Create Interactive Shopping Item Ordering Chatbots & Forms with Widgets
You can boost your customer experience with a seamless bot-to-human handoff for a superior customer experience. Such bots can either work independently or as part of a self-service system. The bots ask users questions on choices to save time on hunting for the best bargains, offers, discounts, and deals.
The platform is highly trusted by some of the largest brands and serves over 100 million users per month. These solutions aim to solve e-commerce challenges, such as increasing sales or providing 24/7 customer support. She has an idea of what she wants, but with thousands of options and sale popups, she gets confused and decides to leave. Well, countless customers come to an ecommerce store with a dream and leave with a dilemma. In addressing the challenges posed by COVID-19, the Telangana government employed Freshworks’ self-assessment bots.
The main purpose of sneaker bots is to accelerate the purchase of online shoppers. If a store has a limited edition of sneakers, the sneaker bots will automate the purchase process. To create higher customer satisfaction, e-commerce platforms can implement measures such as CAPTCHAs, rate limiting, bot detection software, and account security Chat GPT features. Additionally, online retailers may adopt transparent policies, such as clearly labeling products with the number available, to provide a more honest and fair shopping experience for consumers. Striking a balance between meeting customer demand and minimizing carrying costs, such as storage and insurance, is crucial.
Shopify Chatbots You Can’t Live Without In 2023
Each of those proxies are designed to make it seem as though the user is coming from different sources. As the sneaker resale market continues to thrive, Business Insider is covering all aspects of how to scale a business in the booming industry. From how to acquire and use the technology to the people behind the most popular bots in the market today, here’s everything you need to know about the controversial software. Bots are specifically designed to make this process instantaneous, offering users a leg-up over other buyers looking to complete transactions manually. So it’s not difficult to see how they overwhelm web application infrastructure, leading to site crashes and slowdowns.
Continuous bot activity can slow down the affected e-commerce platform’s performance, leading to longer loading times and a frustrating shopping experience. Bad actors also use bots to power account takeover attacks and gain unauthorized access to user accounts. These compromised accounts can then be used for identity theft, unauthorized purchases, and security breaches.
Polls, quizzes, and questions are engagement magnets — the more people interact with those elements, the more people Instagram will share your story with. The audience for Instagram stories is simply waiting and watching for the next viral video or meme to slide across their screens. What makes stories arguably even better for growth than the traditional Instagram feed is the ability for users to interact with the content in a story.
Instagram has been cracking down on accounts that violate their terms of service. Here, we’re covering all the questions you have about buying Instagram followers. We’ve also explored the pros and cons, so you can decide for yourself if it’s a good move for your brand. Intercom is a full featured customer messaging platform that is excellent at managing customer conversations through different stages of the buyer’s journey.
Should you buy Instagram followers?
As a result, it causes negative feedback from customers about the targeted brand on social media. Engati is a Shopify chatbot built to help store owners engage and retain their customers. It does come with intuitive features, including the ability to automate customer conversations. You can create user journeys for price inquires, account management, order status inquires, or promotional pop-up messages.
Whether addressing product-related questions, offering promotional information, or resolving concerns, these bots ensure customers receive timely assistance, contributing to trust-building and loyalty. Moreover, these bots assist e-commerce businesses or retailers generate leads, provide tailored product suggestions, and deliver personalized discount codes to site visitors. This results in a more straightforward and hassle-free shopping journey for potential customers, potentially leading to increased purchases and fostering customer loyalty. Because you can build anything from scratch, there is a lot of potentials.
Because you need to match the shopping bot to your business as smoothly as possible. Shopping bots enhance the buying experience and enable brands to cater to the unique needs of consumers such as round-the-clock and omnichannel shopping, immediacy, and self-service, to name a few. Keep up with emerging trends in customer service and learn from top industry experts.
The key to preventing bad bots is that the more layers of protection used, the less bots can slip through the cracks. When Walmart.com released the PlayStation 5 on Black Friday, the company says it blocked more than 20 million bot attempts in the sale’s first 30 minutes. Every time the retailer updated the stock, so many bots hit that the website of America’s largest retailer crashed several times throughout the day. To get a sense of scale, consider data from Akamai that found one botnet sent more than 473 million requests to visit a website during a single sneaker release. In the ticketing world, many artists require ticketing companies to use strong bot mitigation.
