Machine Learning Application in Online Retail: A JD Case Study

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COIT20249 ASSESSMENT 3

Contents
Executive Summary.........................................................................................................................3
Introduction......................................................................................................................................4
Main Body.......................................................................................................................................5
1. Definition of Machine learning...................................................................................................5
Difference and Relationship between Machine learning and Artificial Intelligence.......................6
2. Application of machine learning in the other three industries sectors other than the Retailer
sector................................................................................................................................................6
3. Investigate how machine learning can be adopted in JD. Discuss its application to at least two
different business functional areas of JD; and the advantages and disadvantages of its
application........................................................................................................................................7
4. Ethical, social and legal issues about the application of machine learning on online retailer
platforms........................................................................................................................................10
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................12
Recommendations..........................................................................................................................13
References......................................................................................................................................14

Executive Summary
The entire report is all about a company JD that wants to implement the concept of machine
learning in their business enterprise just to gain the satisfaction of customers. JD is the online
retailer company which has seen the increment in their sale in the past decade and wants their
customer searches and visit their outlets daily. Machine learning is the application of Artificial
intelligence which describes the actions of the machines by performing and behaving same as
humans and performing their daily operations without being programmed. The main purpose of
this report to attain then knowledge of machine learning and artificial intelligence so that JD can
be able to implement this concept in their business just to enhance the profitability and
productivity and gain the high rate of profit margin. The problem which has been found in the
given scenario was that the decrement in the sale and satisfaction of customers has been reduced.
Thus, with the use of machine learning and artificial intelligence JD can be able to improve the
condition of their company. The entire report is going to give a brief description of the concept
of machine learning along with its various applications where the concept has been used other
than the retailer organization. In addition to the difference between machine learning and
artificial intelligence has been defined along with the legal, social and ethical issues of the
application of machine learning. The recommendation has also been defined for the JD so that
they can implement machine learning in their organization.

Introduction
Machine learning is defined as an application of Artificial Intelligence which aims to provide the
system the capability to learn from the experiences without doing any practical things. This is the
term that is very beneficial for business owners like JD. In the present report, JD is the firm that
is an online retailer Australian company that sells about huge number of merchandise including
electronics, accessories, and books to customers all over the world. The CTO of JD now wants to
implement the use of machine learning in their company as for the enhancement in the business
growth of the company, the use of machine learning in the business can also lead to the
satisfaction of customers. The use of machine learning can also be done inman6y of the other
functional areas just to increase the efficiency of the business for attaining a competitive edge in
the industry. This report is going to have a discussion on machine learning and artificial
intelligence in the context of JD. Along with this the report singing to define the relationship
between both terms. Application of machine learning in three various sector s other than the
retailer companies. The description of how this concept of machine learning is going to be
implemented in JD along with its application of two various functional areas of JD. The
advantages and disadvantages of application of machine learning. In addition to this, the ethical,
social, legal issues for the application of machine learning are to be discussed in context to the
online retailer companies’ platform. To this end, the report will need more discussion which will
end up by the summarization of the entire report.

Main Body
1. Definition of Machine learning.
In today’s time, machine learning has become a hot topic all over the world. This is the term that
has been defined from the field of computer science and is different from the approaches of
computational. Machine learning is having a wide range of applications in the present time. The
main example of machine learning can be facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. The machine
learning is very useful for business purposes as many of the tasks can be completed with the use
of machines only and this reduces the effort of the humans in the business (Konar, 2018). As this
is known that JD is the online retailer company and wants to enhance business growth just to
increase their productivity and profitability. There are many areas in which machine learning is
playing very crucial role.
Machine learning is defined as the application of Artificial intelligence which allows the
computers to have the capability and ability to behave and act like humans without being
programmed. The machine learning in today’s time is used to solve many of the complex issues
and problems. In today’s time there are many tasks that can be performed by the machines and
they can easily act like humans and can help them in performing the certain task of the business
(Hosny, et. al., 2018).
In the simple term, machine learning can be defined as the language which can be able to
perform the complex task of machine learning. There are various problems that can be used to
deals with complex problems such as Java, Octave, Elm, etc. Machine learning can be used in
healthcare, retail Business Company, and other related fields. Facebook and the other social
media sites are to be used to push the advertisements which are based on the past time. The
technology is having the capability of handling the multi-dimensional and multi-variety of data
in the dynamic environment (Momoh & El-Hawary, 2018). Machine learning technology is also
used to make the best possible business decisions through the evaluation of past experience and
with the best knowledge. With the help of machine learning and artificial intelligence, the JD can
do provide its products to its customers with full satisfaction anytime and anywhere.

