SBIR Phase I: Natural Language Processing for Enhanced Sales Communication

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project will result from revolutionizing the way businesses approach sales, by directly and positively impacting sales communication. This, in turn, will lead to increased sales efficiency and increased customer satisfaction, while facilitating the acquisition of new customers and the retention of existing ones. These aspects will directly impact a company's bottom line and improve profitability. While the focus of this project is to build AI technology that can assist sales representatives in their communication, the lessons learnt here and the methods developed will be applicable to other areas where communication is essential, including the medical domain, counseling, or interviews. Furthermore, the goal of this project is to maintain significant involvement of women and under-represented minorities in this woman-owned company. This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project focuses on building an intelligent sales platform expected to positively transform the sales process in business-to-business interactions. This will be achieved by creating technology that assists sales agents by increasing the effectiveness of their communication. Building on recent advances in Natural Language Processing and Machine Learning, novel methods and tools will be developed to measure and ensure sales agent responsiveness, accuracy, professionalism, and empathy in relation to customer communication. This project will leverage a proprietary large-scale dataset of sales emails and associated outcomes as a basis for the machine learning process. By the end of the Phase I project, this research will enable a direct and data-driven understanding of outcome-oriented sales communication and a quantified assessment of potential leads. This will be paramount to the future development of the project and to its impact and success in the marketplace. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.