They can also help ecommerce businesses gather leads, offer product recommendations, and send personalized discount codes to visitors. The ability of shopping bots to access, store and use customer data in a way that affects online shopping decisions has created some concern among lawmakers. However, depending on the legal system in your country, it may or may not be illegal to create shopping bot systems such as a Chatbot for shopping online.
Instagram Bio Ideas to Help You Write an Impactful Bio
You can foun additiona information about ai customer service and artificial intelligence and NLP. Further, if potential customers believe that product reviews have been manipulated, they may become skeptical of the accuracy of product information, making them less likely to make a purchase. This can tarnish the brand image of the business and affect customer loyalty. Different types of online shopping bots are designed for different purposes. A purchase bot, or shopping bot, is an artificial intelligence (AI) program designed to interact with customers, assisting them in their shopping journey. 90% of leading marketers believe that personalization boosts business profitability significantly.
They too use a shopping bot on their website that takes the user through every step of the customer journey. It partnered with Haptik to build an Intelligent Virtual Assistant (IVA) with the aim of reducing time for customers to book rooms, lower call volume and ensure 24/7 customer support. While many serve legitimate purposes, violating website terms may lead to legal issues.
Fairness is one of the most important predictors of loyalty to ecommerce brands. This means if you’re not the sole retailer selling a certain item, shoppers will move to retailers where they feel valued. If you are the sole retailer, shoppers can get so turned off that your brand becomes radioactive—they won’t shop with you again, and they’ll tell their friends and family not to either. While a one-off product drop or flash sale selling out fast is typically seen as a success, bots pose major risks to several key drivers of ecommerce success. Limited-edition product drops involve the perfect recipe of high demand and low supply for bots and resellers.
What is a bot scammer?
Scam bots are computer programs that are programmed to trick people into disclosing sensitive information or money. They typically target victims via messaging apps, social media platforms, or email.
Well, take it as a hint to leverage AI shopping bots to enhance your customer experience and gain that competitive edge in the market. I am presented with the options of (1) searching for recipes, (2) browsing their list of recipes, (3) finding a store, or (4) contacting them directly. This will ensure the consistency of user experience when interacting with your brand.
The bot-riddled Nvidia sales were a sign of warning to competitor AMD, who “strongly recommended” their partner retailers implement bot detection and management strategies. In early 2020, for example, a Strangelove Skateboards x Nike collaboration was met by “raging botbarians”. According to the company, these bots “broke in the back door…and circumstances spun way, way out of control in the span of just two short minutes.
Shopping bots can replace the process of navigating through many pages by taking orders directly. A tedious checkout process is counterintuitive and may contribute to high cart abandonment. From sharing order details and scheduling returns to retarget abandoned carts and collecting customer reviews, Verloop.io can help ecommerce businesses in various ways. From movie tickets to mobile recharge, this bot offers purchasing interactions for all. However, it needs to be noted that setting up Yellow Messenger requires technical knowledge, as compared to others.
If you have four layers of bot protection that remove 50% of bots at each stage, 10,000 bots become 5,000, then 2,500, then 1,250, then 625. In this scenario, the multi-layered approach removes 93.75% of bots, even with solutions that only manage to block 50% of bots each. Which means there’s no silver bullet tool that’ll keep every bot off your site. Even if there was, bot developers would work tirelessly to find a workaround. That’s why just 15% of companies report their anti-bot solution retained efficacy a year after its initial deployment. Bots will even take a website offline on purpose, just to create chaos so they can slip through undetected when the website comes back online.
Streamline Your CRM Workflow: How Dasha Integrates Seamlessly with GreenRope for Enhanced Business Efficiency
Keeping with Kik’s brand of fun and engaging communication, the bots built using the Bot Shop can be tailored to suit a particular audience to engage them with meaningful conversation. The Bot Shop’s USP is its reach of over 300 million registered users and 15 million active monthly users. Yotpo gives your brand the ability to offer superior SMS experiences targeting mobile shoppers. You can start sending out personalized messages to foster loyalty and engagements. It’s also possible to run text campaigns to promote product releases, exclusive sales, and more –with A/B testing available.
The bot can strike deals with customers before allowing them to proceed to checkout. Stores personalize the shopping experience through upselling, cross-selling, and localized product pages. Giving shoppers a faster checkout experience can help combat missed sale opportunities.
