TL;DR:

• Train your AI like a new hire. Give it tone guidelines, review weekly, and keep refining to stay on-brand.
• Adapt AI to real customer behavior. Adjust tone and timing to improve satisfaction, even if the answer stays the same.
• Use AI to drive sales, not just support. Top brands use it to answer product questions and guide pre-purchase decisions.
• Start small and improve as you go. Begin with one common question and test often to build momentum.

If you’ve been side-eyeing AI and wondering if it’s just hype, you’re not alone. A lot of CX leaders were skeptical, too:

“I used to be the loudest skeptic,” said Amber van den Berg, Head of CX at Wildride. “I was worried it would feel cold and robotic, completely disconnected from the warm, personal vibe we’d worked so hard to build.”

But fast forward to today, and teams at Wildride, OLIPOP, bareMinerals, and Love Wellness are using AI to do more than just deflect tickets. They’re…

• Cutting costs without cutting corners
• Driving revenue before a customer even checks out
• Delivering fast, on-brand, human-feeling support at scale

Here are six lessons you can steal from the brands doing it best.

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1. Think of AI as your sidekick

We need to get one point across clearly: AI isn’t about replacing your support team.

For brands with lean CX teams, burnout is a serious problem. And it’s one of the biggest reasons AI adoption is accelerating.

“I was constantly seeing the same frustrating inquiries—sponsorship asks, bachelorette party freebies, PR requests… 45% of our tickets were these kinds of messages,” said Nancy Sayo, Director of Consumer Services at global beauty brand, bareMinerals.

“Once I realized AI could handle them with kindness and consistency without pulling in my team, I was sold.”

Instead of thinking of AI as a replacement, think of it as an enhancement. 

It’s about making sure your CX team doesn’t burn out answering the same five questions 50 times a day.

With Gorgias AI Agent, Nancy’s team now uses automation to absorb the high-volume, low-conversion noise, freeing up their seasoned agents to focus on real revenue-driving moments.

“We use AI to handle low-complexity tickets. And we route higher-value customers to our human sales team—people who’ve been doing makeup for over a decade and really know what they’re doing.”

TL;DR? The smartest teams use AI to take the weight of repetitive tickets (“Do you ship internationally?” “Can I get free samples?”) off their shoulders so agents can focus on conversations that build trust, drive loyalty, and increase LTV.

2. Train your AI like a team member

While you can get started with AI quickly for simple queries, we don't recommend using it “out of the box.” And honestly, that’s a good thing.

Brands that “set it and forget it” are missing the point. Because if you want AI to sound exactly like your brand—not like every other chatbot on the internet—you need to give it the same context you’d give a new hire.

Amber van den Berg, Head of Customer Experience at baby carrier brand Wildride, wrote out detailed tone guidelines, including:

• Dos and don’ts for customer conversations
• Approved Dutch-to-English translations
• Example replies for nuanced, emotional questions
• Pre-written macros for product recs and delivery issues

“Lisa, our AI agent, is basically a super well-trained intern who never sleeps. I give her the same updates I give my human team, and I review Lisa’s conversations every week,” said Amber. “If something feels off-brand, too robotic, or just not Wildride enough, I tweak it.”

The feedback never stops, and that’s what makes Lisa so effective.

Related: Meet Auto QA: Quality checks are here to stay

3. Let AI mirror the pacing of real conversations

Even when AI gets it right, customers might not always feel like it did. Especially if the tone of voice is off or if your customer base just isn’t used to automation.

“Our CSAT was low at first,” said Nancy Sayo of bareMinerals. “Even if the response was accurate and beautifully written, our older customers just didn’t want to interact with AI.”

So Nancy’s team adapted. Rather than giving customers a blunt “no” to product requests, they restructured the flow:

“If someone asked for free product, we’d say, ‘We’ll send this to the team and follow up.’ Then, 3-5 days later, the AI would close the loop. It softened the blow and made customers feel heard—even if the answer didn’t change.”

That simple tweak raised CSAT and created a better customer experience without requiring a human to step in.

Inside Gorgias, teams like bareMinerals review AI performance weekly, not just to catch mistakes, but to optimize for tone, satisfaction, and brand feel. They use:

• CSAT reporting to spot dips in sentiment
• Conversation analytics to flag where AI may be losing trust
• Macro editing to quickly adjust common replies

AI gives you the flexibility to test, tweak, and tailor your approach in a way traditional support channels never could. 

4. Use AI to drive sales—not just support

Too many CX teams still treat AI like a glorified autoresponder. But the most forward-thinking brands are using it to guide shoppers to checkout.

“Our customers often ask: ‘Which carrier is better for warm weather?’ or ‘Will this fit both me and my taller partner?’” said Amber van den Berg, Head of CX at Wildride. “Lisa doesn’t just answer—she gives context, recommends features, and highlights small touches like the fact that a diaper fits in the side pocket.”

With Gorgias Shopping Assistant, brands can turn AI into a proactive sales assistant—answering product questions in real time, referencing what’s in the customer’s cart, and nudging them toward the best option with empathy.

5. CX insights should power the rest of your business

Great support doesn’t stop at the inbox. At Love Wellness, CX is the connective tissue between ecommerce, product, and marketing.

“We meet quarterly with our CX and ecommerce teams to review top questions, objections, and patterns,” said Mckay Elliot, Director of Amazon at Love Wellness. “That feedback goes straight into product development and PDP optimizations on both DTC and Amazon.”

But it’s not just a quarterly ritual. Feedback sharing is embedded in the culture, and they do this with a Slack channel dedicated to customer feedback. 

Dropping in insights is part of the team’s daily and weekly responsibilities. It helps everyone stay close to the content, and it sparks real collaboration on what we can improve. They then use those insights to improve ad messaging and content.

Your team has so much data they can review between channels like email, SMS, chat, and social media—both compliments and complaints. You need to be willing to listen to every customer’s needs.

Read more: Why customer service is important (according to a VP of CX)

6. Don’t overthink it, start small

One of the biggest mistakes brands make with AI? Trying to do too much, too soon.

Rolling out AI should feel like a phased launch, not a switch flip. The best results come from starting simple, testing often, and iterating as you go.

“We started with one simple question—‘Do you ship internationally?’—and built from there,” said Amber van den Berg of Wildride.

“And if it doesn’t work? You can always turn it off,” added Anne Dyer, Sr. Manager of CX & Loyalty Marketing at OLIPOP. “The key is to test, review, and keep iterating. AI should enhance your human experience, not replace it.”

If your helpdesk supports it, start in a test environment to preview answers before going live. Then roll out automation gradually by channel, topic, or ticket type and QA every step of the way.

For most brands, the best starting point is high-volume, low-complexity tickets like:

• “Where’s my order?”
• Subscription pauses or cancellations
• Returns and exchanges
• Store policies and FAQs

You don’t need to solve everything on day 1. Just commit to one question, one channel, and one hour per week. That’s where real momentum starts.

Related: Store policies by industry, explained: What to include for every vertical

How do you measure the impact of AI in CX?

Most CX teams are used to tracking classic metrics like ticket volume and CSAT. But when AI enters the mix, your definition of success shifts. It’s not all about how fast you handle tickets anymore—it’s about how customers feel after conversations with AI, team efficiency, and the quality of every interaction.

Here are the metric CX teams used to track without AI—and what they track now with AI:

The best use of AI makes space for human touch

AI isn’t here to replace your CX team. It’s here to free them up, so they can focus on deeper, more meaningful conversations that build loyalty and drive revenue.

So if you’re on the fence, start small. Train it. Review weekly. Build the muscle.

You’ll be surprised how quickly AI becomes your favorite intern.

