We are here at eTail Palm Springs and seeing and hearing the latest and greatest in e-commerce and retail.
Question: Do you need to choose between AI and human recommendations as a customer? Why not have both? After all, don’t each have their strengths?
AI in the retail experience is all the rage these days, but today I’m talking with someone from a brand that has been incorporating AI-personalized experiences and shopping combined with expert human recommendations for over 14 years, and continues to innovate today.
Today we’re going to talk about how AI-based personalization plus human creativity and input makes an amazing customer experience at Stitch Fix.
To help me discuss this topic, I’d like to welcome Noah Zamansky, Vice President of Product and Client Experience at Stitch Fix.
About Noah Zamansky
Noah Zamansky serves as the Vice President of Product and Client Experience at Stitch Fix, where he leads cross-functional teams spanning Product, Design, Engineering, Algorithms, and Platform Development. A seasoned leader, Noah has a proven track record of shaping product vision and strategy, designing exceptional user experiences, and spearheading the launch of new business ventures. Before joining Stitch Fix, Noah held the role of Senior Director of Product Management at eBay, overseeing Fashion and Vertical Experiences.
Resources
Stitch Fix: https://www.stitchfix.com
eTail Palm Springs: https://etailwest.wbresearch.com/
Connect with Greg on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gregkihlstrom
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Transcript
Greg Kihlstrom:
Welcome to Season 7 of The Agile Brand, where we discuss the trends and topics marketing leaders need to know. Stay curious, stay agile, and join the top enterprise brands and martech platforms as we explore marketing technology, AI, e-commerce, and whatever’s next for the omnichannel customer experience. Together, we’ll discover what it takes to create an agile brand built for today and tomorrow, and built for customers, employees, and continued business growth. I’m your host, Greg Kihlstrom, advising Fortune 1000 brands on Martech, AI, and marketing operations. The Agile Brand Podcast is brought to you by TEKsystems, an industry leader in full stack technology services, talent services, and real world application. For more information, go to teksystems.com. To make sure you always get the latest episodes, please hit subscribe on the app you listen to podcasts on and leave us a rating so others can find us as well. And now onto the show. We are here at eTail Palm Springs and seeing and hearing the latest and greatest in e-commerce and retail. Question for you, do you need to choose between AI and human recommendations as a customer? Why not have both? After all, don’t each have their strengths? AI and the retail experience is all the rage these days, but today I’m talking with someone from a brand that has been incorporating AI personalized experiences and shopping combined with expert human recommendations for over 14 years and continues to innovate today. Today, we’re going to talk about how AI-based personalization plus human creativity and input makes an amazing customer experience at Stitch Fix. To help me discuss this topic, I’d like to welcome Noah Zomansky, Vice President of Product and Client Experience at Stitch Fix. Noah, welcome to the show. Thank you, Greg. Really happy to be here. Yeah, yeah, love to do these face-to-face. I do so many remote recordings and stuff. It’s nice to be on the ground here.
Noah Zamansky: Yeah, it’s really nice. It’s a great day in Palm Springs. So, yeah, really looking forward to chatting more. Absolutely.
Greg Kihlstrom: So, before we dive in, we’ve got quite a few things to talk about. But before we do that, why don’t you give a little background on yourself and your role at Stitch Fix?
Noah Zamansky: Sure. So as you mentioned, I lead the client and styling experience team. And we are a team of product managers, engineers, data scientists, and product designers that were really focused on delivering highly personalized experiences for our clients and giving our stylists the tools that they need to deliver amazing experiences. And so for those who are unfamiliar, Stitch Fix is the leading online styling service that helps clients discover styles that they love. and makes them feel great and look their best. We’ve been doing this for 14 years. The funny thing is, before I joined Stitch Fix, I was actually a client. That’s actually the reason I am at Stitch Fix. I was leading the global fashion initiative at eBay, and Stitch Fix came up as a real leader within the personalization space. And so as a bit of competitive research, I tried the service and I actually became hooked from the simplicity of the quiz to connecting with the stylist and then receiving my first fix and having that unboxing experience where I discovered brands like Vori and some of the brands that Stitch Fix’s own brands that like Algo 01, which I’m wearing today, and that basically fit just perfectly. So from that moment on, I was really hooked, and that’s really what we’re all about. How can we provide best-in-class AI with that human touch of the stylist to create that magical experience? That’s great. I’m a client as well. You are? Yeah.
