Zoom Communications, Inc. has delivered new agentic AI capabilities to help users complete tasks across platforms and save time during the work day. With the Custom AI Companion add-on, Zoom AI Companion can now connect to 16 third-party apps to help orchestrate tasks without leaving Zoom. Additionally, the Custom AI Companion add-on is now available for online purchase, enabling small business owners to leverage AI Companion across third-party video conferencing platforms like Google Meet and others, customise meeting summary templates, create custom avatars, and connect third-party apps to boost productivity and help them get more done so they can focus on building and growing their business.

“With Zoom AI Companion’s agentic skills, users will see a significant productivity boost to help them get more done — not just in Zoom, but across business-essential apps like ServiceNow, Jira, Asana, Box, and more,” said Smita Hashim, chief product officer at Zoom. “The Custom AI Companion add-on empowers users to streamline their workflows by having AI Companion join their Zoom Meetings and in-person meetings, and can now access AI Companion across other video conferencing platforms.”

New connected third-party apps for Custom AI Companion add-on

AI Companion uses agentic AI capabilities to maximise efficiency, helping users save time and get more done without leaving Zoom Workplace. With the Custom AI Companion add-on, users can already connect to apps like Amazon Q, Glean, and Jira to deliver powerful indexing, enterprise search, and ticketing capabilities. New third-party apps also deliver context-rich answers and help complete tasks across workstreams with intelligent app orchestration.

• Improve sales and service outcomes: Accelerate decisions and improve customer satisfaction by empowering teams to resolve service tickets, track opportunities, and update records in real-time, directly from Zoom. When connected to ServiceNow, Zendesk, and other applications, AI Companion helps organisations streamline workflows, reduce manual effort, and ensure customer interactions drive meaningful business results. 
• Reimagine document collaboration: When connected to Microsoft OneDrive, Google Drive, Box*, Confluence, Notion, or Coda, AI Companion helps drive meaningful conversations with secure access to existing documents during meetings, and the ability to generate new documents based on current meetings, update existing documents with simple prompts, or get a quick summary of a document. *Not all document features available at launch.
• Simplify project management: Keeping teams updated on projects and activities can be challenging, but when connected to Asana and Jira, users can query and command project tools, using AI Companion to update project statuses, assign tasks, and set deadlines without app-juggling or manual workflows.
• Reduce communication silos: Keep chats and ideas organised in third-parting messaging appswith the ability to search, summarise, and post messages from AI Companion. 
• Recruit and onboard new talent: When connected to Workday, AI Companion can help expedite recruiting, interviews, and onboarding workflows with search and summary capabilities about open jobs and candidate profiles. 

Visit the Zoom website to learn more about how app integrations with the Custom AI Companion add-on can boost efficiency.

Custom AI Companion add-on expands to online customers

Many entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, small business owners, and consultants often find themselves switching meeting platforms throughout their day to take calls with clients and stakeholders, without a central way to organise their meeting notes. 

The Custom AI Companion add-on, now available for purchase online, expands AI Companion’s meeting summary capabilities to third-party video conferencing platforms such as Google Meet and others, with Cisco Webex coming soon, and delivers agentic AI capabilities to help small businesses get more done

• Professional service providers like consultants and freelancers can simplify workflows and save time beyond Zoom Meetings, Zoom Phone calls, and in-person meetings by using AI-generated meeting summaries across third-party meeting platforms like Google Meet and others. With connections to third-party applications like Asana, they can automatically have projects updated in Asana without leaving the meeting.
• Sales professionals can nurture relationships with prospects and clients while reducing admin time by automatically updating sales records in CRMs based on the conversation. 
• Educators can go beyond meeting summaries and lecture plans to reliably generate summaries and takeaways with custom summaries that can be shared with students to reinforce learning and create personalised videos using Custom Avatars for Zoom Clips to connect with students in different languages. 

With the Custom AI Companion add-on, small businesses can connect AI Companion to these 16 apps, plus tailor AI Companion skills to address their unique needs and drive efficiency across their organisations:

• Work across platforms: Zoom is an open platform, and AI Companion can attend third-party meetings, including Microsoft Teams and Google Meet, with Cisco Webex support coming soon. AI Companion can join meetings on a user’s behalf to automatically transcribe, summarise, and deliver actionable follow-ups.
• Save time with AI-generated clips: With Custom Avatars for Zoom Clips, users can create an avatar in their likeness, provide a transcript of the desired content, and allow AI Companion to generate a clip for them, saving time and helping them scale their efforts.
• Customise meeting summaries with templates: Users can turn meetings into tailored, actionable summaries by selecting from 11 purpose-built templates designed to reflect the tone, structure, and focus of each meeting and match the meeting goals.
• Expand knowledge: Admins can connect Google Drive and other external drive accounts as data sources in AI Studio while respecting existing permission controls, and crawl public URLs as a data source for knowledge collections so AI Companion can provide more relevant answers to users’ queries.