If you want more tips from the experts featured today, you can:

• Watch the full webinar
• Get the AI in Action ebook

TL;DR:

• Consolidation doesn’t mean giving up flexibility. The right all-in-one tools are modular and API-friendly, so teams can customize and integrate freely.
• You gain efficiency, not lose features. One platform means fewer gaps, less manual work, and faster support.
• It’s more affordable and faster than you think. Consolidation cuts hidden costs and delivers ROI quickly.
• Gorgias is built for ecommerce. With a deep Shopify integration and 100+ apps to connect to, it can scale with CX teams, no matter their size.

If your CX team is juggling a dozen different tools just to answer one support ticket, you’re not alone. According to our 2025 Ecommerce Trends report, 42.28% of ecommerce professionals use six or more tools every day. Plus, nearly 40% spend $5,000–$50,000 annually on their tech stack.

That’s a lot of money and a lot of tabs.

It’s no wonder “tech stack fatigue” is setting in. But while many brands are ready to simplify, there’s still hesitation around consolidation. The biggest fear is that all-in-one tools are too rigid or basic to handle the complexity of a growing business.

But the truth is, consolidation doesn’t mean compromise. When done right, it means clarity, speed, and control. It also means fewer tools, smoother workflows, and faster customer support. 

Let’s bust some myths and show you what smart consolidation looks like.

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Myth #1: “All-in-one tools are too rigid”

One of the biggest blockers to consolidation is compatibility. Fifty-two percent of ecommerce professionals said they hesitate to consolidate because they’re worried about tools not playing nicely together. 

That hesitation makes sense. In the past, “all-in-one” tools meant being locked into a single provider’s ecosystem, with limited integrations and rigid workflows. For CX teams managing fast-moving ops and dozens of tools, from email and returns to reviews and subscriptions, the idea of losing flexibility is a non-starter. 

Reality: All-in-one tools are modular, not monolithic

Modern support platforms have moved away from monolithic systems and toward modular API-friendly designs that give brands control instead of constraints. 

If you choose the right platform, consolidation doesn’t lead to a loss of functionality. Instead, it means getting a better-connected system that works smarter.

Just ask Audien Hearing who uses Gorgias’s open API to create an integration with its warehouse software to manage returns directly in Gorgias instead of a shared Google spreadsheet.

They also combine the power of Gorgias Voice with an integration to Aircall to resolve thousands of questions a day. This integration enables agents to access customer and order data directly from Gorgias while on a call—staying in one workspace.

“It's amazing that we're able to create any custom solutions we want with Gorgias's open API. Gorgias is way more than a typical helpdesk if you utilize the features it offers,” says Zoe Kahn, VP of Retention and Customer Experience at Audien Hearing.

Read more: The Gorgias & Shopify integration: 8 features your support team will love 

Myth #2: “We’ll lose features we rely on”

Another common hesitation around consolidation is the risk of putting all your eggs in one basket. If everything runs through one tool, what happens when something breaks or you need to pivot?

It’s understandable, many teams worry that one tool can’t possibly do everything well. Maybe it won’t support their preferred channels, or the automation will be too limited. Or maybe they’ve been burned by a platform that promised too much and delivered too little.

Reality: All-in-one tools reduce gaps, not capabilities

In reality, consolidating gives CX teams more freedom, not less.

Instead of stitching together half a dozen tools and hoping they sync, teams using a single, well-integrated platform gain:

• A centralized view of the customer
• Cleaner workflows with fewer manual handoffs
• Less time spent training agents on multiple systems
• And fewer gaps in data or context

Under one system, your team doesn’t have to jump between tabs anymore. They can just focus on helping customers, quickly and consistently.

Take it from Osea Malibu, a seaweed‑infused skincare brand that transformed their support quality assurance process using Gorgias Auto QA. Their manual QA system was time-consuming and couldn’t scale as ticket volume surged. But the switch made impressive improvements:

• QA time reduced by 75%, from over an hour per week to just 15 minutes
• 100% of tickets now automatically quality‑checked, instead of a small manual sample
• CSAT increased (during BFCM) to 4.74/5, reflecting better consistency and faster resolutions

“Gorgias Auto QA saved me so much time. What used to take over an hour now only takes 15 minutes a week, and I no longer have to worry about spreadsheets.” —Sare Sahagun, Customer Care Manager at Osea Malibu

Myth #3: “Consolidation is expensive and time-consuming”

On paper, consolidation sounds smart. But 47.6% of ecommerce professionals say cost is a barrier, and 40.3% worry about the time it takes to implement a new system.

Sticking with a fragmented stack isn’t exactly cheap or quick, either. Between training new agents, managing multiple vendors, and patching together tools that don’t fully sync, the hidden costs add up fast.

Reality: Consolidation reduces overhead and busywork

It’s not actually consolidation that drains your resources—it’s complexity. And with Gorgias, simplifying pays off fast.

Trove Brands is a standout example. After centralizing their support with Gorgias, they implemented AI-powered order cancellation workflows and saw:

• 45% of tickets automated, cutting manual workload
• 70% reduction in failed order cancellations, saving costs and frustration
• 99.93% faster first response time during BFCM 2024 (from 11 hours 30 minutes to just 30 seconds)

Related: The hidden cost of not adopting AI in ecommerce

What’s the top benefit of consolidating your tech stack?

The biggest benefit of fewer tools is efficiency. It’s also a direct line to real business impact.

Constant tab-switching and duplicate data entry mean way too much time spent managing platforms instead of helping customers.

When you consolidate your tech stack, your team spends less time learning new systems, chasing down info, or waiting for one tool to sync with another. 

Instead, they get everything they need in one place, faster replies, smoother workflows, and happier customers.

And that all adds up to better CSAT, lower churn, and a support team that’s finally free to focus on what matters.

What makes Gorgias different from other all-in-one platforms?

Gorgias is built specifically for ecommerce brands, with features that reflect the way CX teams actually work.

As Shopify’s only Premier Partner for customer support, we offer a native integration that pulls in key order data and context automatically, so agents have everything they need without switching platforms. That means conversations, AI, automation, revenue data, and reporting are in one place.

Our open app ecosystem allows you to connect to 100+ tools like Shopify, Klaviyo, Yotpo, and Recharge in just a few clicks. Need more customization? Our add-ons, like AI Agent and Voice let you level up at your own pace.

Whether you're handling hundreds of tickets a week or scaling globally, Gorgias adapts—so you don’t have to keep reinventing your support stack every six months.

Time to rethink your stack

Dr. Bronner’s, a globally recognized organic soap and personal care brand, made the switch from Salesforce to Gorgias to keep up with growing support demands, and it paid off fast.

Here are the results they saw with Gorgias:

• $100,000 saved in the first year by cutting licensing and developer costs
• 45% of all customer queries automated after just 2 months
• 74% reduction in ticket resolution time, powering faster support
• 11% increase in CSAT, thanks to quicker, more personalized responses

“We don’t get boxed out because we only work with Gorgias tools. Gorgias deeply understands the needs of CX, Shopify, and orders and how those tools work together so that it’s really easy for us to work across the board throughout those tools and that didn’t exist in our last setup at all,” says Emily McEnany, Senior CX Manager at Dr. Bronner’s.

If you’re still stitching together half a dozen tools to handle support, it might be time to ask: Is your tech stack helping you or holding you back?

With Gorgias, you get centralization and flexibility, so your team can move faster, serve better, and scale smarter.

Book a demo or dive into the full 2025 Ecommerce Trends report to see how other brands are rethinking their stacks.