Difference and Relationship between Machine learning and Artificial
Intelligence
Machine learning and Artificial intelligence are the interchangeable terms mainly in the real term
of big data. Both of the terms are not same and this is necessary to understand the difference
between both the terms. Artificial intelligence is the term derived from the field of computer
science and has the ability to learn and performs the task as same as humans do without being
programmed (Lu, et. al., 2018). Now this is necessary to have a brief discussion on the
relationship and difference of both the term named artificial intelligence and machine learning.
Machine Learning Artificial Intelligence
Machine learning is the application of AI
which is based on the machines and giving
access to the machines to learn accordingly and
access the data.
Artificial intelligence is the technologies which
are defined as huge concept and use the
machines to perform all the certain task of the
humans smartly.
The main aim of machine learning is to
enhance accuracy without taking care of
success.
The main aim of artificial intelligence is to
enhance the chances of success without having
the increment inaccuracy.
Machine learning allows the system to increase
the knowledge from the existing data.
Artificial intelligence is a greater mental
process.
Machine learning is the term in which the data
is provided to the machines to learn from it.
The main function of AI is to perform certain
tasks smartly.
Machine learning is a term that leads to
knowledge.
Artificial intelligence leads to brainpower and
understanding.
This technology leads to the formation of self-
learning algorithms.
This technology defines the formation of such
a computer system which mimics the behavior
of humans and works accordingly.
2. Application of machine learning in the other three industries sectors other
than the Retailer sector.
Machine learning is the crucial technology that plays the most important role in human’s life
(Camacho, et. al., 2018). The main application of artificial intelligence other than retail sector are
stated as below -

1. Augmentation - Machine learning helps humans to perform their day-to-day operations
individually or commercially without taking care of the results and without the control of
the output. These types of machine learning can be used in various ways such as data
analysis, virtual assistant and the solutions of the software. The main goal of using
machine learning in augmentation is to reduce the occurrence of errors which are
occurred by humans.
2. Finance Industry - The use of machine learning has been increased day-by-day in many
sectors. The finance industries have also started to use machine learning technology for
better performance (Butler, et. al., 2018). Machine learning is going rapidly in the finance
industry. Machine learning in banks is used to ascertain the pattern in the data and also
preventing from fraud and thefts.
3. Healthcare Industry - This industry was the first one to implement the concept of
machine learning in their industry for detecting the image. Machine learning is having
great use in healthcare industry as this is used to saves the life of humans. Google has
developed the use of machine learning algorithm to assist in identifying cancer, brain
tumour and many more diseases in humans.
3. Investigate how machine learning can be adopted in JD. Discuss its
application to at least two different business functional areas of JD; and the
advantages and disadvantages of its application.
Machine learning becomes popular in the present era in most of the industries. This technology
can also be used in JD organization; its owner believes that this technology can help in
increasing the efficiency of the company. There are some steps which can be utilized by JD
organization in adopting the machine learning in an organization. The steps can be described as:
1. Acquiring customers intelligently: as all the company wants to increase its customers,
JD Company is also working on it and use this technology for introducing new
customers. This company uses three steps for increasing their customers that can be
described as knowing all the needs of customers or audience, engaging new products and
services for their customers, at last, send these products to the customers according to