The Custom AI Companion add-on is now available for purchase online for $12 per user per month with paid Zoom Workplace plans. To learn more about how organisations can tailor AI Companion to meet their unique needs with the Custom AI Companion add-on, visit the Zoom website.

Maximise the workday with AI Companion

Zoom AI Companion continues to enhance productivity and collaboration across Zoom Workplace. These new capabilities are included at no extra charge as part of Zoom AI Companion for all paid Zoom Workplace licenses.

• Get started faster: The new onboarding experience within the Zoom desktop app makes it easier to configure AI Companion settings, including what meetings are summarised, who summaries are shared with, and how they are shared.
• Build better meeting agendas: Users can easily add structure to meetings by creating agendas for upcoming meetings from templates. AI Companion can also leverage previous meetings or Zoom Docs to create even more tailored agendas.
• Get more out of calls: Users can now query AI Companion before, during, and after Zoom Phone calls to help them catch up and gain deeper insights. They can ask questions like, “What was the disagreement about?” or “Can you tell me the main points being discussed?” Users can also have AI Companion pull up information from previous conversations, prioritise missed calls, and draft follow-up messages.
• Summarise documents in chat threads: AI Companion can summarise supported text-based documents shared in Zoom Team Chat to help quickly and efficiently digest new information without leaving the chat thread.
• Capture notes and tasks for in-person interactions: AI Companion also supports in-person meetings with the Voice Recorder, transcribing, summarising, and capturing action items, allowing users to focus on the conversation and revisit details and action items later.
• Easily access meeting assets: Users can access meeting summaries, transcripts, recordings, and event details from the meeting card in the calendar event and via email. Hosts will also be able to share the assets with participants via the meeting card in Zoom Calendar (coming later this month), and participants can request access to the meeting card via the Zoom Calendar event.
• Seamless sharing: AI Companion can be configured to automatically share meeting summaries to third-party platforms, like Microsoft Teams (coming soon) and others, to update counterparts and refresh customer records with the latest conversation highlights.

Zoom Workplace powers collaboration and productivity 

Zoom Workplace continues to accelerate collaboration and help users ideate, create, and deliver effective work effortlessly on a single app. 

• Track edits and publish externally in Zoom Docs: Easily track content changes to docs, highlighting content additions, deletions, replacements, and formatting with specific styles. Users can also now publish Zoom Docs as public webpages, accessible to anyone, whether they are logged in or not.
• Stitch, combine, and create longer clips: Merge multiple Zoom Clips into one seamless video without external apps, preview and make adjustments before finalising edits, and preserve original content without overwriting original assets.

To learn more about Zoom Workplace, visit the Zoom website.

It’s a huge shift, going from working for someone to running your own business, but when your target audience is young families, this comes with a range of extra elements to consider. The first year transitioning from educator to entrepreneur was a winding road that came with many lessons I hadn’t learned in a classroom. Here are six of the most important to consider for other businesses that work with kids and new parents.

Find a sought-after niche

For more than a decade I worked as a primary school teacher. I loved the work, the children, the relationships and the small wins in learning each day. But over time I began to notice a recurring pattern. Many children were starting school without the confidence, emotional readiness and independence they needed to thrive. It wasn’t a question of ability. These children simply hadn’t yet had the chance to build the skills school demands from day one.

After also working in a school readiness program I saw how transformative early support could be. The right preparation set children up not only for academic success but for a lifelong love of learning. That inspired me to make the leap from teacher to business owner, launching HeadStart Club. It is a place where young children can build strong foundations and where parents can feel supported and empowered.

Relationships and word of mouth Are everything

As a teacher, trust was built inside the classroom. As a business owner, trust extends to every interaction, from the first phone call to the first session. Parents aren’t just enrolling in a program, they are trusting you with their child’s wellbeing.

While I initially thought marketing would be about ads, websites and SEO, I quickly learned that word of mouth was my most powerful growth tool. Positive experiences naturally led to referrals but that doesn’t happen automatically. You need to nurture it. I actively ask for testimonials, check in regularly with parents, celebrate milestones and invite feedback. Building strong personal relationships creates a community of advocates who proudly recommend your services to others.

