Best of Content Automation: Saim Alkan's Top Customer Cases of 2022 & Trends for 2023

The year 2022 was tumultuous for e-commerce and brought many uncertainties, imponderables, challenges and unanswered questions that will remain of relevance in 2023.

But despite all that, there were also successes and growth! Saim Alkan, founder and CEO of AX Semantics, has chosen his top 5 favorite AX Semantics automated content creation projects of 2022. We briefly present these below and explain why these automation projects in particular have impressed him so much. After looking back, we also take a look ahead and explain what Saim believes will be particularly important for e-commerce in 2023.

1. Lyreco and the joy of content automation

To begin with, we mention a project in 2022 that showed not only how much potential for success there is in text automation, but also how much fun it can be.

Lyreco Germany has achieved an impressive content development with AX Semantics. Among other things, this is reflected in the fact that Lyreco generated a total of 22,000 product descriptions with the AX software in the first two months alone. This not only saves them time and money, but also spares their employees' nerves, because dull tasks are a thing of the past thanks to automation.

Where monotonous tasks are eliminated, team members have much more fun at work and time to devote to more creative and/or strategic tasks. The (re)gained enjoyment of work for employees is what particularly fascinates Saim about this project. Hence the mention of Lyreco's automation project at this point.

"Thanks to the AX Semantics software, I have much more fun at work, as the requirements for my tasks have become much more qualified."

Mirela Comor, Product Content Managerin at Lyreco Germany

Want to know more about the Lyreco case? Then check out our meetup with Mirela Comor:

2. Mey Wäsche – fastest AX Semantics customer in 2022

Second place in our list of top cases is a real jump starter: Mey Wäsche. A really exciting project, because in just three weeks the company implemented high-quality, emotional, and detailed content in both German and Dutch, thereby internationalizing the business.

The content team actually had to contend with rather difficult conditions. The website design imposed a tight grid, for example for the text length of the product descriptions.

But the result speaks for itself: well-structured texts, a great visual presentation of the product descriptions, and a well-adjusted balance between the customers' need for information and the creation of incentives to buy.

After the great start with the NLG software (Natural Language Generation) of AX Semantics, Mey Wäsche has a lot planned for the year 2023 and wants, among other things, to generate descriptive texts in many languages. At the speed presented for the German and Dutch online store, we are curious to see in how many languages Mey Wäsche will soon offer products. With AX Semantics this is possible in 110 languages.

3. Toolbrothers – traffic success on product pages and blog posts

Can't generate traffic with product descriptions on product pages? Yes, you can! Toolbrothers has impressively demonstrated how it can be done and is thus undoubtedly one of Saim's top 5 projects of 2022. Toolbrothers' Sistrix Visibility Index shows how explosively organic search traffic has skyrocketed.

The tools that Toolbrothers presents on its website are lovingly prepared in terms of text. For each new tool described, there is not only a product page, but also a blog post. Both the blog posts and the product descriptions on the product detail pages are based on product data and are generated automatically with AX Semantics.

Using one product database so efficiently for two types of text is a clever move from a business point of view - and offers great added value for (potential) customers.

Tip: Toolbrothers also makes an impressive appearance on social media channels such as TikTok and YouTube to get the younger generation excited about the craft. Feel free to check it out.

Learn more about Toolbrothers' case in this meetup recording:

4. Kofferworld – 76% sales increase thanks to optimized product detail pages

Kofferworld started with difficult conditions into content automation, because the necessary product data was unstructured and chaotic. Therefore, the product detail pages were a mere collection of rigid data and did not exactly encourage purchases.

With a store relaunch in April 2021, the data chaos was gradually transformed into appealing product detail pages with conversion-driving statements.

And the numbers speak for themselves: Kofferworld is not only growing strongly in organic search, but is also recording a strong increase in sales! Compared to 2021, the company recorded a 31.44 percent visitor increase on the product detail pages in 2022. Sales increased by an incredible 76.87 percent through product detail pages as entry pages.

So much success is motivating, of course, and so Kofferworld has a lot more planned with content automation, such as content personalization and expanding automated copywriting for more product categories.

Our meetup recording with Kofferworld shows how great product descriptions can be created from a chaos of data:

5. OBI – few data, great texts

OBI shows that you can make a lot out of a little, thanks to creative ideas and tricks. And the OBI example also shows how important human input is in content automation. Because that is precisely the foundation for appealing texts.

The OBI copywriting team created the foundation for content automation with creativity, vision and ideas. OBI thus demonstrates how the interplay between the human idea generator and the machine as idea implementer works.

At the end, we see impressive results i.e. appealing product descriptions – even for the seemingly simplest light bulb:

What will happen in 2023?

2022 was a turbulent year - including e-commerce. After an unprecedented growth spurt due to the pandemic in previous years, 2022 saw the onset of a recession that left few companies untouched. Be it due to resource scarcity, energy cost explosions or decreased consumer purchasing power.

Especially in these times, it is important to be well-prepared, to recognize trends and to assert oneself in a highly competitive market. Saim Alkan's trend forecast for e-commerce in 2023 consists of the following three points.

Learning from Northern Europe

An interesting market, especially from a German perspective, is that in Scandinavia or rather Northern Europe. The problem in countries like Finland, Denmark and Sweden is that the markets are relatively small. The markets therefore have a comparatively low volume, due to low population figures, and consequently offer few (potential) customers.

AX customers from Northern Europe try to compensate for this problem by exporting to the whole of Europe and to internationalize their business. With success, as the growth and growth forecasts of our Northern European customers show. With AX Semantics the own data set in the software is easily translated into other languages and played out in the corresponding online store.

Internationalization

Tough times call for courage - this is also shown by AX customers. A prime example is Metav. The tool manufacturer has managed to internationalize its business with a very small team and implements two foreign languages with the help of AX software. Thus, the company manages to sell products on the European market and thus compensates for the decline in sales in Germany.

Also exciting is Metav's automated product video creation based on the automated content creation with AX Semantics. Learn more in our meetup recording with Stephan Bayer from Metav:

Data-driven analysis and optimization

As mentioned above, AX Semantics has identified four stages of content development in its close collaboration with customers. Content automation usually starts with an inventory and the desire to write descriptions for thousands of products as quickly as possible.

Across the four stages of development, building customer intimacy becomes increasingly important, which also means constantly optimizing conversions and sales.

In 2023, the topic of customer proximity will gain momentum once again, predicts Saim. AX Semantics provides services and tools, such as the e-commerce suite called content personalization software, to meet these consumer demands for proximity and personal advice.