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TL;DR:

• Shoppers won’t wait for help—so they leave. Without instant answers, you’re losing sales to hesitation and unanswered questions.
• AI shopping assistants step in right away. They guide, recommend, and resolve concerns in real time, 24/7.
• They boost conversions and AOV. Brands like Pepper and TUSHY saw up to 62% more conversions after adding one.
• They go beyond chatbots. AI assistants proactively sell, using browsing behavior to tailor messages and close more carts.
• Gorgias Shopping Assistant is built for Shopify brands. It starts conversations, mirrors your brand voice, uses browsing data, suggests products, and sends dynamic discounts.

Shoppers aren’t always going to reach out and ask the questions they have, especially if they’re going to have to wait for a response from a CX team. 

That means you’re losing sales to friction, indecision, or information gaps. 

In 2025, the average cart abandonment rate is 70.19%. But if you can find an AI tool that doubles as a support and sales agent, it could make all the difference. 

Gorgias’s Shopping Assistant, for example, has brought a 62% uplift in conversion rate for brands that implement it.

Ahead, learn where you can leverage an AI shopping assistant to increase conversions and craft better purchase experiences. 

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What is an AI shopping assistant? 

An AI shopping assistant is a chat tool powered by AI to provide pre-sales support for shoppers. It can answer questions, make product recommendations, and help guide shoppers in the right direction if they’re stuck. 

Gorgias's Shopping Assistant is a powerful, hyper-personalized AI tool built for Shopify brands. Unlike other AI tools, Shopping Assistant starts conversations with customers, not the other way around. It’s uniquely tailored for each customer by tracking browsing behavior during each session and remembering what shoppers say, keeping conversations natural and recommendations relevant. 

It’ll also chat with shoppers in your own brand voice, as its responses are pulled right from the knowledge you feed it. 

At which point do brands lose sales in the customer journey?

The stages of the customer journey where common drop-off points occur for brands that lack proactive support include: 

• Discovery (casual browsing)
• Interested (considering making a purchase)
• Ready to buy (strong purchase intent)  

1) Discovery (casual browsing) 

There’s a big chance that shoppers—especially first-timers—have questions, but aren’t willing to wait for a human to get back to them. And when your CX team is off the clock? Customers will likely leave altogether.

An AI shopping assistant can help you engage customers right away, even outside your business hours.

Bra brand Pepper uses Gorgias Shopping Assistant to help shoppers find their perfect size. When it detects hesitation, Shopping Assistant points customers to the sizing guide.

This proactive approach creates an easy path for conversation and sets the precedent that any questions will be answered immediately, providing a better––and less confusing––experience. 

“With Shopping Assistant, we’re not just putting information in our customers’ hands; we’re putting bras in their hands,” says Gabrielle McWhirter, CX Operations Lead at Pepper. 

Impact these metrics 📈

For shoppers in the Discovery stage, using a Shopping Assistant boosts clicks and time on site and reduces bounce rate. It does this by surfacing specific questions on relevant product pages. Pepper boosted their conversion rate by 19% with Gorgias Shopping Assistant.

Read more: How Pepper’s AI Agent automates 54% of support and converts 19% of conversations

2) Interested (considering making a purchase)  

In a retail environment, a salesperson can give shoppers recommendations by asking a few questions, especially if they’re unsure of what to buy. 

AI shopping assistants have the ability to mirror those in-person shopping experiences by interacting with customers in real-time to help them find their perfect match.

Shoppers can give as much (e.g., “Help! What dress is suitable for a wedding reception?”) or as little information as they’d like, and the AI shopping assistant will do the rest. 

It’s possible even for questions that are slightly vague, like a customer who types in “how to make up” without any other context:

For example, jewelry shop Caitlyn Minimalist uses Shopping Assistant to recommend products, engaging interested customers and bringing them closer to a purchase.

“As a result of Shopping Assistant, we've seen a measurable lift in AOV through more meaningful customer interactions,” says Anthony Ponce, Head of Customer Experience at Caitlyn Minimalist. 

“Our clients are provided the right information at the right time, creating a seamless experience that builds trust and drives confident purchases." 

Impact these metrics 📈

According to data from Gorgias, email is the highest volume support channel, with ~25% of that tied to pre-sales. AI shopping assistants tackle these pre-sales asks and also upsell by recommending complementary products. This can lead to a boost in average order value (AOV) and conversion rate. 

Read more: How Caitlyn Minimalist uses Shopping Assistant to turn single purchases into jewelry collections

3) Ready to buy (strong purchase intent) 

The main reasons customers abandoned a cart in 2025 include:

• Extra costs (like shipping, fees, taxes) - 39% 
• Delivery times were too slow - 21% 
• Checkout was too complicated or long - 18% 
• Didn’t like return policy - 15% 

An AI shopping assistant can mitigate or resolve these issues. They resolve crucial questions—like delivery time or return policies—that need in-the-moment answers. By alleviating pre-sale concerns, they give customers the confidence to make a purchase.

For example, bidet brand TUSHY leverages Shopping Assistant to answer questions about toilet compatibility that might flush a pending sale. 

Aside from quelling customer concerns, Shopping Assistant can also send discount codes to close deals. Unlike general discount codes you find across the internet, these discounts are uniquely generated for each customer, keeping them engaged and on your site.

Impact these metrics 📈

AI shopping assistants can reduce cart abandonment rate and increase conversion rate. Gorgias Shopping Assistant adjusts to your sales strategy by sending customers discount codes that can be the final nudge to checkout.

Read more: How TUSHY uses Shopping Assistant to drive 190% higher chat conversion rate by building customer confidence

Why traditional chatbots don’t cut it anymore

Most AI tools are built just for support. They deflect tickets and answer FAQs, but they’re not built to sell. 

Shopping Assistant proves that support teams can also drive revenue by upselling, suggesting exchanges, and giving shoppers the confidence to try a brand for the first time (or to give it another shot).

Gorgias’s AI Shopping Assistant uses context-based decision making and looks for specific behavioral signals: 

• Products viewed - Which product pages have they visited?
• Pages views - What pages have they explored, like FAQs, reviews or categories?
• Current page - Which page are they currently browsing?
• Purchase history – What have they bought from this brand before?
• Cart data - What items are currently in their cart?

Improve conversions with Gorgias Shopping Assistant 

Ultimately, the cost of not adopting AI can be higher than the investment of implementing it. 77.2% of ecommerce professionals use AI to improve their work. Why not extend those benefits to your customers? 

AI Shopping Assistants help you create better customer experiences overall. These tools help reduce customer effort, increase average order value, save would-be-lost sales, and create more customer touchpoints.  

Hire the always-on Shopping Assistant that never misses a sale.

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TL;DR:

• Shopping Assistant is your new AI sales closer. It jumps in when shoppers hesitate, delivering real-time, personalized support that drives conversions.
• It boosts revenue by acting like your best salesperson. It knows when to recommend, upsell, or offer a discount, without being pushy.
• It remembers what shoppers do mid-session. That means smarter conversations, better suggestions, and bigger order values.
• It’s already delivering results. Brands using Shopping Assistant are seeing 62% more conversions, 10% higher AOV, and 5x ROI.
• You control the strategy. Customize how it promotes discounts, when it steps in, and how it speaks.

What’s the common factor between shoppers debating between products and considering a splurge? Hesitation. 

Today’s shoppers are overwhelmed with choices. They don’t want to be left to figure things out on their own. They want guidance.

But most brands are missing that crucial piece of the puzzle. They lack a strategy that accompanies shoppers on their journey. A tool that encourages shoppers to proceed to checkout. And, ultimately, a customer experience devoid of a sales approach.

That’s why we built Shopping Assistant, an AI Agent that proactively engages browsers, offers context-aware product recommendations, and turns hesitation into conversions in real time.