Build a business around community not just programs

In teaching I was part of a school community and in business I had to create one. I soon discovered that many parents crave connection just as much as their children need support. Simple touches like open communication, opportunities for parents to meet and celebrating children’s progress helped turn HeadStart Club into more than just a service. It became a place where families felt they belonged.

The community approach has also helped families stay with us long-term, moving through our various programs as their children grow. That sense of belonging has become one of the most valuable parts of the business. We are now building on this even further by planning events, presentations and workshops designed to educate, connect and support parents on their journey. Creating these shared learning spaces allows families to feel part of something bigger and strengthens the trusted relationships at the heart of what we do.

Privacy and safety are non-negotiable

Supporting young children means operating with the highest levels of privacy, safety and care. I invested early in clear policies, secure systems and staff training to ensure we protect every child’s personal information and wellbeing.

We are careful about everything from photo permissions to how we handle enrolment data. In a business serving families, one mistake in this area can erode trust quickly. Having strong protocols in place not only protects families but also gives them confidence in the care we provide.

You need a backup plan for life’s unexpected turns

One of the hardest lessons I faced came when I was unexpectedly diagnosed with stage one bowel cancer during my first year of business. It was a stark reminder that even with the best planning, life can change overnight.

Fortunately, I had begun building systems early on including automated processes, procedure manuals and trusted staff who could step in. This allowed the business to continue while I focused on my treatment and recovery. For any service-based business owner, especially sole operators, having contingency plans isn’t a luxury, it is essential for long-term sustainability.

Collaboration beats competition

As a teacher, collaboration was second nature. In business I have carried that same approach. Rather than viewing other businesses as competition I have built partnerships with local allied health professionals such as speech therapists, occupational therapists, child psychologists and local playgroups.

These partnerships allow us to create holistic support networks for families and open up valuable referral pathways. When businesses serving young families collaborate everyone benefits, especially the children.

The transition was worth it

Moving from teaching into business ownership was one of the biggest and most rewarding transitions of my career. The heart of my work hasn’t changed. I still get to support children and families every day but now I also get to shape the way we serve them, build meaningful community connections and adapt quickly to meet emerging needs.

For anyone considering making the leap my advice is simple – stay mission-led, build strong relationships, prepare for the unexpected and lean into collaboration. When you focus on people first, the business will follow.

Contributed by By Ali Carter, Founder, HeadStart Club

AMP Bank has announced its latest product release as it continues evolve its proposition to meet the challenges and needs of small businesses, the launch of a business overdraft in AMP Bank GO.

AMP Bank’s research found that 70% of Australian small business owners are worried about cash flow and 3 in 5 small business owners worry about paying bills.

The unsecured business overdraft is a flexible funding option to help manage the ups and downs of day-to-day cashflow, designed to help small businesses have access to funds when they need it.

AMP Bank GO’s instant app notifications help business owners stay on top of their spending, helping them adjust how much they want to spend with the in-app business overdraft cap feature.

AMP Bank GO’s business overdraft has a competitive, transparent interest rate and interest is paid only on what is used. The business overdraft is accessible through the Everyday Business Account; eligible customers can apply in less than 10 minutes to access from $2,000 to $20,000. It’s initially available for sole traders and will continue to evolve further over time.

Redefining banking for small business

AMP Bank first launched its challenger mobile-first proposition in February, now named AMP Bank GO. It has been designed and built to help Australia’s millions of small business owners – including solopreneurs, side hustlers and mini businesses – more effortlessly run their business on the go. 

John Arnott, Director, AMP Bank GO said:

“Small business owners don’t need more complexity – they need simple, smart tools that help them stay in control.

“AMP Bank GO’s business overdraft is designed to do just that – giving business owners the flexibility to manage cash flow, smooth out income dips, and handle the unexpected without stress.

“We’re building AMP Bank GO from the ground up to reflect how Australians actually live and work – especially those running small businesses.

“Too often, banking in Australia overlooks the needs of small business owners. We’re changing that by designing solutions that put their experience and success at the centre.”

For more information about AMP Bank GO and the business overdraft, visit AMP’s website.

Intuit, the global financial technology platform that makes Intuit TurboTax, Credit Karma, QuickBooks, and Mailchimp, today announced a new suite of tools and integrations designed to help marketers and small- and mid-sized businesses better understand and leverage their customer data, unveiled during its flagship event FWD: London and building on momentum from its recent FWD: Sydney.

