{"id":19123,"date":"2018-11-07T06:00:41","date_gmt":"2018-11-07T14:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/industry\/blog\/?p=19123"},"modified":"2023-07-17T12:03:36","modified_gmt":"2023-07-17T19:03:36","slug":"what-you-need-to-know-to-start-your-ai-journey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/industry\/blog\/general\/2018\/11\/07\/what-you-need-to-know-to-start-your-ai-journey\/","title":{"rendered":"What you need to know to start your AI journey"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Every day, the gap between now and the future seems shorter than ever before, with new technology and automation that bypass anything we envisioned even a decade ago. Artificial intelligence (AI) is the buzzword of the day, and while it sounds futuristic, AI is here now. It\u2019s getting cheaper and more accessible to businesses of all sizes every day. What\u2019s more: it\u2019s rapidly being deployed all over the world. You can\u2019t afford to wait.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s talk about why AI may be for you, and how much easier it is to adopt than you might have thought.<\/p>\n

A quick dive into AI<\/strong><\/p>\n

Buying AI is a little like buying air\u2014you can\u2019t see or touch it. But for many businesses today, it\u2019s just as essential as oxygen. AI is an abstract technology: a set of cognitive abilities built into software or machines. It can parse text, images, video, and voice to find information, learn, and form deductions. With continuous input about customer interactions, for example, AI systems learn from data, building on history to continually improve the quality of answers to business questions.<\/p>\n

A manufacturer wants to better predict when a machine might break, while a financial service needs to know when and how to intensify fraud detection. AI provides those insights\u2014and because it digests and refines its understanding of patterns over time, those answers continually improve.<\/p>\n

If AI can mean this much to your customers\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

AI brings a new level of personalized online experiences to customers. Facial recognition and actionable information from images accessed by apps can be used to make interactions more relevant, natural, and satisfying.<\/p>\n

With AI, your company can be more available to customers. Chatbots offer the 24\/7 availability. They can handle low-level issues, providing answers in the time and place customers prefer. In fact, by 2025, it is estimated that bots will handle 95 percent of customers interactions.<\/p>\n

\u2026think what it can mean to you <\/strong><\/p>\n

With AI tackling more predictable, mundane tasks, your employees are freed to focus on strategic goals and dive deeply into creative solutions. AI doesn\u2019t take over from your employees. Its precision and predictive capabilities merge with the human abilities of your team\u2014creativity, insight, empathy, and much more\u2014to fast track your goals. With apps that learn from the data they gather, you\u2019ll save money on more precisely targeted preventative maintenance.<\/p>\n

The insights gleaned from AI solutions provide an ever-richer context for building on past successes, improving products, and showing when a change in direction can optimize profit.<\/p>\n

Your business powered by AI<\/strong><\/p>\n

The convergence of breakthroughs in AI technology and cloud computing power means that putting powerful AI technology directly in the hands of business owners is affordable\u2014and easier than ever before. AI is becoming ubiquitous to businesses of all kinds and sizes. The transformative power of AI is here, and it can take your business to a new level. Don\u2019t wait.<\/p>\n

See how you can transform your business with our AI Business Basics interactive guide<\/a> today.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AI is no longer science fiction. Profoundly useful, affordable, and within the reach of most businesses, AI is transformative. See what it can do for you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":576,"featured_media":19237,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ms_queue_id":[],"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"_classifai_error":"","_classifai_text_to_speech_error":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"post_tag":[4289],"content-type":[1483],"coauthors":[4309],"class_list":["post-19123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-ai","content-type-thought-leadership"],"yoast_head":"\nWhat you need to know to start your AI journey - Microsoft Industry Blogs<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/industry\/blog\/general\/2018\/11\/07\/what-you-need-to-know-to-start-your-ai-journey\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"What you need to know to start your AI journey - Microsoft Industry Blogs\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"AI is no longer science fiction. 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