Greg Kihlstrom: I’ve got a couple of things on today actually. Very cool. Yeah. Done it a few times now. We’ll certainly talk about this a little bit more, but the experience certainly makes it a valuable thing as a customer to be able to have those recommendations, but also not feel like it’s just kind of going into the AI void and stuff like that.
Noah Zamansky: Yeah, I’d love to hear some of your feedback also. One of the things that actually, just to go a little bit further, that really worked for me is I can never get jeans and pants that fit. And Stitch Fix nailed it for me, you know, on the first time. And I’ve never had that, you know, going to like a retailer, I always have to, you know, get my pants, you know, tailored. But, you know, something about the fit and the experience with Stitch Fix just really worked for me. And so, yeah, I’m curious to see if it, you know, if it worked for you as well.
Greg Kihlstrom: Yeah, definitely. I’m a repeat customer, so I think that bodes well. Let’s dive in here. You touched a little bit on the business model in the introduction, but why don’t you talk a little bit more for those a little less familiar with it. What is the business model and how did that get started?
Noah Zamansky: The business model is combining best-in-class AI and human stylists. That’s really the crux of it. From our entire experience, AI and human styling is embedded across. From the algorithms that essentially leverage literally billions of data points from over 100 million fixes to the tools that we provide to our stylists to deliver amazing fixes to the way we even plan inventory Personalization is embedded and really part of our core experience. And so that’s really the heart of our model.
Greg Kihlstrom: And so, you know, I talk a lot about AI on the show and there’s a lot of, I would say newer AI stuff that’s, you know, obviously like things like chat GPT have really brought generative AI and things into the spotlight. But as you mentioned, and I mentioned at the top of the show, you’ve been doing AI for 14 years at Stitch Fix. So how has AI played this role since the early days of Stitch Fix?
Noah Zamansky: Yeah, it’s been evolving and so it’s really been at the core of who we are. But, over the last year and a half or so, we kicked off this transformation because what we realized was that client expectations had kind of shifted and we realized that we needed to move with them. And so, as strong as our model was in terms of the recommendations and the stylist experience, we needed to bring it into the next stage. And so, that really kicked off about 12 months of investment in new innovation that really helped us evolve past where we were 14 years ago. And I can share a little bit about the process there, but firstly was our onboarding experience, which we’ve completely redesigned. And if you remember, it was kind of like this, almost like a form that you would fill out when you go to the dentist’s office. Very simple, but more of a one-way communication. And we revamped that to really make it more of a two-way conversation and building in little moments of micro feedback and personalization to really share that we heard you. And then as part of that launch was the launch of StyleFile. which is our personalized, AI-powered style profile that we provide to clients so that they can understand their style. This is really impactful for our clients because it leverages the power of our algos and analyzes the likes and the dislikes. the responses that you were giving through that style quiz and mapped it to 10 unique style types, things like boho, edgy, contemporary, and to formulate a picture of your comprehensive style. And it’s been really a great inspirational experience for our clients. We’re making it more shoppable, so you can actually shop your style file, and it’s super highly personalized. So I don’t know, have you tried? Yeah, I did. So I’m a modern prep. Modern prep? Yeah.
Greg Kihlstrom: Yeah, yeah. Do you think like it was accurate? I think so. Yeah, yeah. At least on good days, you know. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, I thought it, yeah. I think it makes it a little more tangible and stuff to have that kind of persona. I mean, working in marketing, you know, I think of it as like a persona, but maybe the average customer doesn’t deal with that stuff every day. So I think it’s easy to like, have something to identify to and even to react to, I would imagine, right?
Noah Zamansky: Yeah, I think that’s exactly right. I think people were really excited, our clients were really excited to be able to react to it. I don’t think that they really had that, you know, that style authority kind of really helping them to illuminate kind of what their style, the elements of their style were. And like, you know, mine is an adventure sport, which is It’s actually spot on. On the weekends, I love to go outdoors, so I’m wearing more active wear. At work, I’m wearing more contemporary and modern clothing. To be able to explore these individual facets is really fascinating for our clients. Our stylists and clients are able to discuss the style file and share how that fits in with their own styling experience.
Greg Kihlstrom: So let’s talk a little more about the client experience. And I know we touched a little bit on this, but let’s start at customer acquisition and just how is the joining process, you know, how are you thinking about that and how are you continuing to evolve that?
