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Salesforce is launching a new feature that uses machine learning to let customers make predictions based on data stored with the tech titan’s software. Einstein Prediction Builder is designed to take any of the fields that users have set up inside a piece of software — like Salesforce’s Sales Cloud CRM — and generate predictions for future outcomes based on saved data.
For example, Salesforce users could input information they have about customers and use Einstein Prediction Builder to generate a churn prediction system that would score each customer based on how likely they are to stop using a product or service.
The feature is designed to make it easier for companies and users who don’t have machine learning expertise to reap the benefits of the current explosion in AI technology. Custom predictions can be set up through a visual editor and don’t require coding of any sort.
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That’s not to say customers should expect to get around some of the key limitations of machine learning. They’ll still need enough data to generate accurate predictions, and Salesforce’s system will prevent them from even attempting to set the feature up if it finds the customer in question doesn’t have enough data.
In theory, customers with significant transaction volume should be able to set up custom predictions without much trouble, but that requirement could make it harder for smaller businesses (or those with fewer transactions) to reap the benefits of these custom predictions.
The amount of data needed will scale with the complexity of the task customers are asking the Prediction Builder to address. For example, a system that’s trying to predict one of two outcomes will be easier to create than one that’s supposed to determine one of 500 outcomes.
This news comes alongside the announcement of Einstein Bots, a feature that (as the name implies) is designed to provide customers with bots that can help automate customer interactions based on information that’s stored in Salesforce. All of this is part of the news from Salesforce’s Dreamforce conference, which is taking place this week in San Francisco.