And it’s working. Brands using Shopping Assistant are seeing a 62% uplift in conversion, 10% higher average order value, and 5x ROI.

Here’s a closer look at what’s behind the magic.

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AI-powered shopping, built for sales

Most traditional chatbots passively wait for questions and deliver answers that aren’t personalized to each shopper's preferences. 

Unlike these bots, Shopping Assistant reads real-time signals like pages viewed, cart contents, and conversation tone. This results in a solution that not only offers support but also offers personalized, proactive selling. This enables Shopping Assistant to continuously refine and adjust its playbook, evolving with each shopper as their journey matures.

Here’s how Shopping Assistant engages with customers across the shopping journey:

1. Discovery: Gathers preferences and educates.
2. Interested: Makes targeted product suggestions.
3. Ready to Buy: Assists with checkout, nudges purchases with discounts.

Take this example below. When a customer vaguely asks “how to make up,” Shopping Assistant interprets it as a sign of interest in makeup products and recommends a starter kit.

Personalization that understands you

Where traditional bots reset with every message, Shopping Assistant does the opposite. It has built-in context-aware intelligence that remembers what shoppers have clicked, viewed, and added to their cart during a session. 

This enables natural, relevant, and persuasive conversations that truly resonate with each shopper. It goes beyond reading messages and observes behavior to adapt its responses.

That means it knows if someone has:

• Viewed three red lipsticks but didn’t add to cart
• Repeatedly checked sizing info for the same dress
• Added two serums to their cart after browsing dry skin FAQs

With plenty of context to work with, Shopping Assistant is not only smarter but also more profitable than the average chatbot. It drives more conversions with product recommendations and lifts average order value with timely upsells based on what’s been added to the cart or viewed. 

Here’s what it looks like in action: When a customer engages through a product page, Shopping Assistant recommends a matching outfit, suggesting it’s aware of alternate product variants and the customer's likely interest in that style.

Dynamic discounts that convert without undercutting

Promotions are powerful, but they’re not one-size-fits-all. 

With Shopping Assistant, merchants can define their discount strategy to align with their brand. These strategies can range from offering no deals to using aggressive promotions. 

Once the strategy is set, Shopping Assistant waits for hesitation and customer intent to trigger a discount, firing it at the most conversion-worthy moment.

Proactive engagement in 3 ways

Shopping Assistant initiates conversations. It’s built to engage shoppers, spotting when they linger or show signs of confusion, stepping in with timely, personalized help.

Every second counts in ecommerce. If a shopper pauses on a product page or is left scrolling through an endless search results page, Shopping Assistant detects it in real-time and reaches out with a relevant prompt like:

• “Need help picking the right shade?”
• “Want to know our return policy before you buy?”

Here’s how Shopping Assistant reduces drop-off, builds confidence, and drives faster decision-making in three different ways.

1. Suggested product questions 

Shopping Assistant automatically triggers commonly asked questions depending on the product currently being viewed. In one click, shoppers can get the answer to the question they’re curious about. This combats hesitation caused by a lack of information, resulting in more confident conversions.

2. Ask Anything Input

When shoppers land on the homepage, it’s easy to become overwhelmed and not know where to navigate. The Ask Anything Input provides an easy way to start a conversation with Shopping Assistant and get the guidance they need.

Shopping Assistant can refine its response to the customer based on the page context. For example, when the customer is on a product page, Shopping Assistant knows exactly what product is being asked about.

3. Trigger on Search

Shopping Assistant can step in to offer pinpointed help based on a shopper’s search query. Instead of scrolling through a results page, Shopping Assistant triggers a message based on what the shopper entered, offering an easier and faster way to find what they need.

Smart recommendations and relevant upsells

Shopping Assistant’s suggestions are rooted in real context: what the shopper has viewed, added to cart, or asked about. Whether they’re exploring a specific product line or revisiting a category they’ve shown interest in, Shopping Assistant delivers relevant upsells and complementary items that make sense for the customer.

This personalized approach to upselling increases cart size without feeling forced—it’s smart, seamless, and sales-driven.

Shopping Assistant can even turn vague product questions into upsell opportunities. By asking questions, it learns more about an individual to come up with recommendations that best fit their preferences.

Try Shopping Assistant today

Shopping Assistant is transforming the way shoppers engage and helping ecommerce brands sell more effectively. Through smarter conversations and real-time personalization, it turns every interaction into an opportunity to convert, build trust, and drive revenue.

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TL;DR:

• Don't just turn it on, coach it. Treating your AI Agent like a team member, not a plug-and-play tool, is what makes it truly helpful and memorable.
• One owner and one hour a week is enough to make a big impact. SuitShop’s Katy Eriks runs QA and training solo, using a repeatable system to log feedback and improve performance weekly.
• Don't forget to pause and evaluate. SuitShop temporarily turned off AI to improve their help content, making automation far more effective when it came back online.
• Let your best human agents guide your AI. Katie studied her top-performing teammate's tickets to teach AI the best responses and macros.
• Brand voice matters as much as accuracy. SuitShop's AI Agent "Max" is trained to sound warm, helpful, and on-brand. Customers even thank it by name.

The most coachable team member on your support team might not be human.

Brands that want to keep up with rising customer expectations are turning to AI to help meet demand. But as SuitShop’s Director of Customer Experience, Katie Eriks, will tell you, great results don’t come from flipping a switch.

They come from coaching.

Since implementing Gorgias AI Agent, SuitShop has reached a 30% automation rate, all while maintaining a lean CX team and giving every customer the tailored experience they expect (literally and figuratively).

“I consider myself its boss,” said Katie, who runs the entire coaching process solo. With under an hour of weekly maintenance now, SuitShop’s AI Agent runs efficiently, accurately, and on-brand.

Katie spoke at Gorgias Connect 2025 to share exactly how she got there. You can watch her full session below:

The case for coaching your AI Agent 

When brands think about automation, they often imagine flipping a switch and watching repetitive tasks vanish. But in practice, it’s not that simple, at least not if you care about customer experience.

Gorgias encourages brands to treat their AI Agent like a junior teammate — someone you onboard, train, observe, and coach over time.

Brands that do this well are already seeing massive gains:

• 60%+ of customer conversations fully automated
• First response times under 30 seconds
• Consistent CSAT scores of 4.5 and above
• Major cost savings during high-volume seasons

For SuitShop, automation was about creating space for their small team to focus on specialized service. Space to scale without scaling headcount. And space to do it all without losing their voice.

Step-by-step: SuitShop’s AI coaching workflow

Katie and her team had been longtime Gorgias users, but when they turned on AI Agent in August 2023, the results were unremarkable. The responses weren’t inaccurate, but they weren’t helpful enough either.

What Katie learned was to “Be hands-on early. Use downtime to train. And never stop refining.”

So she got to work, not by replacing the tool, but by going deeper into it. Here are her coaching tips: 

One owner, one hour a week

Katie made herself the sole point of contact for training and QA. That might sound like a lot, but over time, it became a light lift.

“At this point, it’s definitely less than one hour per week,” she said. “In the beginning, it was more time-consuming because I needed to create help center articles and Guidance regularly. Now I’ve got it down to a pretty quick thumbs-up, thumbs-down kind of process.”

Katie uses Monday mornings to review AI Agent tickets from over the weekend, when fewer human agents are available and AI takes the lead.

Read more: Why your strategy needs customer service quality assurance

Pause and perfect before scaling

Unlike many retail brands, SuitShop’s busiest time isn’t the holiday rush — it’s wedding season in the summer and fall. So when things quieted down in December, Katie used that time strategically.

She temporarily turned off the AI Agent to regroup.