Sustainable growth has become more challenging than ever in an increasingly uncertain business environment. According to research, 71% of SMBs are concerned with customer acquisition.* Mailchimp’s latest set of tools are designed to address this need by providing a connected, data-driven solution that empowers businesses to engage with customers more effectively, boost conversions, drive repeat business, and generate more referrals— accelerating long-term growth.

Built on the Intuit platform, these tools leverage AI to segment data and surface actionable insights for the user with higher-quality zero-party data, enhancing the insights they can glean and act on. By automating these tasks, the Intuit platform is powering done-for-you experiences that are saving businesses time and giving them more insights to better run and grow their business.

“SMBs and SMEs across Australia are facing high operating costs, tighter budgets, and reduced consumer spending. As a result, they’re being forced to do more with less,” says Anthony Capano, Regional Director, APAC, of Intuit Mailchimp. “Our latest innovations are focused on giving them the tools to eliminate complexity and make their customer data work harder. By ensuring that their tools work together to help manage growth. They can now connect advertising, marketing automation and customer insights in one place, ensuring they show up at the right moment, with the right message, every time.”

Over the past year, Mailchimp has focused on updating its marketing product to strengthen its ability to drive revenue for brands, totalling over 2,000 product updates and enhancements since December 2024. This includes enhancements like simpler audience segmentation, faster loading times across the app, a more powerful Marketing Automation Flows feature (formerly Customer Journey Builder), and more. These latest product features represent the next step in Intuit’s journey to become the end-to-end business platform that integrates the power of Mailchimp and QuickBooks, enabling customers to both run and grow their business, all in one place. These features connect the tools and data providing insights and action that delivers instant quality in every customer interaction and ensures continuity across the entire customer journey. The following products were announced at Mailchimp’s FWD: London event:

• New and enhanced lead generation integrations with Meta, TikTok, Google, Snapchat, and LinkedIn— designed to help businesses automate, streamline, and optimise every step of the lead-to-conversion journey. With these new integrations, marketers can seamlessly bring lead information from their social and paid advertising campaigns into Mailchimp, helping them build richer, more comprehensive customer profiles and automatically nurture leads with hyper-personalised marketing campaigns in real time.
• The availability of more than 100 new pop-up templates, allowing businesses to grow their customer base with less work by using highly customizable pop-up forms for deeper targeting, effective data collection, and more personalized campaigns. The latest pop-up form templates were designed for businesses in the education and non-profit, health and wellness, and arts and entertainment sectors. 
• More robust and intuitive custom reports with the Metrics Visualizer, giving marketers over 40 different performance analytics to easily compare and analyze data across email and SMS channels to build insightful reports and visualizations, and get the granular insights they need to understand their campaign performance.

These advancements will expand on the efficiencies that Mailchimp customers have come to expect. “It’s nice to have such an ease of access to information. It feels like we’re not having to do as much digging or joining the dots as much, which is really nice,” says Freya Doggett, digital marketing officer at Serpentine Galleries, a contemporary art gallery in London, of her experience connecting integrations. “Mailchimp really simplifies things that are complicated by nature.” 

Customer data tools coming soon

• New Custom Audience Tools: Later this year, Mailchimp will add new custom audience tools, enabling marketers to send audience segments directly to Meta technologies and Google Ads to find lookalike audiences or retarget ads to existing customers. The combination of all these tools is helping marketers turn ad spend into real insights and revenue, provide a 360° view of their customers to fuel smarter segmentation and personalization, and drive efficiencies for finding and retaining customers across their channels. 
• SMS Contact Import via API: Mailchimp customers will soon be able to easily engage customers who prefer SMS-only communication by adding contacts without the need for email addresses. By bringing SMS data directly into Mailchimp, marketers can combine it with email data, purchase history, and other information to get a richer understanding of their audience to execute coordinated omnichannel campaigns.
• Intuit’s AI Agents: Coming soon to QuickBooks, powered by the Intuit platform, businesses will be able to access a virtual team of end-to-end AI agents, including customer, payments, finance, project management, and accounting agents, to take the next large step in delivering done-for-you experiences, coupled with insights and recommendations to grow and run a business. This is designed to solve challenges before they arise with predictive insights, take smart action on businesses’ behalf, and seamlessly connect them to AI-enabled human experts when needed, with customers always in control. In fact, 56% of Intuit customers report making better decisions in less time with Intuit AI.** 

For more information, please head to: mailchimp.com/whats-new

Hesitation to hit “publish” is one of the biggest roadblocks for business owners trying to grow their brand online. They know they need to show up, but they overthink every post, agonising over every word, questioning their authority, and fearing judgment.

