How Face Recognition Increases Customer Engagement & Satisfaction

A Face in the Crowd: The Basics of Face Recognition Technology

Unless you have an identical twin, your face is one of your most unique characteristics. And its distinguishable landmarks – the exact space between eyes, the precise curve of the cheek, the fullness of the lips – can be analyzed by face recognition technology and converted into an individualized ‘faceprint’: a unique identifying tag much like a fingerprint.

As humans, picking faces out of a crowd is something we’re hardwired to do, but training computers to act in the same way is much more difficult. It takes us a split second to process factors like different facial expressions, the wearing of scarves, hats, sunglasses and makeup, as well as a degree of similarity in looks, age, gender and ethnicity. And so in aligning science fiction with reality, deep learning and artificial intelligence has enabled computers to visually search, find and identify specific faces within large image collections. 

How Can This Artificial Intelligence-driven Tech Affect My Business?

The number of businesses incorporating this strategic technology is extensive, and though face recognition software is still used largely for security, other applications are becoming more and more popular, particularly in the retail and hospitality industry.

Let’s look a little closer at some of the ways face recognition technology can impact your business — not only can it increase customer engagement, but many businesses who offer it either as a gimmick or as a serous service, are starting to gain a lot of press. If you’re willing to be creative, face recognition technology can be incredibly successful for your company.

Using Face Recognition in the Security Industry

Face recognition technology is now standard at most airports, and aside from law enforcement agencies using the tech to catch criminals, retail is also jumping on the security bandwagon. Wal-Mart, Saks Fifth Avenue and Nordstrom use facial recognition technology to scan the face of anyone who enters a store, identifying any suspicious people and potential shoplifters from their image database, while instantly alerting store security on their phones.

Creative Tech Solutions for Hospitality – Yes, It Works Well!

On some Disney cruise ships, photographers roam the ships for the duration of the vacation taking photos of travelers. The photos are sorted using facial recognition software that pairs the images to the specific people in the photographs. Later, passengers can scan their Disney ID (which they receive before the trip) at a kiosk and all of their pictures are pulled up — without any time being spent searching for yourself in the images.

Face Recognition API Helps Keep Track of Brand Ambassadors

PR firms and photo agencies use facial recognition technology to monitor brand ambassadors and high-value assets, producing results in seconds. Facial recognition and detection helps agencies track campaigns, and the results allow for in-depth analysis with PicScout’s Insights for Business.

The Next Step: Endless Possibilities with Face Analytics

The estimates are that by 2020, the face recognition market will reach $6 billion worth. It’s essential for businesses to stay ahead of the curve with best-practice technology – and in this way, PicScout, a pioneer of image recognition since 2002, offers a broad range of robust, scalable and fast visual capabilities with its Visual API. 

Not only does this Visual API use face recognition, but it also applies face detection and face analytics to determine demographics within your visual content. This can be extremely helpful with both content stored on a database, as well as real-time advertising and tracking.

To know more about PicScout’s Visual API and learn how you can apply it to your business, contact us here.

Keeping track of all your images has never been easier, and picking a face in the crowd?

Well, just ask PicScout.