“I decided to turn it off and really beef up our Help Center,” she explained. “I went back to the tickets I had to answer myself, checked what people were searching in the Help Center, and filled in the gaps.”

She built out content with a mix of blog knowledge, internal macros, and ChatGPT. Once she felt confident the content base was solid, she turned AI back on.

Read more: How to optimize your Help Center for AI Agent

Use data to guide your coaching plan

Once SuitShop’s foundational content was in place, Katie didn’t just sit back and hope for the best. Instead, she built a repeatable feedback loop grounded in data — one that helped her spot opportunities for improvement before they became issues.

Rather than combing through tickets at random, Katie created custom views inside Gorgias to zero in on the most impactful coaching moments:

• Low CSAT tickets: Any conversation that ended with a customer satisfaction score below expectations got flagged. These were clear indicators that something about the tone, accuracy, or clarity of the AI response had fallen short.
• High handover rates: Katie looked at the tickets AI Agent was regularly handing off to humans. Many of these were actually answerable. The handover just meant that guidance was missing, miscategorized, or too vague.
• Agent-tagged tickets: To make this scalable, Katie empowered her team to flag any strange or impressive responses from the AI. By using a tag like AI_agent_feedback, team members could drop tickets into a coaching queue without needing to write a full explanation.

To keep all of this actionable, Katie logs insights in a shared spreadsheet that functions as a live to-do list. Every row includes:

• A link to the ticket
• A summary of the issue
• The resolution (e.g., new Guidance or macro needed)
• A status tracker (not started / in progress / completed)
• A link to the resource she created in response

These insights are also available in Gorgias’s dashboard, where you can identify the top issues customers had.

“Sometimes I do it all in the moment. Other times I’ll log it and come back later when I can take the time to do it right.”

By combining frontline feedback with structured ticket views, Katie turned scattered QA into a consistent coaching system — one that ensures SuitShop’s AI Agent keeps getting smarter every week.

Learn from your human agents

One of Katie’s most effective strategies comes from her own team.

Like many CX leads, she noticed that some agents consistently resolved tickets in a single touch. That pattern, Katie realized, wasn’t just a win for customers, it was a roadmap for an AI-driven support strategy.

Her teammate Tacy quickly became her go-to signal for what the AI Agent needed to learn next.

“I pull her tickets often to see what she’s responded with. It helps AI learn from her directly.”

By reviewing Tacy’s ticket history, Katie identified standard replies that didn’t yet exist as macros or Guidance. If Tacy was writing the same sentence repeatedly or copy-pasting a reply manually, that meant it could (and should) be taught to the AI Agent.

She also tracked Tacy’s macro usage rate. If Tacy frequently used a macro for a certain issue, but other agents weren’t, it flagged an opportunity to standardize responses across the team and the AI.

The key insight? If it only takes one touch for a human to answer, the AI can be trained to do it too.

These small efficiency wins added up quickly, especially during peak season, when the ability to automate just a few extra conversations per day created meaningful breathing room for the rest of the team.

Related: How to automate half of your CX tasks

Make your AI sound human (and on-brand)

Automation without brand voice feels robotic. Katie made sure SuitShop’s AI Agent sounded like a natural extension of the team, and that started with a name: Max.

“We get replies like, ‘Thanks Max!’ from customers who think it’s a real person.”

Using AI Agent’s tone of voice settings, Katie went deep on personalization. She customized everything from sentence structure and greeting format to whether or not emojis and exclamation marks should be used (they shouldn’t, in SuitShop’s case).

Her AI Agent instructions include clear direction on:

• Tone: Warm, empathetic, clear, especially with high-stress wedding-related issues
• Structure: Shorter responses for chat, slightly more detailed for email
• Dos and Don’ts: Specific words or phrases to use or avoid, pulled from real team responses
• First/last name use: Always first name only, to keep things friendly but respectful

Katie also made sure she instructed AI Agent to acknowledge customer emotions — especially frustration — and to offer reassurance when things went wrong.

And because AI responses are written at lightning speed, she regularly reviewed messages to ensure they didn’t come off as cold or abrupt, especially in sensitive situations like delayed wedding orders or size issues close to the event date.

Live coaching: What it looks like in practice

In the workshop, Katie walked through two real support tickets where AI missed the mark and how she used those moments to improve.

In one case, a customer asked a common question: “The navy suit I’m looking at says ‘unfinished pant hem.’ Will the pants need to be hemmed?”

Despite having help articles and macros explaining this exact issue, AI Agent responded: “I don’t have the information to answer your question.”

That was a red flag.

Katie immediately stepped in to coach the agent by:

• Applying the correct existing resources
• Writing an ideal sample reply as an internal note
• Checking tone, empathy, and phrasing
• Testing the fix by pasting the same question into the test environment

“I like to write a short internal note, so if I see that ticket again, I know exactly how I coached it.”

In another case, AI Agent was incorrectly handing off a sizing question about jacket sleeve length. Katie realized that a previous broad handover topic ("sizing and fit questions") was causing confusion by flagging issues that the AI should have been able to handle.

So she deleted the handover topic and replaced it with a clear guidance article — complete with example questions, macros, and links to sizing resources.

“Once I added specific questions in quotes, it made a huge difference.”

What's next: AI tools that help you scale faster

SuitShop didn’t automate 100% of CX — but that’s not the point. At 30% automation (and growing), Katie gives her team more time to specialize, connect, and handle urgent or emotional conversations with care.

Here’s what Gorgias offers to help as well:

• Optimized intent dashboards: These show the most common topics customers ask about, the AI’s performance on those topics, and how much opportunity there is to increase automation.
• Auto-generated knowledge: Based on your macros, Help Center, and even Shopify data, Gorgias can now draft suggested guidance for your review, making it faster to train your AI Agent without starting from scratch.
• Auto QA: This tool scores every AI (and human) response based on resolution, accuracy, communication, and tone. It gives you full visibility across your team and automations, without needing to review each ticket manually.

Whether you’re just getting started or trying to move beyond basic automation, Katie’s approach proves that coached AI outperforms out-of-the-box tools every time.

Want to coach your AI Agent like SuitShop? Book a demo to see how Gorgias can help you scale smarter.

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TL;DR:

• Subscribers drive 3x more value than one-time buyers. Subscriptions create ongoing relationships that build loyalty and increase lifetime value.
• Make subscription opt-ins easy and appealing. Use tools like default subscription settings, upsell widgets, and A/B testing to encourage conversions at every step of the journey.
• Retain subscribers by treating key drop-off points as recovery moments. Use win-back campaigns, payment recovery, and personalized support to reduce churn.
• Meet customers where they are with AI-powered tools. Solutions like Gorgias Shopping Assistant and Recharge Concierge SMS provide real-time, contextual support and subscription management.

Vanessa Lopez, VP of Customer Experience at Recharge, recently led a workshop that outlined how brands can transform one-off interactions into rich subscription journeys that increase opt-ins, reduce churn rate, and boost lifetime value (LTV). 

Here’s what we learned.

What are the different subscription types?

There are many different ways that you can offer subscriptions. Here’s a rundown of the most common. 

Subscribe and save

The most common subscription type is “Subscribe and save.” Instead of making a one-time purchase, customers subscribe to a product and receive it on a different cadence, whether that's weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, or quarterly.

For example, Apothékary offers a Subscribe and Save option for its herbal remedies where shoppers get a discounted rate if they subscribe every one, two, or three months. 

Subscription boxes 

Subscription boxes ship to customers monthly. Shoppers subscribe over a course of time, like every quarter, six months, or year. For example, CrunchLabs offers a prepaid Build Box option for kids and adults who want to tinker like engineers. 

Meal kits

Meal kits are weekly food delivery services that either include pre-packaged ingredients to cook a dish or fully cooked dishes.