With shopping bots personalizing the entire shopping experience, shoppers are receptive to upsell and cross-sell options. Contextual product recommendations based on a shopper’s purchasing history, browsing behavior, and other parameters can help retail brands drive more profits and achieve a higher average order value. The integration of purchase bots into your business strategy can revolutionize the way you operate and engage with customers.
It has features such as targeted messaging, a unified box for customer communications or personalized support. If you need to be in constant dialogue and support with your clients Intercom will fit you. Take for example a retailer that wants to sell 1,000 high-value/high-demand widgets. In order to ensure each of these widgets goes to a human rather than a bot, this retailer created a workflow where they raffle a single widget to every 100th checkout request. They have implemented traditional bot mitigation tactics including Google reCAPTCHA. Meanwhile, the maker of Hayha Bot, also a teen, notably describes the bot making industry as “a gold rush.”
Online shopping bots let bot operators hog massive amounts of product with no inconvenience—they just sit at their computer screen and let the grinch bots do their dirty work. Sometimes instead of creating new accounts purchasing bots from scratch, bad actors use bots to access other shopper’s accounts. Both credential stuffing and credential cracking bots attempt multiple logins with (often illegally obtained) usernames and passwords.
Hickory Lane Home uses Reels to show her followers more relatable content that draws the viewer in. As a result, the comments are flooded with relatable responses and amusement that you just can’t get from purchased followers. Include a few hashtags to the caption and choose a popular sound that people enjoy listening to. Even if you don’t see an immediate bump in followers, stay consistent and keep an eye on how many views your Reel gets.
Malicious actors often use networks of bots to amplify false narratives, manipulate trends and swiftly disseminate misinformation. Users should exercise caution when encountering accounts exhibiting suspicious behaviour, such as excessive posting or repetitive messaging. When I clicked the suggestions the bot offered for a kitchen compost bin, I was dumped into a zillion options for countertop compost products.
You can foun additiona information about ai customer service and artificial intelligence and NLP. Quickly implement advanced AI solutions like Microsoft Voice and Google Cloud Natural Language to generate useable data and insights. Get reusable task bots for SAP, Excel, artificial intelligence and more with just a few keystrokes. This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks.
Keelvar’s integration with SAP Ariba means customers will be able to take advantage of both sourcing tools with this rich bidirectional integration. HUMAN’s (formerly PerimeterX) Human Challenge also uses behavioral data to flag suspicious users, who are then met with a “press and hold” challenge that’s easier for humans and harder for bots to solve. Finally, the best bot mitigation platforms will use machine learning to constantly adapt to the bot threats on your specific web application. In the cat-and-mouse game of bot mitigation, your playbook can’t be based on last week’s attack. Or think about a stat from GameStop’s former director of international ecommerce. “At times, more than 60% of our traffic – across hundreds of millions of visitors a day – was bots or scrapers,” he told the BBC.
This is thanks to the artificial intelligence, machine learning, and natural language processing, this engine used to make the bots. This no-code software is also easy to set up and offers a variety of chatbot templates for a quick start. Simple online shopping bots are more task-driven bots programmed to give very specific automated answers to users. This would include a basic Chatbot for businesses on online social media business apps, such as Meta (Facebook or Instagram). These bots do not factor in additional variables or machine learning, have a limited database, and are inadequate in their conversational capabilities. These online bots are useful for giving basic information such as FAQs, business hours, information on products, and receiving orders from customers.
The first was to place the product on a brand-new website with an unguessable address — analogwebsitewrittenonpaper.com. He wrote a basic automation script to submit 50,000 entries into a sneaker raffle. In 2018, he started Cybersole, https://chat.openai.com/ which gained notoriety as one of the few bots to work on Shopify. Dennis Ho, a senior product manager at Shopify focused on bot protections, said that his team working with retailers tries to change tactics every time.
The failure to automate solving the challenges at scale, the delay in executing the attack, and mounting investments make the attack unattractive and forces attackers to give up for good. Denial of inventory in online gaming poses significant challenges, particularly in virtual economies where players buy, sell, and trade virtual items. These online hoarding practices create scarcity, inflating the value of specific in-game assets and disrupting the economy, making it difficult for newer or casual players to obtain sought-after items. Travel site owners depend on precise inventory management, and any disruption in reservations and bookings can lead to both short-term and long-term negative consequences. The money-saving potential and ability to boost customer satisfaction is drawing many businesses to AI bots. Customers expect seamless, convenient, and rewarding experiences when shopping online.
