Artificial intelligence makes this possible for the hair color products retailer. The machine-learning algorithm factors in the answers to a 20-question hair coloring quiz more than 4 million shoppers have taken, along with more than 24,0000 product reviews of the retailer's 50 SKUs. It also factors in a shopper's repeat purchase rate, net promoter score and hundreds of thousands of shopper and customer service agent interactions, says Dave King, chief technology officer at Madison Reed. With all of this historical information, Madison Reed's algorithm is the ultimate master colorist that can recommend hair coloring products, King says. When Madison Reed first launched its product recommendation engine, it was coded by humans and did not factor in all of the data points that it does today.

Ulta Beauty chain is adding a new "consultant" to its in-store team. Through its partnership with hair color brand Madison Reed, Ulta is deploying a color-recognition chatbot (called Madi) that gives consultations similar to those customers receive from a professional colorist in a hair salon. Described by Madison Reed as the industry's first-ever color-recognition chatbot, Madi combines artificial intelligence and selfies to engage in-store shoppers. Here's how it works: In- store customers looking for a hair color text "Hello" to 34757, activating Madi on their mobile device. The tool will prompt the shopper to upload a selfie focused on her face and hair, then followup with a few quick questions.

When Amy Errett set out to create Madison Reed, an online shop for hair coloring products, she and her team thought a 12-question, quiz-based algorithm was all they needed to determine the right dye for each customer's hair. But from the moment the San Francisco startup launched in 2014, women began sending in their selfies--they wanted a more visually-based assessment. Madison Reed, which prides itself on customer service, was happy to have its representatives review the selfies and assist customers, but the key to success for any tech business is the ability to scale. That's why in 2016, Madison Reed began experimenting with computer vision, a technology that applies artificial intelligence to interpret and act on visual data. Errett and her team were hoping to create photo-recognition technology that could analyze women's selfies, identify their hair, determine the color, and match it to one of the company's 46 available shades.