Surprise and delight

For brands that are selling higher-cost or unique items, subscriptions to purchase the same product over and over might not be the best way to gain subscribers.

The better option is a curated box, also known as a "subscribe and delight" or “mystery” box. It’s a unique way to cater to customers who prefer trying out different products, rather than receiving the same product on a recurring basis.

For example, premium snack box brand Bokksu specializes in shipping Japanese snacks. Rather than packing the same treats each month, the brand curates different items with every package. This creates both excitement and differentiation each time a customer gets a delivery.

How to drive revenue growth with subscriptions

1. Turn interactions into journeys
2. Create multiple touchpoints for conversion
3. Retain subscribers over time
4. Meet customers where they are
5. Approach AI as a solution-driver

Subscriptions are the original relationship between a brand and its customer. In fact, subscribers drive three times more value than the one-time buyer. That's because a one-time purchase is really just that—a moment in time—while subscriptions are a journey.

“When you have a customer and they subscribe, you get to see that moment they fell in love with your brand,” says Vanessa. “You get to see when they have those moments where they made you a part of their routine. Every time they engage with you and purchase something new, you learn their rhythms. You learn their preferences. It's impossible to do that with one-time buyers for the most part.”

Subscribers drive three times more value than the one-time buyer, and that's because a one-time purchase is really just that—a moment in time—while subscriptions are a journey.

1) Turn interactions into journeys 

Subscribers can only drive growth if you can get those customers to subscribe in the first place. This is what Recharge does: it takes customer interactions and turns them into a customer journey, allowing you to act on those signals in a personal way at scale.

It all starts the moment a shopper browses a product. Each touchpoint is an opportunity to turn that shopper into a subscriber—from the product description page to the subscription widget to checkout.

Vanessa’s tip? Make subscriptions the default option on a product description page. When you present customers with the better and more convenient option, and they see this information at the right time, they're more likely to subscribe. 

Put it into practice 💡

Now, it’s time to test. Here's a checklist you can follow to A/B test your subscription journey: 

• Test the small details, like button styles, CTA copy, subscribe and save benefits, and their positions on the page.
• Compare different value propositions and discounts. 
• Analyze the difference in opt-in and subscriber rates and product performance, and keep iterating. 

When customers see the right information at the right time, they're more likely to subscribe. That's because it's the better and the more convenient option.

2) Create multiple touchpoints for conversion

Let's say you have a customer who starts on a product description page. They decide not to subscribe—no worries. You can catch them in the cart. 

When they add a product to their cart, you can upsell them with different subscription benefits so they know what they're missing out on. Do it again when they review their cart, and then again when they go to checkout, showing them complementary products that they might be interested in.

And don’t forget to take advantage of that post-purchase "your order is confirmed" high—offer customers cross-sell products, complementary products to their order, or similar items to what they've purchased in the past.

By creating multiple touchpoints for conversion, you’ll increase the possibility that they’ll make a purchase.

Put it into practice 💡

Set up automations in the subscription tool –– like Recharge –– you use. That means adding on upsell and cross-sell tools, and perfecting the times they trigger for customers. Test out different copy and cross-sell/upsell offers to see what resonates the most. 

3) Retain subscribers over time 

Just as important as acquiring customers is keeping them around. 

The Recharge team names three core customer moments that might actually diverge from what brands expect to happen in the customer journey:

1. When a payment fails
2. When a customer cancels their subscription
3. When a customer skips—and keeps on skipping

And while they might seem like hiccups in the process, these moments are actually hero moments. They’re moments that give you the opportunity to actually win those customers back.

Put it into practice 💡

• Prevent cancellations by addressing individual customer concerns at scale with a help desk like Gorgias. 
• Set up win-back campaigns. Recharge found that these types of campaigns can convert up to 35% of subscribers by giving them a compelling personalized offer and a straightforward reactivation.
• Recover failed payments to ensure small issues –– like billing and shipping address inconsistencies –– don’t get in the way of your sales. 
• Connect all of your customer touchpoints with rewards and referral products.

4) Meet customers where they are

For browsing shoppers, educational and informational resources are the best way to meet their needs, hesitations, and objections.

For regular subscribers, it’s providing them with direct control over their subscription, whenever they want.

The goal is to reach customers where they already are and respond instantly to their needs in a personalized way.

Gorgias’s Shopping Assistant does exactly that—meeting customers where they are by answering customer questions and even initiating conversations based on browsing activity. 

This AI sales tool detects a shopper's intent, cart contents, and browsing behavior to initiate conversations, recommend products, and even send discounts as they make a decision.

Modern bidet brand TUSHY saw a 20% increase in chat conversion rate after implementing the tool.

Put it into practice 💡

Decide how you’d like to leverage AI and automation to meet customers where they are. That might be by providing a phone number that customers can interact with via SMS, or implementing a tool like Shopping Assistant to strike up conversational AI chats. Using AI and automation will help you better meet your customers where they are and at scale. 

5) Approach AI as a solution-driver

Rather than using AI to come up with problems your brand can solve, Vanessa recommends looking at the challenges your brand has already seen with subscriptions.

The key is to view AI as a tool that drives three core areas: 

1. Scaling your business without adding headcount
2. Reducing churn
3. Increasing how much customers spend with you over their lifetime

Vanessa says the most effective strategy starts with leveraging AI-powered tools, such as Recharge’s Concierge SMS.

Typically, SMS tools use template auto responses like, "How do you want to manage your subscription? Type one to cancel, type two to skip." But these aren’t compelling enough for customers to respond. What if they want to do something that doesn't fit in those two options?

Concierge SMS enables brands to build stronger relationships with their customers through conversations powered by pre-trained AI. It personalizes SMS support with customers, so relationships can expand into loyalty.

Put it into practice 💡

Implement an AI-driven subscription management tool that allows customers to interact and ask questions via SMS, rather than only being able to confirm or deny upcoming shipments.

Grow your brand sustainably 

Gorgias and Recharge are a powerful combination when it comes to integrating subscription management with top-notch customer support.  

With Recharge, efficiently convert one-time buyers into subscribers, retain subscribers through intelligent interventions, and connect every customer touchpoint into one cohesive journey. 

With Gorgias, sell more and resolve support inquiries with conversational AI. 

Book a demo →

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TL;DR:

• Segment customers for personalized support. Use purchase history and behavior data to tailor every interaction, making conversations more relevant and higher-converting.
• Offer onboarding calls for complex products. TUSHY's "Poo-Rus" turned free install calls into a $15 paid service that dramatically boosts customer LTV and retention.
• Pick up the phone strategically. Use voice calls for abandoned carts, stuck tickets, and VIP follow-up.
• Give agents freedom to make judgment calls. Empower your team to bend policies and offer solutions that prioritize retention over rigid rules—confident agents drive more cross-sells.
• Train for helpful selling, not pushy pitches. Use roleplaying to teach agents how to spot buying signals and offer value naturally.

At Gorgias Connect LA 2025, CX leaders from Tommy John, TUSHY, Triple Whale, and Talent Pop shared how support teams solve problems and drive revenue.

This shift, known as the support sales flywheel, doesn’t involve massive overhauls or shiny new tools. Instead, it means doing the small things exceptionally well, like picking up the phone, empowering agents to make judgment calls, and adding a personal touch where others automate.

These brands have shown that when support teams focus on consistency, connection, and conversion, the results compound. Every thoughtful interaction spins the flywheel faster, boosting loyalty, LTV, and revenue.

Ahead, we’re breaking down the most actionable takeaways so your team can start building its own support-led growth engine.