New California bill aims to ban ticket-buying bots – LAist
New California bill aims to ban ticket-buying bots.
Posted: Fri, 01 Mar 2024 16:57:35 GMT [source]
Consequently, implementing Freshworks led to a remarkable 100% increase in Fantastic Services’ chat Return on Investment (ROI). But if you want your shopping bot to understand the user’s intent and natural language, then you’ll need to add AI bots to your arsenal. And to make it successful, you’ll need to train your chatbot on your FAQs, previous inquiries, and more. In fact, a study shows that over 82% of shoppers want an immediate response when contacting a brand with a marketing or sales question. This was intended to throw a wrench into the store’s usual checkout procedure and make it difficult for anyone to automate the process. And it seemed to be working when the shoes went on sale in June; Bodega and Shopify didn’t see much bot activity.
The software also gets around “one pair per customer” quantity limits placed on each buyer on release day. By managing your traffic, you’ll get full visibility with server-side analytics that helps you detect and act on suspicious traffic. For example, the virtual waiting room can flag aggressive IP addresses trying to take multiple spots in line, or traffic coming from data centers known to be bot havens. These insights can help you close the door on bad bots before they ever reach your website. Google’s CAPTCHA has grown more advanced over time, from initially typing in blurry words to Google analyzing browsing history and similar behavior to judge whether users are legitimate. Whether an intentional DDoS attack or a byproduct of massive bot traffic, website crashes and slowdowns are terrible for any retailer.
SoleSavy is an exclusive group that uses bots to beat resellers at their own game, while also preventing members from exploiting the system themselves. The platform, which recently raised $2 million in seed funding, aims to foster a community of sneaker enthusiasts who are not interested in reselling. Some private groups specialize in helping its paying members nab bots when they drop. These bot-nabbing groups use software extensions – basically other bots — to get their hands on the coveted technology that typically costs a few hundred dollars at release. Shopping bots are becoming more sophisticated, easier to access, and are costing retailers more money with each passing year.
These bots are like your best customer service and sales employee all in one. Verloop.io is a powerful tool that can help businesses of all sizes to improve their customer service and sales operations. It is easy to use and offers a wide range of features that can be customized to meet the specific needs of your business. BIK is a customer conversation platform that helps businesses automate and personalize customer interactions across all channels, including Instagram and WhatsApp.
Can I buy a trading bot?
MetaTrader Market is the best marketplace from where you can quickly find a trading robot or technical indicator with the most desired parameters. You can select an application and make a payment in just a couple of clicks straight from the platform — the application will be downloaded immediately and ready for use.
It can lead to product shortages and stockouts, making it difficult for retailers to meet customer demand. Certainly empowers businesses to leverage the power of conversational AI solutions to convert more of their traffic into customers. Rather than providing a ready-built bot, customers can build their conversational assistants with easy-to-use templates. You can create bots that provide checkout help, handle return requests, offer 24/7 support, or direct users to the right products. Actionbot acts as an advanced digital assistant that offers operational and sales support. It can observe and react to customer interactions on your website, for instance, helping users fill forms automatically or suggesting support options.
‘Taylor Swift’ bills would crack down on bot ticket purchases, resale – Detroit News
‘Taylor Swift’ bills would crack down on bot ticket purchases, resale.
Posted: Thu, 25 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMT [source]
These challenges are served to users according to their real-time risk assessment. It supports 250 plus retailers and claims to have facilitated over 2 million successful checkouts. For instance, customers can shop on sites such as Offspring, Footpatrol, Travis Scott Shop, and more.
WhatsApp chatbotBIK’s WhatsApp chatbot can help businesses connect with their customers on a more personal level. It can provide customers with support, answer their questions, and even help them place orders. These are intelligent, pieces of software that sit on top of the Sourcing Optimizer infrastructure and are customized to suit the individual organisation’s procurement process.
- The Bot Shop’s USP is its reach of over 300 million registered users and 15 million active monthly users.
- Stores personalize the shopping experience through upselling, cross-selling, and localized product pages.
- Shopping bots have many positive aspects, but they can also be a nuisance if used in the wrong way.