Noah Zamansky: Yeah. One of the challenges is really how do you get to know your client in a short period of time without really putting them through a really super arduous process? How can you explain who we are in a short period of time? For us, it’s really about empowering the clients. And so when you’re taking the onboarding quiz or the style quiz, we want to make that as interactive as possible. These moments of micro-personalization, you may remember the style shuffle experience. So we ask our clients, do you like or dislike different styles? And that puts them in the driver’s seat in terms of how quickly we can learn about their preferences, and it actively shapes our understanding and the algo, essentially. We want to make that as seamless as possible. We want to go deep with our clients because we need to understand the details of their fit, their style preferences, but we don’t want to overwhelm them. We want to have a two-way conversation, and so that’s why elements such as playback and style file are super important. One of the interesting things, too, is where We continuously improve our algorithms with A-B testing, multiple A-B tests every day to improve the relevancy, conversion, and the effectiveness of our algorithms. We find that when we’re explaining and providing more context around the changes, it acts as like an amplifier. And so, we see a much stronger signal where, hey, for example, where we’re sending you something that may be out of your comfort zone. Maybe there’s like a leather jacket or something that is a bit of variety or a new arrival. And, we’re explaining it more consistently with contextual nudges throughout the client experience. We’re finding that that really has an amplifying effect, as I was mentioning, and it really is just driving trust. with our clients at the end of the day and a better understanding of how the algos are working for them.
Greg Kihlstrom: Yeah, yeah. Well, and of course, the algorithm is also complemented by humans, right? That’s an interesting dynamic here. There’s so much focus being put on automating absolutely everything, everywhere, with every company, right? So, you know, I think another interesting part is you’ve put a lot of investment and focus on an algorithm, but there are also real people doing things. So can you talk a little bit about, you know, how do you balance those two things? You know, giving credence to the algorithm and all the technology that you put to it, but also the human aspect seems a valuable part as well.
Noah Zamansky: Absolutely. The stylists, our humans, are really at the center of who we are. We have got such an amazing talent pool there. Really, we really want to empower them with the science and give them the tools. You mentioned the algo. We also have a tool called Notasist. which leverages OpenAI’s latest large language models to help stylists write a really personalized note to each and every fix. Think of it as like a first draft. The beauty of it is that it’s really integrated within the broader context of what else is happening within that fix, the other items, the complementary items. It’s tuned to the right line of business, then the tone of voice. But, it really allows the clients to get through that styling note faster so they can spend more time actually styling and providing creativity and human empathy to the styling process. That’s really one of the key areas that we’re driving. One of the other tools that we provide for them is our outfits model. which generates over a million outfits per day, complementary items to each of the items that you may own or you may be browsing or maybe in your fix. That helps stylists as well provide more outfit options, category diversification. The thing that is really important for us is spotlighting them. One of the launches that we did was Stylist Profiles. So this really showcased your stylist, their interests, their expertise, and their photo. So now you can actually, you can see their photo, who they are. That had a really strong impact on one of our key qualitative metrics of, we measure want you back, which is after you’re done with your fix, do you want to have the same stylist? So just having that human connection was really important in terms of how we’re balancing the science and increasingly putting the stylist more in the forefront and in the spotlight to really showcase their expertise.
Greg Kihlstrom: And also, the other big trend over time that we’re seeing is just Consumers wanting more and more flexibility. So, you know you mentioned, you know, you can change your stylist if you want to or I mean, there’s a lot of room for flexibility within the interface You already mentioned of being able to choose and select and like or not like things or whatever Are you seeing this as a continuing trend of just consumers wanting more and more flexibility? And if so, how are you thinking internally? Is this just going to keep growing in terms of that need?
Noah Zamansky: I think it is. I think the majority of our clients are looking for that. We do have some clients that just love the convenience of the service and are comfortable with the stylus taking full control. But what’s happening increasingly with our clients is that they do want that flexibility. One of the ways that we’re driving towards that is, traditionally, we were sending out five-item fixes, but we’re expanding and giving clients the options to select up to eight items. That gives them a lot more flexibility in terms of going after, like, hey, I want a seasonal refresh, or I have a new job, and I need two or three outfits. Can you send me an eight-item fix? That flexibility is something that we’re increasingly building in. We have two modes of interaction on Stitch Fix. We have our fix experience, but we also have our freestyle experience, which is a highly personalized, more self-shopping mode, which has outfits and recommendations. We’re seeing that be really successful and continue to grow. That’s an indication that our clients do want that flexibility, and we’re continuing to evolve that.