Watch the full panel here:

5 tactics that power the support sales flywheel

From scrappy install calls to AI-powered training, these CX leaders aren’t only talking about driving revenue, they’re doing it. Here’s how they’re turning support into a sales flywheel, and the tactics your team can start testing today.

1. Personalization at scale starts with smart data

“Customer service done right is actually a great source of revenue.” That’s how Tamanna Bawa, Tech Partner Manager at Triple Whale, kicked off the conversation on how data can transform CX from reactive to revenue-driving.

She advises segmenting customers based on purchase history and behavior to deliver more personalized, higher-converting interactions. 

In a market where margins are razor-thin and ad costs are high, Tamanna emphasized that “incremental gains from personalization are the difference between companies that are thriving and the ones that are just surviving.”

Steal this strategy 

• Segment customers based on behavior and purchase history using your helpdesk, CRM, or analytics tool.
• Give agents access to this data so they can personalize every interaction.
• Use macros that adapt based on customer segments, like VIP status, product interest, or past issues.
• Focus on relevance over volume: one well-timed, tailored message converts better than a generic one.

2. The power of onboarding calls

What do you do when your hero product needs a cultural shift as much as it needs installation instructions? If you’re TUSHY, you send in your “Poop Gurus.”

Ren Fuller-Wasserman, Senior Director of CX at TUSHY, shared how her team launched a scrappy, free CX-led service that has now become a legendary video install program to help customers set up their bidets.

The real value wasn’t just tech support. As Ren put it, “It wasn’t about the actual install process, it was the encouragement they needed to change culture.” These calls sparked deeply personal moments (yes, even with cats and toddlers wandering in) and created the kind of emotional connection customers never forget.

Today, that service has evolved into a $15 paid add-on at checkout, and the customers who use it have significantly boost LTV and retention. It’s a masterclass in turning support moments into revenue through genuine human connection.

Steal this strategy

• Identify a product or feature your customers often hesitate to use, install, or fully understand.
• Offer free, low-lift onboarding calls via Zoom or Google Meet to guide them through setup or usage.
• Track LTV, CSAT, or repeat purchase rates for those who opt in.
• If it drives results, package it as a paid add-on at checkout or use it to surprise and delight key segments.
• Use simple tools like Calendly and Typeform to automate scheduling and reduce lift on your team.

3. When in doubt, pick up the phone

Phone support is back, and it’s becoming one of the most effective ways to turn conversations into conversions.

Ren from TUSHY swears by it. Her team uses customer phone numbers from abandoned carts to reach out directly. “You can send a hundred emails,” she said, “but a voicemail from a real person cuts through the noise.” Even if customers don’t answer, the fact that a brand called is memorable, and often enough to drive them back to checkout.

Max Wallace, the Director of CX Tommy John echoed the value of voice. His team recently implemented Gorgias Voice, using it to track conversion rates by agent. That visibility helps them identify what top performers are doing differently and replicate it across the team. “By the end of a tough call, customers often apologize for how they started. You can’t get that kind of de-escalation over email.”

In a world where inboxes are crowded and chat fatigue is real, a real voice builds real trust and real revenue.

Steal this strategy

• Start small: offer limited phone hours once your chat and email support are dialed in.
• Use phone strategically—for abandoned cart outreach, stuck tickets, or VIP follow-ups.
• Track call outcomes with tools like Gorgias Voice to see which agents are converting.
• Train agents to de-escalate and personalize through roleplaying or AI-based call simulations. 

Pro Tip: Don’t rush into phone if your other channels aren’t dialed in. “Master email and chat first. Then, start with limited phone hours. Taste it before scaling it,” said Armani Taheri, the co-founder of TalentPop. 

4. Trust your team to use their judgment

For Max at Tommy John, revenue-driving support starts with two things: deep product knowledge and the freedom to bend the rules.

“We have five different fabrics for men’s underwear alone,” Max shared. To help customers choose the right one, agents need firsthand experience. That’s why Tommy John sends new products directly to the support team, so they can offer real, personalized recommendations like “Try Second Skin instead of Cool Cotton.”

But product knowledge is only half the equation. The other half is empowering agents to make judgment calls. Tommy John’s “Best Pair Guarantee” allows customers to try a product and get a refund or replacement if it’s not the right fit. 

Agents are trained to prioritize retention, offering replacements instead of refunds, recommending better-suited products, and using their own discretion to keep customers happy.

As Max put it, “We don’t have really strict policies… we want them to use their best judgment.” That confidence translates into smoother resolutions, more cross-sells, and customers who stick around.

Steal this strategy

• Send new or popular products to your CX team so they can speak from firsthand experience.
• Build simple product cheat sheets or comparison guides to help agents make tailored recommendations.
• Give agents clear guidelines—but also the freedom to make judgment calls when it comes to refunds, replacements, or policy exceptions.
• Let your team know it’s okay to “bend the rules” if it means keeping a customer happy.
• Track outcomes like retention and CSAT to show how empowered agents directly impact loyalty and LTV.

5. Training teams to sell without the push

How do you train outsourced agents to drive revenue, without sounding like a sales team? According to Armani Taheri of TalentPop, it starts with confidence and context.

“You have to tailor-fit the training approach to each brand,” he explained. That means grounding agents in product knowledge, tone of voice, and customer journey before they ever interact with a shopper.

One of the most effective tactics is roleplaying. Armani’s team uses both live roleplays and AI-powered chat simulations to prepare agents for real conversations, pre-sales, post-sales, and everything in between. Tools like Replit and Lovable help create lightweight, brand-specific training environments agents can practice in at their own pace.

The goal isn’t to turn CX reps into hard sellers. It’s to give them the confidence and consistency to recognize revenue opportunities, and act on them in a natural, helpful way.

Steal this strategy

• Start with the basics: make sure agents understand your product, tone of voice, and customer journey.
• Roleplay low-pressure scenarios, then layer in more complex ones.
• Try AI-powered training tools like Replit or Lovable to create brand-specific simulations agents can practice anytime.
• Emphasize helpfulness over selling: coach agents to spot buying signals and offer value, not push products.
• Review transcripts together to highlight great conversations and show how small shifts lead to better outcomes.

Tools to power your flywheel

Ready to turn your CX team into a revenue engine? Here are some of the tools mentioned by the panelists that help make it happen:

• Gorgias Voice: Track revenue by agent, spot top performers, and improve conversion rates across the team.
• Flip CX: Automate common phone interactions with AI-powered voice support.
• Kixie: Drop voicemails, integrate with Klaviyo and Shopify, and build smart call queues for abandoned cart outreach.
• Calendly + Typeform: Scrappy, low-lift tools for scheduling paid or free support calls that drive LTV.

Whether you're scaling phone support or experimenting with post-purchase outreach, the right tools make the flywheel spin faster.

Your CX team might be your best-kept sales secret

They’re on the front lines with your most engaged customers, answering questions, easing doubts, and uncovering what really drives purchases. With the right tools and training, they resolve tickets and help close the sale.

With tools like Gorgias Voice, it’s easier than ever to connect the dots between conversations and conversions.

Want to see how your CX team can help drive growth?

Book a demo to see how Gorgias Voice powers sales through support.

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TL;DR:

• Start with your CX team—they know what customers are asking. Their insights reveal what’s confusing, what’s converting, and what’s causing returns before marketing ever gets involved.
• Turn pre-sale questions into better messaging. Use common support queries to improve landing pages, product descriptions, and emails so customers feel confident enough to convert.
• Your best-performing products aren’t always the most hyped. Let real customer comments guide your messaging by identifying what people rave about in chats and reviews.
• Customer confusion and returns usually stem from messaging gaps. Fix product pages, policies, and descriptions to better reflect what people need to know upfront.

