IBM has released an app based on Watson that can forecast consumer buying patterns.
The Watson Trend App (available on the App Store) is designed to help understand the reasons behind shopping trends and predict which the most sought-after products are.
It provides information not only about which products people are buying but how they feel about these products.
So far, IBM’s tool has revealed that lego products, stand-alone digital cameras, running shoes and the Hello Barbie connected doll are trending highly.
IBM has also predicted that for the first time during the Thanksgiving holiday period, consumers will seek out the best purchases on their mobile devices rather than desktops.
During the five-day period, mobile traffic is expected to increase 17 percent compared to 2014, while mobile sales are predicted to be up 34 percent from last year.
The app works by distilling sentiments from tens of millions of online conversations across social media sites, blogs, forums, comments, ratings and reviews.
