or toe in the water, because it's easy to break search off. It impacts your customer experience. It impacts conversion if you're in e-commerce and it's very easy to plug us in, even to the older stacks. So I love it when there's a trend out there, when we can help customers win on the front end of that trend and when we can also help customers win, sort of trying to catch up to that trend, if you will.
Speaker 1:Oh, super interesting. So we've seen the trend towards a renewed focus on customer experience. Consumer experiences it's been nice to experience as an end user, but what are you seeing on the buyer side, the tech buyers? Does that filter down to your customers? Are they really doubling down on CX, and how has that affected your thinking about the product and how you can help them?
Speaker 2:Yes, I think a number of the customers that we interact with they talk about their journey mapping exercises that they're doing so that they can impact the entire customer experience. And that's where, frankly, the whole browse part of the experience comes in. Because when people aren't sure what they're looking for or it's not a quick transactional buy, because when people aren't sure what they're looking for, or it's not a quick transactional buy, it's a larger, more luxury good or lifestyle choice that they're trying to make with a Caribbean cruise, for example. You know it is that experience, so that they can understand. You know what is that experience going to be when they step onto the ship, what are the different ways they can impact their own experience? With different packages, drinks packages, meals packages, you know all sorts of elements like that. So, yeah, I mean we're an integral part of how a brand would show up for their customers.
Speaker 1:Oh, fantastic. And just looking at your website, you're in the far upper right-hand side of the Gartner Magic Quadrant for search and product discovery. Congratulations on that. So small feat. What are some of your plans to stay in that upper right-hand quadrant? What are you guys focused on the rest of this year and next?
Speaker 2:Sure, yes, we were very honored when the Gardner Magic Quadrant came out in May of 24 and placed us in the uppermost right hand corner, as you said. So we have a focus in terms of our innovation agenda around AI, as you would expect, in the core engine, and making sure that we are enhancing that customer experience by ensuring that they can get the very best relevance conversion if they're in an e-commerce world. And if they are in an e-commerce world, then you want the experience to be great, not just for the end users, but you also want it to be great for your own in-house users of the technology as well. So the merchandising studio is an active area of innovation for us, making merchandisers' lives easier and then overall, making sure that we have applicability for the broader swath of the market out there. So it's an exciting time.
Speaker 1:It is indeed, and AI, gen AI is only fueling that excitement and very practical use cases. Congratulations on all the success and thanks for taking the time out of your busy August. You know we're all trying to balance family and work and appreciate your taking the time. Thanks so much.
Speaker 2:You're more than welcome and thank you for inviting me, evan.
Speaker 1:Okay, take care, and thanks everyone for listening than welcome, and thank you for inviting me, evan. Okay, take care and thanks everyone for listening and watching and until next time.