Your CX team talks to customers every day. They know what’s confusing, driving purchases, and causing returns, because they hear it firsthand.

But all too often, those insights stay siloed in support tickets and live chat transcripts instead of informing the campaigns that shape the customer journey.

This post is here to change that. We’re breaking down the most valuable questions marketing teams should be asking their CX counterparts. When marketing and CX work together, you get more relevant messaging, smarter product positioning, and campaigns that convert.

Whether you’re planning a big seasonal push or just want to improve product education, this is where to start.

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1. What do customers ask about before buying?

Your CX team knows what makes shoppers hesitate. They’re the ones fielding questions like: Does this come in a larger size? Is it final sale? Will it arrive in time?

Beyond being pre-sale inquiries, they’re signals. They reveal what your customers care about most, and where your messaging may be falling short. When marketing teams tune into this, they can proactively address objections in landing pages, product detail pages (PDPs), emails, and top-of-funnel content.

At luxury jewelry store Jaxxon, Director of Customer Experience Caela Castillo saw firsthand how important it is to address these questions early. 

“Chat used to be a support tool for repetitive questions and problem-solving, but now AI Agent takes care of that for us,” she said. Once those friction points were handled upfront, the CX team could focus on more meaningful conversations, and conversions improved.

And when AI recommended the wrong products? Conversions dropped. It was a clear signal that relevance matters, especially before the sale.

Ask your CX team:

“What do customers most often need to know before they buy, and how can we answer that earlier in the journey?”

2. What product do customers rave about—and why?

Your best-selling product isn’t always your hero product. Sometimes, it’s that under-the-radar item that customers can’t stop talking about. The one that shows up again and again in reviews, chats, and post-purchase surveys.

The insight is gold for marketers. The key is to find out why people love it. Is it the fit? The feel? The results?

At online fashion brand, Princess Polly, Alexandria shared that her team expected Gen Z shoppers to lean on AI for recs, but what really influenced them was customer feedback. Reviews, not bots, built trust. That’s why campaigns built around real customer language and experiences often outperform the most polished product copy.

Shopping Assistant can turn those rave reviews into real-time action. It highlights top products using your Shopify product catalog to make personalized recommendations, proactively assists shoppers by using behavior signals, and even offers tailored discounts when they’re ready to convert. That means less guesswork, greater relevance, and an easier path to purchase.

Ask your CX team:

“Which product do customers rave about most, and what exactly are they saying?”

3. What product causes the most complaints?

When customers are frustrated, it’s easy to blame the product. But in many cases, the issue isn’t quality, it’s communication.

At Shinesty, a men’s underwear brand, Molly Kerrigan, Senior Director of Retention, observed that high return rates often stemmed from unmet customer expectations. 

She noted the importance of maintaining clear and consistent communication as the company grows, “We get a lot of praise from our customers, and they talk highly of our CX team after 1:1 interactions. We can’t lose that as we scale.” 

Molly notes that using Gorgias AI Agent enables Shinesty’s customers to receive quick answers, freeing her team's time for more complex or sensitive issues.  

Similarly, Princess Polly saw that delivering a standout customer experience meant being fast, consistent, and helpful at every stage. After switching to Gorgias, their support performance improved dramatically:

• 80% decrease in resolution time
• 95% decrease in first response time
• 40% increase in efficiency

Before changing the product, try updating the messaging. Use insights from CX to rewrite descriptions, add size guides, include user-generated content, or even build a quick-fit quiz. Small tweaks help set clearer expectations and reduce unnecessary returns.

Ask your CX team:

“Which products are driving the most complaints, and what do customers wish they knew before buying?”

4. What confuses customers the most?

Confusion is a conversion killer. If a customer isn’t sure about how something works, what’s included, or whether it’s right for them, they’re more likely to bounce.

That’s why it pays to ask your CX team where customers get stuck. Is it a product feature that needs more context? A vague store policy? A missing detail on a bundle?

The good news is that most confusion is fixable. Start with the following steps: 

• Simplify your product pages
• Add quick-hit FAQs to your emails
• Use plain language and real examples

If you’re using Shopping Assistant, you can go even further. It can detect when shoppers are hesitant and provides real-time nudges. Like an assistant who knows all your needs, Shopping Assistant automatically surfaces the questions customers are likely to ask when evaluating a product, so they’re equipped with the clarity they need to proceed to checkout.

TUSHY, a modern bidet brand, faced similar challenges. As bidets aren't mainstream in North America, shoppers often had concerns about product compatibility and installation. They’d ask questions like:

• Will a bidet fit my toilet?
• Is installation complicated?
• Which bidet is right for me?

Without immediate answers, many potential buyers would abandon their purchase. To address this, TUSHY implemented Shopping Assistant, providing instant support. Taking this approach resulted in an 81% higher chat conversion rate compared to human agents and a 13x return on investment.

“The Shopping Assistant has been a game-changer for our team, especially with the launch of our latest bidet models. Expanding our product catalog has given customers more choices than ever, which can overwhelm first-time buyers. Now, they’re increasingly looking to us for guidance on finding the right fit for their home and personal hygiene needs,” said Ren Fuller-Wasserman, Sr. Director of Customer Experience at TUSHY.  

Ask your CX team:

“Where do customers get confused most often—and how can we clear that up sooner?”

5. Which products are frequently bought together?

Your CX team picks up on patterns that analytics sometimes miss. They hear which items customers ask about in the same chat, which products get added to carts together, and which pairings people reorder time and time again.

That intel is a goldmine for bundling and upselling. It helps you build smarter campaigns that feel relevant and drive real value.

Zoe Kahn, owner of Inevitable Agency and former VP of Retention and CX at Audien Hearing, emphasizes the importance of using AI to enhance customer interactions.

“A lot of that revenue was potentially missed revenue because these were customers sitting on the site, asking questions about the products, and wanting an answer now so they could purchase…Now, AI can answer those questions immediately and convert those customers.”

With Shopping Assistant, you can act on these insights in real time. It will surface personalized product pairings, bundle suggestions, or accessories based on customer behavior. All before they hit the checkout page.

6. Which products lead to the most returns, and why?

Returns cut into your margins and chip away at trust. Most of the time, they’re not caused by poor-quality products. They happen because expectations weren’t met.

Your CX team already knows which items come back the most and why. Maybe the color doesn’t match the photos. Perhaps the fit runs small, or the product description left out a crucial detail. 

Instead of pushing the product harder, reframe how you present it. Add real customer photos. Include fit notes or a sizing chart. Call out anything that might surprise the customer post-purchase. A little clarity upfront goes a long way in reducing returns and boosting retention.

At Pepper, an intimates brand specializing in bras for small-chested bodies, they recognized the importance of pre-sale education. When customers have sizing questions, their AI Agent, Penelope, can provide immediate assistance.

“Penelope takes the information we give her and responds better than a Macro. She tailors it so that it sounds like a natural conversation between two people,” said Gabrielle McWhirter, CX Operations Lead at Pepper.

By proactively providing instant support, Pepper improved customer satisfaction and saw an 18% uplift in average order value.

Ask your CX team:

“Which products get returned the most—and what could we do upfront to change that?”

CX + marketing = smarter campaigns, better results

Before you launch your next campaign, start with a quick sync with your CX lead. They already know what your customers need to hear. You just have to ask.

From fixing messaging gaps to surfacing the right products at the right time, these insights help you connect with customers in personal, timely, and relevant ways.

Tools like Shopping Assistant make it easier than ever to act on this data in real time. You can turn CX knowledge into dynamic recommendations, personalized nudges, and smarter discounts.

Ready to see how you can improve your online shopping experience? Book a demo to see how Gorgias Shopping Assistant engages customers in real-time.