How Ecommerce Brands Can Use Adobe Generative AI to Improve Online Merchandising

Over the past few years, AI has emerged as a groundbreaking resource that’s transforming how brands are approaching online promotion. It is no longer just a trend, but something that seemingly everyone is integrating into their existing workflows. Now, thanks to artificial intelligence, ecommerce brands can unlock more value from existing assets, maximizing their lifespan and use cases. AI can also help create new, unique assets with minimal overhead, making the creative process more efficient than ever before. This is only the tip of the iceberg of how we can and plan to use AI and is just a hint at what’s to come. This article will explore simple but impactful applications for AI in the online merchandising process for ecommerce marketplace brands.

The Rise of Adobe Generative AI

Adobe Photoshop is a leading program for digital asset creation. Adobe’s generative AI capabilities have rapidly evolved over the past couple of years. Adobe first introduced a generative AI tool called Content Fill which generated additional content for images by analyzing the visual elements around it. Although this addition sounded promising, Content Fill wasn’t perfect and many of the generated areas looked patterned, making it easy to distinguish between what was real and artificially generated. However, since the introduction of Content Fill (and feedback on its performance), Adobe has further enhanced its generative AI capabilities.

4 Ways to Use Photoshop’s Generative AI

1. AI Generative Fill

Unlike its predecessor Content Fill, which was limited to referencing existing image content, Photoshop’s newer Generative Fill feature leverages Adobe’s generative AI to expand visual assets. This addition is particularly valuable for marketplace sellers facing common challenges like product image formatting—for instance, converting vertical photos to horizontal layouts to fit the image requirements of Amazon and other marketplaces. By instantly expanding canvas sizes and then intelligently mimicking the new areas, Generative Fill can empower ecommerce brands with complex edits in as fast as just a few seconds.

2. Adobe AI Photo Direction

When Adobe AI-generated photos fall short of production-ready assets, they can still serve as a helpful tool for visual direction and creative ideation. For example, during a recent project with a science technology company, our team encountered challenges finding an appropriate stock photo for a product lifestyle image, and initial AI-generated photo attempts appeared too synthetic. However, we discovered a valuable workaround: leveraging the Adobe AI photos as blueprints to guide the brand. By inputting a refined and specific prompt for the type of image we were looking for, we were given an output of a few potential photography ideas that the client could use as creative direction.

3. Visual Asset Development

When a given asset or icon isn’t available, there is now an option to use text-to-image or text-to-graphic commands to artificially generate what is missing. For example, when working on a marketing campaign for an electronics brand, our creative team realized a specific visual asset was needed, and it would take about an hour to create from scratch. Instead, they leveraged text-to-image generation to create a background foundation for the photo and further refined it in Photoshop with light effects—streamlining the entire process to only 15-minutes. This specific example demonstrates how using Adobe Photoshop’s generative AI is not meant to replace creative expertise but amplify it.

4. Adobe AI Stock Photos

Lastly, Adobe now offers a fully AI-generated stock photos site that can quickly bridge gaps during creative production. You’ve likely seen AI-generated images on social media or even Google search. Some images, especially when AI tools were initially introduced, had imperfections like misaligned body parts or unnatural lighting—but Adobe’s AI photos have quite improved since then. When a brand lacks visual assets, Adobe’s AI-generated stock photos can be a fast alternative – helping to keep projects pushing forwards without delays in timelines or further investment into creative resources.

3 Reasons Why Adobe’s AI Isn’t Perfect

1. It’s Not a Complete Solution (Yet)

While AI is, in many ways, a groundbreaking tool, it’s critical to note that the technology is not yet a complete solution. Not every output is perfect, either because the AI tool doesn’t fully understand what you’re looking for or it will present an image that just doesn’t look right to the human eye. Ecommerce brands testing Adobe’s generative AI photo capabilities must be prepared for some amount of unpredictability; some inputs may be resolved with just one query while others will require multiple iterations or even manual editing after generation to get to the complete, final product. In an attempt to combat this unpredictability and reduce user frustration, Adobe has a helpful list of prompting suggestions on their website to follow when using their generative AI.

2. Poor Adobe Generative AI Outputs

Outdoor Brand

One of the ecommerce brand’s photos had the product title displayed at an awkward angle, making it difficult for online customers to read. To resolve this, our creative team attempted to adjust the photo using Adobe’s AI to improve the readability of the title. Unfortunately, it was difficult to get the right output, and they ended up having to edit the photo manually.

Beverage Company

Our creative team had access to a stand-alone product image but were hoping to publish a photo that showed multiples of the same product stacked on top of itself. They asked Adobe’s AI to use the photo as reference and generate another version where multiples of the product were stacked atop each other. Unfortunately, despite multiple prompting attempts, the outputs were consistently only of cardboard boxes rather than utilizing the style of the initial product image. This is another example of a photo that needed to be created manually as Adobe’s generative AI was not able to give us a proper, usable image.

3. Ethical Concerns

The rise of artificial intelligence has surfaced many ethical concerns with a growing conversation around artists whose work is now being referenced as foundational learning data for many AI tools (and in many cases without the artist’s consent or choosing). There is also a question of artistic authenticity, with many creatives concerned about the value of their work reducing as AI’s artistic capabilities improve. Now, some people who purchase art may second guess whether it was made completely by AI or a human.

