# The Best of Applied Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Automation, Bots, Chatbots

## Automating Customer Support With Human-Like Virtual Agents (Interview with Rachael Rekart of Autodesk)

As part of our AI For Growth executive education series, we interview top executives at leading global companies who have successfully applied AI to grow their enterprises. Today, we sit down with Rachael Rekart, Director of Machine Assistance at Autodesk, a software firm that provides specialized software for the architecture, engineering, construction, … [Read more...](/content/automating-customer-support-with-human-like-virtual-agents-autodesk/index.html)

## Driving Customer Engagement and Transparency With AI (Interview with Rob Walker of Pega)

As part of our AI For Growth executive education series, we interview top executives at leading global companies who have successfully applied AI to grow their enterprises. Today, we sit down with Dr. Rob F. Walker, VP of Decisioning & Analytics at Pegasystems, a technology leader in cloud software for customer engagement and operational excellence. [Read more...](/content/customer-engagement-transparency-rob-walker-pegasystems/index.html)

## Selling AI? Here’s How To Stand Out From The Noisy Marketing Hype

Hoping to appear relevant, businesses love to invoke AI in their marketing every chance they get — but not everyone is impressed. When the hype gets out of control, facts get lost in the haze and the real promise of artificial intelligence regresses into a sci-fi version of snake oil. [Read more...](/content/overcome-ai-marketing-hype/index.html)

## A Taste Of Tomorrow: How Food and Beverage Companies Leverage AI

People have become picky eaters. Our ancestors ate whatever they could forage, but modern day Homo Sapiens expect gourmet meals at street food prices on demand. Consumers prefer fast, affordable, healthy, and delicious. To meet fickle consumer tastes, food and beverage (F&B) companies look to artificial intelligence to help them scale new products and stay profitable. [Read more...](/content/food-beverage-cpg-companies-leverage-ai-machine-learning/index.html)

## Neural Network Generates Fake Startups. Hilarity Ensues.

Top-tier branding agencies can run you $50,000 or more for a project. For bootstrapped entrepreneurs looking for a new name, tagline, and logo for your startups, this pricing can seem nuts. Naming is also a rather contentious affair, requiring you to balance co-founder preferences, customer opinions, and the unpredictable whims of domain squatters who may be hogging your … [Read more...](/content/recurrent-neural-network-generates-startup-names-hilarity-ensues/index.html)

## From Gloom to Glam: The Evolution Of Facebook Messenger Chatbots

Good things come to those who wait, but sometimes you have to ride out rainstorms to get your rainbows. In 2011, Facebook launched its Messenger platform and people gladly hopped in, forming an active community of around 600 million chatty humans by 2015. In April 2016, the social network opened Messenger to chatbots, conversational software programs driven by algorithmic … [Read more...](/content/facebook-messenger-chatbot-evolution/index.html)

## How Artificial Intelligence Is Used In Customer Experience Automation

Artificial intelligence and virtual agents promise improved user experiences and decreased servicing costs. These occur through several pathways. Virtual agents can be used to ensure the customer is routed to the proper department. Virtual agents are conversational computer programs that interact directly with a customer without human intervention. They are also known … [Read more...](/content/artificial-intelligence-used-customer-experience-automation/index.html)

## Common Pain Points In Customer Experience & Service

By 2020, customer care will overtake product and price as the number one way for a business to differentiate itself. This is the age of the customer, and companies must progress to meet changing consumer expectations. In the words of famed economist Arthur F. Sheldon, “He profits most who serves best”. Half of consumers will take their business elsewhere within a day as a … [Read more...](/content/history-common-pain-points-customer-service-experience/index.html)

## The Future Of Visual Intelligence For Brands

Ever since neural networks began their renewed renaissance in 2012, computer vision has been a ripe field of study and innovation for AI researchers and a fruitful area of applied AI for enterprises. Deep learning enables incredible feats of machine vision, such as classifying image subjects at human parity and dynamically generating completely new imagery. [Read more...](/content/brand-visual-intelligence-clarifai-matt-zeiler/index.html)