It is an interactive type of AI because it learns after each interaction such that sometimes it can only attend to one person at a time. Purchase bots play a pivotal role in inventory management, providing real-time updates and insights. They track inventory levels, send alert SMS to merchants in low-stock situations, and assist in restocking processes, ensuring optimal inventory balance and operational efficiency. That’s why everyone from politicians to musicians to fan alliances are fighting to stop bots from buying tickets and restore fairness to ticketing. That’s why online ticketing organizations are on the front lines of a battle against ticket bots. Purchase bots leverage sophisticated AI algorithms to analyze customer preferences, purchase history, and browsing behavior.
Such a customer-centric approach is much better than the purely transactional approach other bots might take to make sales. WeChat also has an open API and SKD that helps make the onboarding procedure easy. What follows will be more of a conversation between two people that ends in consumer needs being met. With Kommunicate, you can offer your customers a blend of automation while retaining the human touch. With the help of codeless bot integration, you can kick off your support automation with minimal effort.
Even a team of customer support executives working rotating shifts will find it difficult to meet the growing support needs of digital customers. Retail bots can help by easing service bottlenecks and minimizing response times. Chatbots can shorten this process to just two steps – you need to give a chatbot your order details, share your location via GPS, or put it manually. Moreover, the company launched a Twitter chatbot that decreases the ordering process to just one action- sending a pizza emoji in direct messages. After the launch of Facebook and Twitter chatbots, Pizza Hut increased digital revenue by 75-80% and continue to receive 50% of its orders from these digital channels. By using an e-commerce chatbot, customers can identify the product they want, find it in a matter of clicks, and buy more seamlessly.
The sneaker resale market is now so large, that StockX, a sneaker resale and verification platform, is valued at $4 billion. We mentioned at the beginning of this article a sneaker drop we worked with had over 1.5 million requests from bots. With that kind of money to be made on sneaker reselling, it’s no wonder why. By holding products in the carts they deny other shoppers the chance to buy them. What often happens is that discouraged shoppers turn to resale sites and fork over double or triple the sale price to get what they couldn’t from the original seller.
The use of artificial intelligence in designing shopping bots has been gaining traction. AI-powered bots may have self-learning features, allowing them to get better at their job. The inclusion of natural language processing (NLP) in bots enables them to understand written text and spoken speech. Conversational AI shopping bots can have human-like interactions that come across as natural.
The no-code chatbot may be used as a standalone solution or alongside live chat applications such as Zendesk, Facebook Messenger, SpanEngage, among others. Tobi is an automated SMS and messenger marketing app geared at driving more sales. It comes with various intuitive features, including automated personalized welcome greetings, order recovery, delivery updates, promotional offers, and review requests. Stores can even send special discounts to clients on their birthdays along with a personalized SMS message.
Shopify uses different techniques to prevent bots, including puzzles and trivia questions that are difficult for an automated bot to solve. It has also taken steps to prevent transactions when a shopper’s checkout path follows the shortcuts used by bots. Thanks to resale sites like StockX and GOAT, collectible sneakers have become an asset class, where pricing corresponds loosely to how quickly an item sells out. Sophisticated sneaker bots, which can cost thousands of dollars, are key to creating the artificial scarcity that makes a sneaker valuable and, in turn, makes a brand seem cool. Let’s get our retailers to enable users to make a purchase and keep the bots running in circles, accomplishing nothing.
How do bots work?
A bot is an automated software application that performs repetitive tasks over a network. It follows specific instructions to imitate human behavior but is faster and more accurate.
Who is a good bot?
A ‘good’ bot is any bot that performs useful or helpful tasks that aren't detrimental to a user's experience on the Internet. Because good bots can share similar characteristics with malicious bots, the challenge is ensuring good bots aren't blocked when putting together a bot management strategy.
Can trading bots make money?
Trading bots have the potential to generate profits for traders by automating the trading process and capitalizing on market opportunities. However, their effectiveness depends on various factors, including market conditions, strategy effectiveness, risk management, and technology infrastructure.
Can I buy a trading bot?
MetaTrader Market is the best marketplace from where you can quickly find a trading robot or technical indicator with the most desired parameters. You can select an application and make a payment in just a couple of clicks straight from the platform — the application will be downloaded immediately and ready for use.
About Me
What’s Susan up to?
Penn State Center for Holocaust and Jewish Studies will host me as I present a solo program of song and history focusing on the roots of Eastern European Jewish music and related songs.
I have the honor of presenting this year at the annual American Folklore Society's conference. A lecture on papercut arts around the world and a demonstration of my own work will take place during the conference on October 22, 2021!