Before they know it, they’ve wasted hours stuck in a cycle of indecision while others, often with far less experience, show up consistently and position themselves as the go-to expert.

This isn’t just frustrating; it’s a missed opportunity to attract dream clients and grow your business.

If you find yourself stuck in post paralysis, here’s how to move past it and start showing up with confidence:

1. Get Out of Your Way

Imposter syndrome whispers, Who do you think you are?—a thought that stops so many business owners from putting themselves out there.

A mindset shift that works? Detach from the post. Imagine you’re a social media manager responsible for someone else’s brand. Would you overthink it the same way? Probably not—you’d create, post, and move on.

The truth is, if you wouldn’t judge someone else for posting the same thing, why assume others will judge you?

Instead of overthinking, treat your content like an experiment. What resonates? What falls flat? The only way to know is to post and pay attention to the response. Turn it into a game.

2. See Social Media as a Flowing Stream

Many people hesitate to post because they fear their content will be scrutinised forever. However, social media doesn’t work that way.

Think of your feed as a river—your post floats by, seen by the people online at that moment, and then it moves along. It’s not a Post-it note stuck to your forehead for all eternity.

Consistency beats perfection every time. The sooner you let go of the pressure to make every post flawless, the easier it becomes to show up regularly.

3. Focus on Impact Over Perfection

What’s worse – posting something that’s not “perfect” or keeping your expertise hidden from people who need it? Your ideal clients are out there seeking exactly what you offer. Every day you stay invisible is a day they can’t find you.

Or on the flip side:
✅ The right person sees your post, and it resonates with them.
✅ They start following, engaging, and building trust with you.
✅ They become a client.

When you compare the two, one of those outcomes is far more important than the other.

4. Call Out Your Ideal Clients in Your Posts

The easiest way to engage the right people? Make it clear who your content is for.

Instead of:
“Here’s why social media matters for business owners…”

Try:
“Coaches & consultants—struggling to turn content into clients? Here’s why your messaging isn’t landing.”

This does two things:
🔹 It grabs the attention of the right audience.
🔹 It filters out the people who aren’t a fit, so you’re not answering the wrong inquiries.

“Done is better than perfect.” Because the truth is, an imperfect post that goes live will always outperform the “perfect” one sitting in your drafts.

Your expertise is too valuable to keep hidden. The world needs what you have to share, and there are premium clients out there ready to work with you.

But they can’t find you if you’re stuck in content paralysis.

So next time you’re hesitating to hit ‘post’, remember: Every expert you admire started by simply sharing what they know. Your next dream client could be just one post away.

Because at the end of the day, how can you become a thought leader if nobody knows your thoughts?

Contributed by Kady O’Connell, Founder of Kady Creative and Booked Out Brand

monday.com, the multi-product platform that runs all core aspects of work, has announced its monday.com AI Vision, representing its key focus areas for 2025. Building on its robust platform, monday.com’s strategy will focus on three pillars—AI Blocks, Product Power-ups, and the Digital Workforce—to accelerate its vision to democratise the power of software.

monday.com’s approach to AI aims to address the unique challenges businesses and employees encounter. The company’s AI offering will give SMBs and mid-market companies a competitive advantage to scale and shift business dynamics without increasing resources and enable enterprise and Fortune 500 companies to accelerate processes often slowed by scale. Additionally, monday.com’s approach will enable anyone –– no matter their tech background –– to become a builder of AI, as the technology will be effortlessly integrated into their workflows. 

“People adopt products, not technology, and that’s where monday.com comes in. By embedding intelligence into the products our customers already know, use, and love, AI will accelerate our mission to democratise the power of software,” said Daniel Lereya, Chief Product and Technology Officer at monday.com. “monday.com’s AI Vision is not just about adding new features; it’s about reimagining how work gets done, unlocking infinite possibilities, and empowering businesses to scale like never before. With a majority of our customers in non-tech industries, they’re looking to us to lead them through the AI transformation. Our productisation of AI ensures that intelligence serves our customers and not the other way around.”

At the core of monday.com’s AI vision are three foundational pillars meant to simplify and enhance the way teams work:

• AI Blocks: monday.com’s modular, customisable AI actions allow customers to harness AI within new and existing workflows with no technical expertise required. Customers can leverage advanced capabilities such as “Categorise,” “Extract,” and other AI-powered actions to analyse data, identify patterns, and streamline decision-making with just a few clicks. 
• Product Power-ups: AI capabilities will be seamlessly embedded throughout monday.com’s suite of products to help customers tackle the most critical challenges. From resource management and predictive risk management to CRM data automation and real-time service ticket resolution, these capabilities enable teams to make faster decisions and streamline processes.
• Digital Workforce: A scalable, AI-powered team of agents designed to work around the clock. These specialised digital workers will handle tasks such as analysing project risks, unlocking stuck sales deals, and identifying recurring customer service issues. In March, monday.com plans to launch its first AI agent, monday Expert. This agent is designed to assist with onboarding new users to the platform, provide guidance on achieving specific actions across products, and even carry out tasks on users’ behalf.