Greg Kihlstrom: Do you see just AI being a continuing kind of force in what you’re doing? I mean, it sounds like, you know, the balance is key, but again, all of these other retailers out there are, it’s almost as if it’s a new, I mean, AI has been around for 40 years, right? But like, it seems like it’s a relatively new or novel thing to some degree, but like, is AI, you know, gonna continue to be a big component of Stitch Fix moving into the future?
Noah Zamansky: You nailed it. It’s been part of who we are, and so for us, it’s definitely not an add-on strategy.
Greg Kihlstrom: Sorry, to that point, I think that’s what I find interesting about this is that it doesn’t feel tacked on, maybe because you’ve been doing it for 14 years as a company.
Noah Zamansky: Absolutely. No, no. It’s so true. I think the exciting thing, though, for us is, over the last six to twelve months, how fast everything has been developing. We are seeing AI actually expand to every area of our business now. You know, not just the personalization and the styling experience, but how we plan our inventory, so predictive inventory planning. And so, when you look at where AI is entering into every area of the business, it’s just accelerated. So, we’re really feeling really optimistic about how it’s going to accelerate in a lot of areas. But, one of the other areas we’re really excited about, too. which is emerging out of more of the curiosity realm into more of an impactful use case. Within our space of styling is generative AI, especially the multimodal applications. When we think about the possibilities for a client and a stylist to have a conversation about visualizing a style. you know, virtual try-on, and that enhancing that creativity and visualization, we think there’s a lot of opportunity there. So, you know, watch this space. Yeah, yeah. But we think that that’s a really exciting area for our client and stylist relationship.
Greg Kihlstrom: Well, and with the customer data and preferences and all that stuff that you have, I mean, I think for a lot of companies, I think that’s the challenge from the start is how do we get enough information from our customers to start personalizing and all that. But it would seem it’s part of your model to understand and to have that deeper understanding. So it seems like to put you at an advantage there to be able to do that.
Noah Zamansky: Yeah, I think it’s definitely an enviable position, but we have such a deep relationship with our clients and every item that they keep, every item that they send back, we ask questions about that. And that helps inform our understanding of them. And so we’re in a really lucky position because we built this trusted relationship with our client base, and they’re happy to give that kind of information because they know that if I’m giving that information to my stylist and to Stitch Fix, the next fix is going to be even better. And that’s what we try to make it is continuous learning, continuous improvement, and so that we’re constantly getting better and better for you.
Greg Kihlstrom: Well, and I think that’s a good point, too, because I talk with a lot of companies about first-party data strategies and all this third-party cookies going away. The antidote to that is what you’re saying, which is get better and direct information. But the trade-off there is that You literally said it, customers don’t want to give information if they feel like it’s not going to be used. But I think the benefit here is you’re asking for stuff, you’re showing tangible direct value from them providing that information, not just storing it somewhere and maybe use it someday or whatever. So I think that’s a powerful example of a good first-party data strategy.
Noah Zamansky: Yeah, absolutely. And I think when your genes come back, for example, and they just fit better than they ever had because you’ve given that feedback, like, hey, it’s kind of too long. Right. The next box, it comes and it’s actually spot on. That’s real time. That’s super tangible for clients. And so that’s what it’s about. It’s about that trust. And as you said, you said it perfectly.
Greg Kihlstrom: Thanks. Well, yeah, we’ll know it. Great to see you here in Palm Springs. One last question I like to ask everybody on the show. What do you do to stay agile in your role and how do you find a way to do it consistently?
Noah Zamansky: Great question. I think, for us, in this turnaround at Stitch Fix, we’re moving very fast. We feel a huge sense of urgency to improve our experience for clients. As you know, the product development process takes time. We spend a lot of time in discovery, listening to clients, working with engineering, architecture, and design to really deliver the improvements for our clients. That’s like you build a plan, right? You build a 100% plan. But, in order to stay agile, you have to be flexible because you’re going to learn things like next week, tomorrow that your clients are going to tell you that you have to pivot. Any 100% plan, I can guarantee you, is going to be not 100% right. Making sure that you can maintain that flexibility is super critical. That’s what I find is making sure we’re not too locked in, we’re being agile, we’re listening to customers continuously. And, you know, the other thing is really like, the space is moving so fast. How do we stay up to speed? And for me, it’s like, you know, having conversations like this, coming to eTail, but also for my team, it’s how can we do Hack Week? And so we spend a lot of time, we’ve done Hack Week and hackathons to really stay sharp and explore and discover the latest technology. So that’s how I think about it.
Stay tuned for more of our interviews from eTail Palm Springs 2025.
