Endear's New AI Opportunity Engine Drives 35x Increase in Store Associate Outreach

Retail CRM leader transforms customer data into actionable outreach, unlocking scalable, usage-driven retail engagement, without adding headcount

NEW YORK, May 20, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Today Endear announced the launch of AI Opportunity Engine, an AI-powered clienteling tool that helps store teams identify and target customers with ongoing and personalized outreach at scale - what to say, and when to send it.

In early deployments across select apparel stores, AI Opportunity Engine grew associate-led outreach 6x in six weeks with a 35x return. These results indicate that AI-generated outreach recommendations can significantly increase both the volume and consistency of personalized engagement in-store without sacrificing conversion rate.

A recent Endear survey of 1,000 U.S. shoppers found that 63% of consumers are more likely to return to a store when a sales associate follows up personally, and more than half report making an additional purchase as a result. By making this kind of outreach systematic and scalable, AI Opportunity Engine helps brands turn store visits into repeat revenue.

"The associate is still one of the most underleveraged growth channels in retail," said Leigh Sevin, co-founder and CEO of Endear.  "AI Opportunity Engine is showing us that when you remove the friction of deciding who to contact, what to say and when, teams don't just do more outreach, they build a habit around it. That's where the real long-term impact lies."

AI Opportunity Engine enables store teams to:

• Easily identify which customers to contact: Automatically generates a daily queue of high-intent customers without having to build a list manually.
• Generate personalized messages, without writing it: Pre-drafts SMS and email outreach aligned with brand voice and customer context.
• Scale clienteling, without scaling headcount: Allows teams to review, edit, and send messages in a matter of seconds.

The rollout also revealed meaningful shifts in store associate behavior. Stores that previously had little to no personalized outreach are now among the most active, with some of the highest conversion rates observed. These patterns highlight how removing the friction around outreach expands associate participation and improves performance across teams.

Endear supports over 2,000 stores in over 19 countries, powering relationship-driven selling for brands including Reformation, AG Jeans, and Boll & Branch. AI Opportunity Engine is currently available to select partners, with broader availability planned in the coming weeks. To learn more, visit https://endearhq.com/ai-opportunity-engine.

About Endear

Endear is the retail CRM for modern brands that want to build more meaningful customer relationships that drive real results. Designed for growing mid-sized brands, Endear empowers store teams with unified customer profiles backed by real-time data, seamless integrations, and AI-powered tools that make clienteling scalable and effective. By streamlining outreach across channels like text, email, and WhatsApp, Endear helps deliver personalized, high-impact customer experiences that increase foot traffic and boost sales. By making every engagement trackable and actionable, Endear is redefining retail ROI so every store becomes a performance channel and every interaction becomes an opportunity for growth. For more information, visit https://endearhq.com/.

SOURCE Endear