To ensure AI remains accessible, monday.com offers a flexible and transparent pricing model for AI Blocks. Every plan includes 500 free AI Credits per month, providing teams with a simple way to explore the power of AI. For organisations with more significant needs, additional credits are available through buckets that scale with usage. Options range from a starter pack of 2,500 credits, geared towards lower usage, to enterprise buckets of 250,000 credits, providing flexibility for businesses of all sizes. 

Over 245,000 customers trust monday.com to deliver flexible, reliable, and scalable solutions for managing their work, and that extends to how the company approaches and implements AI. monday.com prioritises transparency, explainability, and ease of adoption to ensure its AI is intuitive, practical, and transformative for organisations of all types and sizes. By embedding AI to enhance rather than disrupt existing workflows, monday.com ensures that teams can confidently leverage its capabilities while maintaining full control.  

monday.com’s AI capabilities are already driving significant impact, with customers performing approximately 10 million AI actions as of the end of FY24, nearly tripling quarter-over-quarter, highlighting its value across various industries. 

Learn more about monday.com’s AI product offerings here.

The latest monthly product trends update from Shopify is in, and we’ve also pulled out the top-selling items from Boxing Day specifically. 

As with previous versions, Shopify analysed first-party platform data to reveal Australia’s top trending products for December and Australia’s favourite Boxing Day purchases. Shopify powers 25% of all online commerce in Australia, for reference.

Diving into Boxing Day sales, Shopify discovered that Apparel and Beauty products dominated the top-selling product categories. The full list is below, based on the total volume of items sold. 

10 top-selling items from Boxing Day by total volume:

1. Shorts 
2. Lotions & Moisturisers 
3. Nail Polishes 
4. Eye Makeup 
5. Body Makeup 
6. Face Makeup 
7. Boxer Briefs 
8. Temporary Tattoos
9. Trunks 
10. Sunscreen 

Across the whole of December, Aussies embraced creativity, celebration, and self-improvement. The data below is based on trending products, which are those that have seen the biggest month-on-month spikes. 

Arts and crafts 

• Aussies found themselves flexing their creative muscles over the holiday season, with the highest trending product category in December being Colouring Books & Pads, which went up by 1345.1%.
• With the new year upon us, it’s the time to prepare the vision boards and take up journaling as a resolution. Bulletin Board Accessories (80.7%), Bulletin Boards (17.6%), Journals (12.5%) and Pens & Pencils (11%) all saw significant spikes MoM.

Holiday happenings

• The holiday season brought a surge in festive favourites, with Note Cards skyrocketing by 224.1% and Greeting Cards up 144.7% as people spread cheer far and wide.
• Shopify data proved that indulging in seafood remains a beloved holiday tradition with Fresh & Frozen Seafood sales jumping 64.4% in December. Sweet treats like Cherries (28.5%) and Chocolate-Covered Fruit (27.7%) also made their way onto holiday tables. 
•  Outside of mealtimes, Aussies kept safety top of mind, with Breathalyser sales soaring 77% as drivers stayed mindful of holiday double demerits.
• However, not all festive traditions endured during the Christmas season with advent calendars seeing a 90.6% MoM decline. 

Waiting for boxing day to stock up on essentials

• Boxing Day was all about stocking up on our fashion, health and beauty essentials.  Shorts took the highly anticipated top spot, followed by a range of skincare favourites,
• with Lotions & Moisturisers, Nail polishes, Eye Makeup and Sunscreen all landing in the top 10 products purchased. 
• Boxer Briefs ranked as the 7th most purchased item despite overall sales dropping by 67.1% MoM in December, while Trunks ranked 9th, continuing with the trend of shopping for bottoms.
• But it wasn’t all about stocking up on everyday essentials. Surprisingly, Temporary Tattoos ranked 8th on our shopping lists on Boxing Day as Aussies got festival-ready or sought to adorn themselves with something fun during summer. 