These concerns extend beyond just attribution and ownership—many creative professionals worry about their long-term job security as AI becomes increasingly sophisticated at generating art. The fear that AI could eventually entirely replace humans in creative fields has created a complex relationship between creative professionals and artificial intelligence, raising fundamental questions about the future of creative work and production.

5 Benefits of Using Adobe AI for Brand Photos

Despite the growing concerns with artificial intelligence, leveraging generative AI tools in Adobe Photoshop and other tools can also undoubtedly provides creatives with an array of benefits, often allowing for saved time and improved workflows.

1. Licensed Work

One significant advantage of using Adobe’s generative AI is that its photos are legally owned by the company and properly licensed. Where other AI platforms may operate in legal gray areas, Adobe ensures using their photos eliminates such uncertainties.

2. Guide Direction

Artificial intelligence can be a helpful companion for creative ideation, offering ecommerce brands a quick and easy way to visualize concepts for product photography and iconography. Not only can it help compose photos and graphics themselves, but even when an AI-generated image doesn’t meet final production standards, it can serve as a blueprint for inspiration – providing designers with a starting point that can be refined or reimagined into something else. This is truly one of the main benefits of AI; it is not a replacement for human creative input or expertise, but rather a collaborative partner that can accelerate the creative production process.

3. Save Time

Saving time is probably the most obvious advantage of using AI-powered design tools, like Adobe Photoshop’s Generative Fill. With the right prompt, it can dramatically reduce creative production time. Some designs, when done manually, may take upwards of 3 hours for a single visual asset – whereas AI may only take 30 seconds-1 minute to generate a usable output. As a result, AI is truly revolutionizing visual asset creation, allowing ecommerce brands to accelerate their creative production.

4. More Flexibility

Using AI photos or enhancing existing visual assets with generative AI can allow for substantially more flexibility. Now, ecommerce brands can create and use product images in more ways than ever before. We can now do things like transform previously unusable assets into usable imagery, show products in different environments, and easily adjust specifications to that of a marketplace’s requirements. This capability can far extend the utility of a brand’s visual asset library while ensuring that every image meets the high standards required by online platforms like Amazon.

5. New Adobe AI Photo Features

Adobe’s ongoing commitment to AI innovation provides brands with a significant competitive advantage. As the software expands its AI features, programs across its Creative Suite are becoming increasingly sophisticated and efficient with the introduction of additional AI capabilities.

Recent updates to Illustrator include a Generative Vector tool for creating custom illustrations and icons with text prompts. Additionally, there is now a generative AI recoloring feature that can easily transform a graphic’s colors by pulling them from a reference image.

In Adobe Photoshop, more AI editing tools have been released recently. One, an AI Distraction eraser, can remove subtle imperfect parts of an image, such as eliminating flyaway hairs and or fuzz on clothing. Another AI feature can match (generate) an image based on a provided reference photo.

The Future of Work with Artificial Intelligence

AI is clearly, in many ways, revolutionizing the way that creative teams operate and reshaping how ecommerce brands approach product presentation on marketplace. Despite its already popular usage across the industry, we expect to see more and more companies turning to AI tools in the coming months and years. It is surely a potential game changer for ecommerce brands of all sizes and will likely make an even larger impact in the long term.

Artificial Intelligence for Photography

Where traditional photoshoots have been expensive and time-consuming, AI can easily generate unique product environments without the manual hassle. It can provide more creativity in product settings without the complexity of having to locate said environment in real life. We expect to continue to see this assist the product staging process, helping speed up creative workflows.

Additional Ways AI Can Impact the Future of Work

One example of how humans can use AI as a tool for creative development comes from a recent story shared by one of the largest agencies in the world on how they used AI to develop icons for a government website project. Although opinions are mixed on AI’s involvement, it highlights the need for human guidance in leveraging AI. With this example, human designers gave the AI program a paint stroke reference to guide icon creation. As designers are developing more and more visual assets, using AI can be a helpful tool with production – as long as it’s a collaborative tool rather than the creative force.

Beyond creative applications, AI’s potential extends into other business functions—from answering consumer questions or comments about products (we’ve already started to see this with Amazon’s Rufus), developing product pages from scratch, and identifying strategies for increasing online product sales. This technological evolution could easily affect the entire workforce as much as the invention of the computer, if not more so. Only time will tell but based on everything we’ve seen and experienced so far, companies that don’t learn to embrace AI will get left behind; meanwhile, those who strategically experiment and integrate AI into their existing workflows will gain significant advantages over competitors.

Conclusion

As the digital marketplace continues to evolve, successful ecommerce brands will approach AI not as a replacement for creative expertise, but as a collaborative tool that amplifies human workflows and creative production. At Brandwoven, we recognize AI’s transformative potential while also maintaining a critical, value-driven perspective that prioritizes brand integrity above all else. As we continue to test AI tools, we are most careful about application to ensure it genuinely enhances clients’ brand messaging rather than detracting from it. For ecommerce brands seeking to unlock the full potential of AI for their online, visual merchandising assets while maintaining a unique brand voice, our expert team stands ready to guide you through this ongoing advancement.