ELEVEN languages and counting! Over the years, I've crafted ketubot that honor many cultures. In addition to the expected Aramaic, modern Hebrew, English, and even Yiddish, I have included Korean, Kannada, Latin, Arabic, and even the Telugu seen in the cropped image above! What a joy this has been!
What a wonderful experience I shared with the community of Las Cruces, NM and the Guild of American Papercutters when I presented an hour-long lecture on the worldwide history of papercut arts on March 16, 2021. This was in conjunction with the museum's show of Islamic papercut art. We looked at tools, traditions, and especially shared visual vocabularies from India to Mexico, from Persia to China and beyond!
February 18, 2018 - Susan will be hosted by the Sholem Aleichem Center in the Bronx for a concert. Come for a shmuez (a chat) and stay for the music!https://www.pineclubgolf.com/best-electrical-push-carts/
As part of the Sacred: Image, Text, Ritual exhibit at Lebanon Valley College, Susan will be presenting a lecture recital titled "Words as Homeland: Where Jewish Text, Art, and Song Converge to Express a Culture." Thursday, February 8, 2018, 5 pm at the Zimmerman Recital Hall.
A wonderful arts residency in Teaneck, NJ at Congregation Beth Sholom concluded with a full concert, accompanied by Adrian Banner on Piano. Enthusiasm and learning flowed back and forth the entire time. Fabulous community!
What a great night at the Jalopy in Brooklyn on June 16, 2016 as my new trio with Lauren Brody and Jake Shulman-Ment stepped out to strut our stuff! Many languages, many musical cultures, and great joy in blending our voices and instruments.
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In the beautiful summer landscape of Rindge, New Hampshire, I was privileged to teach traditional Jewish papercut arts at the annual National Havurah Committee's Summer Institute. We turned a large, sunny room into an art studio, and the class burst into enthusiastic art creation. I love the celebratory greeting of everyone's creations as skills and appreciation deepen over four days of classes. I'll come to you! Just ask!
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Back to the Catskills, this time teaching for HAZAK, a group under the umbrella of United Synagogue that offers among its programs an annual summer week of learning and camaraderie. I used my lecture/recital format to widen the world of Yiddish song for about 150 life-long learners as we studied, laughed, sang a bit, and grew to know one another in Kerhonkson, NY.
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When Nancy Spielberg screened her film Above and Beyond in Harrisburg's Chisuk Emuna Congregation, I was tapped to create a papercut gift for her. I chose the color scheme of her promotional material and the Hebrew words which translate into "Be strong... and strengthen one another." The filmmaker and I are shown here. (photo by Josh Damrauer)
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Each year the myriad of faith communities in the Harrisburg region come together to celebrate in song. Here's an image of my participation, sharing the beauty of Yiddish song at the Pine Street Presbyterian Church.
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One of three children's programs to wind up a hectic and marvelous Scholar in Residence program at Congregation Beth El in Fairfield, CT. Lectures, singing programs, explorations of Yiddishkayt - and a debut concert of the new Leviton/Brody duo in concert! I'll happily come to your community, too!
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Yiddish Culture on St. Croix! I received the warmest welcome all across the island where I had the opportunities to teach a vocal arts class in a school, offer an adult papercutting workshop, lecture in the synagogue, and get the whole audience at the Reformed Church singing along in multiple languages! Cultural seeds planted and the smiles, voices, and hugs still linger in memory!
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The Judson Church off Washington Square was packed with well over 300 people on December 30, 2014, to honor the memory and brilliance of Adrienne Cooper, and to award Michael Wex with this year's Dreaming in Yiddish prize. Below is an image of the finale of the musical performance of the Kanonen song from Brecht and Weill's Threepenny Opera, translated from the German into Yiddish by Wex himself. An all-star band backed us as we belted out the Army Song and others, accompanied by the brilliant puppetry and staging of Great Small Works and Power Point translations which made the text a little less inscrutable! What a night! Singers below include Sarah Gordon, Eleanor Reissa, Tine Kindermann, Dan Kahn, myself, and others.
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A whirlwind arts week in Caldwell, NJ at Congregation Agudath Israel allowed me to open Jewish folk arts to energetic groups from preschoolers through elders. The tots sang and acted out Yiddish songs with costumes and props, the school students (4 larger groups) explored paper arts and traditional papercutting, and adults were treated to a series of lecture recitals, everything taking place in a large space where I hung over 35 works of framed art. What a fabulous arts residency for all of us together!