New year, new me, new hobby

• As the year wrapped up, Aussies set their sights on cultivating new hobbies and deepening existing passions. Many tuned into their musical side, with Electronic Musical Instruments soaring by 85.8%, while others aimed to capture memories with Instant Film Cameras up 72.2%. 
• Gamers freshened up their favourite consoles with Portable Game Console Skins seeing a 132.8% spike, while green thumbs emerged as Greenhouse purchases grew.
• This year might be the one where Aussies finally invest in their dream ride, with Motorcycles & Scooters sales soaring by 102.2%. They’re also gearing up to ride the waves, as Bodyboards sales rose by 47.8% and Wakeboard Parts by 40.2% MoM in December.
• Aussies are unleashing their inner kitchen wiz, and are taking on new kitchen ventures with Yogurt Makers (41.9%.), French Presses (30.6%), and Barbecue Briquettes (26.7%) coming in hot in December. 
• But while many Aussies opened their wallets for their hobbies, spending on everyday essentials remained important with the rise in Toilet Paper (79.3%) to purchases of Electric Toothbrushes which grew by 69.6%.

Please see other key figures below:

Top-selling items in December:

1. Colouring books & pads 1345.1%
2. Underwater Camera Housings 531.1%
3. Sound Synthesisers 263.9%
4. Note Cards 224.1%
5. Greeting & Note Cards 144.7%
6. Electric Traps 141.9%
7. Portable Game Console Skins 132.8%
8. Motorcycles & Scooters 102.2%
9. Water Sport Tow Cables 98.7%
10. Electronic Musical Instruments 85.8%

Top trending tech products:

1. Portable Game Console Skins – 132.8%
2. Tablet Computer Parts – 43.7%
3. Game Racing Wheels –  42%
4. Turntables & Record Players – 39.5%
5. Radios – 38.5%
6. Satellite Receivers – 36.3%
7. Game Controller Accessories – 32.1%
8. Hard Drive Carrying Cases – 29%
9. Portable Game Console Cases – 28.9%
10. DJ Systems – 28.7%

Top trending food and beverage products:

1. Oat Drinks – 75.4%
2. Fresh & Frozen Seafood – 64.4%
3. Seafood – 57.7%
4. Cheese – 33.2%
5. Cherries – 28.5%
6. Chocolate Covered Fruit – 27.7%
7. Stone Fruits – 24.8%
8. Pastries & Scones – 24.4%
9. Donuts – 24.3%
10. Garlic – 22.9%

Top trending apparel products:

1. Satchel Bags – 65.7%
2. Wig Accessories – 56.3%
3. Card Cases – 49.1%
4. Track Jackets – 42.9%
5. Bucket Bags – 25.9%
6. Cowboy Hats – 16.3%
7. Sweatpants – 14.8%
8. Snow Pants & Suits – 14.8%
9. Bucket Hats – 14.5%
10. Watch Winders – 14.4%

Methodology: 

• December sales by Shopify merchants in Australia are based on data from December 2024, compared to data from November 2024.
• Boxing Day sales by Shopify merchants in Australia are based on the volume of sales per category on December 26, 2024. 

Epson has launched two new compact desktop scanners, the ES-C320W and the ES-C380W, to support the digitalisation process and address new office challenges associated with hybrid working – in particular shared workspaces, smaller offices and reduced desk space.

These new scanners give users the versatility to choose the most suitable media path, and by featuring an intuitive design and exceptional flexibility boast a new footprint that saves 60 percent of desk space¹. This means users can easily conquer clutter and reclaim space with scanners specifically designed for productivity and peace of mind.

ES-C320W

To enhance workflow efficiency, there is easy wireless scanning with the ES-C320W and the ES-C380W. Then the inclusion of Epson ScanWay® with the ES-C380W means users can also use the product as a standalone solution, scanning and selecting workflows from its bright 2.4″ LCD touchscreen, removing the need for a PC. Users can also scan to popular cloud-based services, including OneDrive^®, Sharepoint^® online and Microsoft Teams^® using Epson Connect^®2.

ES-C380W

With two-sided scanning, and a 20-sheet auto document feeder, the new scanners can efficiently handle stacks of paper in one fast pass at speeds up to 30 ppm/60 ipm.³ The flexible scan path provides remarkable versatility and the ability to scan most document types, from standard paper to invoices, greeting cards, business cards and passports.⁴

ES-C380W

Both models include a range of image and text enhancement technologies, including OCR (optical character recognition) processing, automatic cropping, paper skew correction and Epson ScanSmart^® Software.⁵ These features help ensure excellent image quality and enable users to preview and email scans as well as save valuable time with automatic file name suggestion for streamlined file management.