their requirements (Parakh, M. 2018). This company uses algorithms of machine learning
for increasing the number of customers.
2. Customer support at a higher level: the real support to customers on products can be
started from selling the product or services. This organization uses this technology and
gain the trust of the customers by solving their issues on time. Through this, the users can
easily tackle out all the problems and manage several customers at a time.
3. Forecasting of business: The owner of the JD Company can forecast on many areas or
locations and gain the ideas of the needs or requirements of the customers. An
organization can stay one step ahead for the unplanned situation by using machine
learning technology.
4. Management of people: this company can keen focused on to hire the skilled person by
using the machine learning technology through which the human errors are reduced down
in the organization and productivity of the company can be increased out positively.
Two application areas can be described as:
Area 1: Stocking or inventory
In this, the retailers can use data purchasing for predicting all the needs at an inventory level.
This information can be promoted on to the daily dashboards through which the manager can be
able to know all the orders of purchasing items. This technology also uses the camera through
which the managers can be able to know about the entire unusual patterns based on the real-time
aspect.
Area 2: Behavioural tracking of marketing and products
If the optimization inventories are in losses, the revenues can be driven by the placement of
marketing and products. There is several sensors can be placed in sensors through which the
tracking of inventories can be done easily.
Advantages:
 It has the capability for handling multi-dimensional data at the dynamic or static
environment.

 It gives allowance to a reduction in the time cycle and utilizes the resources inefficient
manner.
 Source programs presence can also increase the usability of the algorithms in most of the
companies.
Disadvantages:
 Results interpretation is a major challenge for determining the effectiveness of the
algorithm.
 The techniques selection is not conducted properly.
 Relevant data acquisition is the most common problem.

4. Ethical, social and legal issues about the application of machine learning on
online retailer platforms
Ethical issues:
The main ethical issue that can be faced in online retailer company is data theft and security.
Data theft is a major problem in present scenarios and it can be seen in most of the companies
also in the JD organization. It can be seen that the data breaches can be conducted on most of the
retailing companies daily. The new trend which is going is of selling all the products online. Due
to this lots of the details of the company can be processed out which is in under fear of hacking
from the third party and use of this detail in an illegal manner (Faggella, D. 2019). Due to this
the security concern is in a hot area. Customers can feed their sensitive information for making
the transaction due to which the security factor is the main issue. Security issues can also be
faced during login time. The passwords do not seem to be correct on re-login, this will decrease
the trust level of the customers and they have a fear that their data can be hacked out form the
other person or third party. This will also affect the company’s productivity and efficiency. Theft
of data can be majorly seen in most of the companies at the time of online marketing.
Social and legal issues:
The main issues are related to maintaining or managing the loyalty of the customers for their
products. For gaining trust from the customer side, the company struggles to create the new
members. This challenge can be faced by both sides that is form the customer side or from the
buyer side. In online retailers’ company, another issue is of abandonment of the shopping cart.
The filled of bugs in most of the process can cause several customers to flee in droves. E-
commerce companies can find many issues with selling the products according to the behavior of
the clients. Analysis of the competitor for the same products and services also create major
problems. Form this the owner of the company is not able to see various aspects of the other
companies due to which the company owner loses the value of their products and this will
decrease out their productivity as well as company’s efficiency. The delivery of experience for
Omni channel of customer also the major concern, in this the number of customers is not able to
touch the profits due to the lack of knowledge. Sometimes, the customers are also faced the issue

of verification of identity on an online medium. It means that they face problem on login time for
the online websites which will affect their trust issues and they are not interested in feeding all
the details again and again.

Conclusion
From the above-mentioned report this has been concluded that the use of machine learning in the
online retail sector is beneficial for the JD firm to increase the growth of business. The entire
report was defined in context of the JD firm just to establish the concept of machine learning in
the organization just to enhance productivity and profitability. With this report JD can be able to
provide better services to its customers so that they can reach and visit their retail outlets again
and again. The main importance of describing this report was to gain knowledge in the sector of
machine learning and artificial intelligence and to resolve all the problems faced by JD in their
organization in context to their customers. The above report has attained all the objectives by
defining the concept of machine learning, along with the relationship between artificial
intelligence and machine learning. The report has also described the various application where
machine learning has been used other than the retail sector. Along with this the objectives have
been attained by defining the various legal, social and ethical issues of application of machine
learning. To the end, the concept of machine learning is very wide as this ned ton be discussed
more in the future and the major points can be discussed in the future bout machine learning just
to attain the high rate of profit margin in the organization named JD.