Chatbots and virtual assistants and conversational AI and on and on. We keep hearing about all these emerging technologies, but most of the time these phrases leave us confused as to what it all means, and even more, how to use these emerging technologies within our business operations.

You may have already heard the predictions that suggest by 2020, 70% of customer interactions will involve technology such as chatbots or virtual assistants. ASUG News sat down with Giacomo Gasperini, director, SAP digital commerce, to discuss how SAP is using this technology on its digital channels to improve its customers’ experience, how the technologies fit within the SAP portfolio, and how you can apply them to your own business processes.

Sharon: What is a virtual assistant and what is a chatbot? How are they different? How are they different than artificial intelligence (AI)?

Giacomo: Let’s start with artificial intelligence because it’s an umbrella term that we use to describe machines that mimic those prodigy functions that we normally associate with human minds, such as learning or problem solving. To break it down further, machine learning mimics how humans learn and conversational AI mimics how humans interact.