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Tech Tactics is Sourcing Journal’s discussion series with brands and technology companies, featuring their latest innovations.

Attentive AI is taking its technology global.

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In July, the artificial intelligence-powered short message service (SMS) and email marketing platform launched AI Pro—a cutting-edge suite of tools designed to enhance marketing messaging—internationally.

Since adopting AI Pro, brands like Hot Topic, Crate & Barrel, Ugg and Tecovas have experienced an average revenue increase of 124 percent while also improving customer experience, the group said.

“We’re so excited about AI Pro and the results it’s delivered so far,” said Megan Edwards, senior manager of customer relationship management at Tecovas. “Building the correct segments is time-consuming and open to human error, but AI Pro takes all the guesswork out of it and delivers the results we’re looking for. This ability to better identify and communicate with our audience will be our key to driving success in the upcoming holiday season.”

Upping customer engagement

In addition to driving revenue for brands, Attentive is on a mission to revolutionize customer engagement to deliver real-time, personalized interactions, which, according to McKinsey & Company, can help drive performance and better customer outcomes.

Since launching nearly a decade ago, Attentive has significantly expanded its retail and e-commerce offerings to enhance customer engagement for brands like Guess, Boston Proper, Blenders and more.

The company now provides an abundance of text communication solutions such as AI Pro, designed to engage customers throughout the entire purchasing lifecycle with promotional, transactional and conversational text messages.

Attentive’s SMS systems offer several key functions, including Audience Manager, which leverages engagement data to segment audiences and creates tailored messages for each subscriber, incorporating dynamic content to ensure relevance. Meanwhile, the Concierge feature allows companies to collect information on customer preferences through keywords or numbers that trigger automatic replies.

“Attentive is constantly innovating our platform to solve customers’ needs, meet industry standards and work with changing privacy requirements,” Amit Jhawar, the company’s CEO, told Sourcing Journal. “Not only do we have the best-in-class strategy, but we also have the best customer service team who guide clients through every step of the way.”

Attentive client Claire’s has used the SMS technology to solidify and maintain its status as a prominent lifestyle brand for 12- to 16-year-old shoppers. Unlike emails—which can sometimes get lost in the inbox—the tween specialty retailer found that text messages are opened immediately and capture attention more effectively.

“People are dismissing our email messages—but connecting with customers on their phones is a much more direct way of communicating with them,” said Andres Baez, senior digital marketing manager at Claire’s. “It’s the evolution of the communication path.”

After implementing Attentive’s SMS technology in 2022, Claire’s achieved its two main goals: expanding its U.S. subscriber base and launching SMS programs in the UK, France and Ireland. Additionally, Claire’s increased its U.S. SMS subscriber list by 149 percent and increased return on investment (ROI) by a factor of 17.

“We became the leading AI-powered SMS and email marketing platform for brands by helping marketers reimagine personalization in the AI age and making personalization possible by building profiles of what consumers care about most,” said Jhawar. “Hyper-personalization moves the needle and converts ROI, and for brands [like Claire’s], it’s about engaging every shopper at the right time, with the right message, on the right channel.”