Zoom held its inaugural CX summit in Asia Pacific (APAC), exploring how organisations can move beyond buzzwords to unlock the transformative power of artificial intelligence (AI) in shaping the customer journey. The event featured keynotes from Ricky Kapur, Head of APAC at Zoom; Chris Morrissey, Head of Zoom Contact Center; Simon Kriss, Asia’s leading voice on AI in CX, as well as perspectives from the industry, including representatives from Lenskart and Iress.

Key takeaways from the event include:

Transforming businesses with superior CX

●      In his keynote, Ricky Kapur emphasised the rapid evolution of customer experience (CX). Customers are now seeking differentiated experiences from brands, not just products or services. Personalisation, swift issue resolutions, and genuine empathy at every touchpoint are crucial to building customer trust and loyalty.  

●      With almost 60% of customers willing to leave a brand just after one or two negative support experiences, every interaction shapes brand perception. The stakes are now higher than ever.

●      Legacy solutions cannot solve modern customer expectations and customer service teams must be equipped with the right tools to enable seamless experiences and real-time engagement. Many organisations are looking to AI not just to address customer pain points but to help their agents become more productive and empowered with the right information to solve issues.

○      In fact, Frost and Sullivan projects that investment is expected to increase to over 70% across all AI areas in the next two years.

●      Organisations need a single platform that provides a consistent and seamless experience – both internally for collaboration, and externally for customer interactions. By doing so, businesses can create more demand, increase customer loyalty, and accelerate revenue.

Advancing innovation in CX with AI

●      AI-powered customer service can benefit every aspect of an operation, from delivering exceptional user experiences for customers and agents to creating more cost-effective, efficient workflows.

○      In his keynote, Simon Kriss highlighted several use cases of AI that has transformed CX in APAC, including:

■      Real-time translation between call centre agents and customers, especially in a region as diverse in languages as Asia – helps customer service teams to respond promptly regardless of the language used, resulting in enhanced customer satisfaction while reducing the need to hire language specialists.

■      Automated post-call summaries not only save time for human agents but provide more consistently formatted summaries that can be more easily analysed at a later stage.

●      Zoom Contact Center is the first video-optimised omnichannel contact centre in the market, offering over 700 features designed to elevate customer experiences. Recently introduced AI innovations include:

○      AI Companion for Contact Center, which provides live transcription, summarises calls, and even generates follow-up tasks for agents in real-time.

○      AI Expert Assist, an intelligent feature that transforms customer interactions by analysing conversations on the fly and provides agents with information they need – right when they need it.

○      Zoom Workforce Engagement Management, which harnesses AI-generated insights to forecast staffing needs, automate scheduling, and plan agent workload.

●      “Organisations today strive to provide a connected, unified experience for everyone that interacts with the brand, be it an agent, an employee, or a customer. In order to do so, there needs to be a change in technology capabilities, particularly by harnessing a modern AI-powered CX platform like Zoom that looks at CX and employee experience as one,”  said Chris Morrissey, head of Zoom Contact Center.

Building customer trust through AI-powered CX

●      The event also featured a customer panel discussion with Lenskart, Asia’s largest eyewear company serving 40 million people, with more than 1,500 omnichannel stores across 175 cities in India, Singapore and Dubai, and Iress, a global provider of financial services software.

●      The panel explored the evolving role of AI in shaping customer experiences and agent engagement, and how organisations can strike the delicate balance between technology, efficiency, and human connection.

●      The panellists agreed that humans must be put at the centre of AI implementation. With the right tools and training, customer success teams can leverage insights to make data-driven decisions for better business outcomes.

○      Rahul Rupani, Product Owner at Lenskart said that a significant challenge they faced was managing the uneven distribution of optometrists across different regions in India. To address this, Lenskart turned to Zoom Contact Center which enabled optometrists to carry out remote eye tests for customers via video. Rahul added that the company is also planning to utilise AI features in Zoom Contact Center to enhance CX outcomes while scaling their services. By analysing data from these remote interactions, his team will be able to quickly identify areas of improvement such as whether optometrists are following the guidelines of an eye test.

○               Kelly Fisk, Chief Corporate Affairs and Marketing Officer, Iress, highlighted that the true power of AI is to free the human up for higher-value work,  such as building relationships and making informed decisions. This is how Iress has leveraged Zoom Contact Center for its support teams. Large amounts of data from customer engagements are analysed with AI and fed back to product and customer support teams. This has helped drive quality control and coaching for employee development and has empowered team leaders to manage customer queues and resourcing more effectively, ultimately resulting in more positive CX outcomes.