Tuesday, September 9th. “Ralph wrecks the internet”. Not that Ralph.

Ralph Lauren launched an AI-Powered fashion styling helper called Ask Ralph.

This bold move exposes the brand to newness yet again. As a consumer of the brand, a fan of their innovation and follower of their ecommerce and direct-to-consumer business, I have found RL to be head of the class as it relates to online story-telling, site design, features and capabilities.

Well, here they go again. This launch of the Ask Ralph AI-capability leads me to a thesis on how our behaviors will change radically in the short term. The way we search, I believe is already changing. It’s becoming more natural language based. Like, “what should I wear to a lunch meeting?” or “I have a wedding coming up and need a blue suit”.

This is only going to propagate more when ChatGPT introduces Shopify and other vendors ecommerce platforms directly into the interface. So now we never leave the ChatGPT window and no longer redirected to a brand DTC site.

I recently gave a presentation and was asked. Is DTC dead? I said. Absolutely not! Then proceeded with a metaphoric answer… The blocks that consumers hang out on is changing much more dynamically. In the past it was all about redirection. Get the consumer to somehow, someway land on my website. Either the homepage, or PDP/PLP page.

Now and in the future, it will be up to brands to chase consumers block to block to reach them where they are. Without redirection but instant ecommerce capabilities wherever they are visiting. We see this from Social media and we will see this advance in the AI interface.

So, go Ask Ralph and check it out for yourself. This is a masterclass for how to rollout AI-features that draw you in, keep you there, and provide extreme personalized experiences. Well done Ralph!!!