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Nearly 100 people attended a lecture/recital stitching together I. B. Singer's writing and the artists who illustrated his books as Susan sang her way through the bookshelves, Sunday, November 16, at Chisuk Emuna Congregation in Harrisburg, PA. This was the second event in the year's programming under a grant from the Koster Foundation.
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I was guest lecturer at Dickinson College today, October 6, singing my way through a program on Jews and Food. Unlike the light weight singalongs I often do on this topic, the class took food songs into the framework of Hasia Diner's examination of the place of food in Jewish life in the Pale of Settlement through acculturation in America. 15 songs unpacked! A great eye-opening experience for all!
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Heeding God's Call is a national organization working at a grassroots level to end gun violence and straw buying. On September 18, within days of two gun murders in Harrisburg, I participated in an interfaith program at the MLK Baptist Church in the heart of our city. We 'sang' Reisen's Dos Naye Lid together as the assembled crowd held colored cards with words in Yiddish and English.
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A happy bride at the huppah with her papercut ketubah! 'Tis the season, and I've been busy with commissions of all sorts!
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A full week of learning and teaching at the Havurah Summer Institute was a welcome experience again this year. Located at Franklin Pierce College in New Hampshire, about 300 Havurahniks from infancy to elder sage-age filled days and nights with enthusiastic work, food, music, and exploration. I taught classes in Yiddish song and helped create a soundscape for Tisha B'Av this summer. Loved it!!!
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A lovely way to begin the summer's KlezKamp's Wisconsin adventure was a solo concert at Chai Point in Milwaukee. Jill Gellerman and were welcomed to the beautiful facility and then I sang for and with a great crowd of elders, eager to be part of the action!
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Quite a surprise when I met the truck from Welch Signage in Maine, carrying the massive synagogue feature wall I had designed, to see a piece of my own artwork prominently displayed on both sides of the vehicle!
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I performed for over 100 people at beautiful Maris Grove in Pennsylvania's Delaware County on May 13. As part of the PA Humanities Council's program of Commonwealth Speakers, I was able to bring the sound of Yiddish to an audience largely unfamiliar with the language and culture. As always, common threads were immediately found!
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Verrry busy these days creating a synagogue feature wall, but I took time last week to be interviewed for Ted Merwin's article "The Aesthetics of Judaism" in The New York Jewish Week. Here's a quote: "For Susan Leviton, a ketubah-maker, paper-cut artist and Yiddish folk song performer ..., it was during the 1960s and ’70s, when many Jews flocked back to their roots, that Jews... 'took Judaism back into their own hands' and began braiding challahs and tie-dying prayer shawls. Hiddur mitzvah 'alters us as we fulfill a mitzvah or perform a ritual,' she told me. A Midrash (Song of Songs Rabbah 1.15) suggests that observance of the commandments makes Jews beautiful, even as Jews glorify God through hiddur mitzvot."
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An outpouring of love and creativity filled the room as we honored the memory of Adrienne Cooper and saw Jenny Romaine accept the first Dreaming in Yiddish award for her visionary work. Here's Susan on stage with Alicia Svigals, Jake Shulman-Ment, Benjy Fox Rosen, Aaron Alexander, Michael Winograd, and Dan Blacksberg, 12/21/13. (Photo by Bob Blacksberg)
When Goucher College Hillel welcomed a gift of two Torah scrolls, I was honored to craft mantles and wimples. So much silk! Garnet polished to look like pomegranate seeds! Text and the visions of students to work with! A grand experience.
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A totally spectacular group of artists, writers, social activists, and even puppeteers joined me for a week of creative work as I served as Artist in Residence at the 2013 National Havurah Conference Summer Institute in Rindge, NH. In 4 days of intense collective learning and creating, we built a musical theater production in a box (a cranky) and shared the story of the plight of needleworkers, past and present, with 300 others in a rapt audience!
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It was a beautiful day in Baltimore as the Jewish Museum of Maryland presented its annual Risch Memorial Program. I was delighted to be the featured performer, following brief, powerful presentations by Andres Salguero, Ssuuna, and the DC Turkish Folk Music Group. It always touches me to rediscover the points of connection among immigrant communities, regardless of geographic homes, cultures, and reasons for relocation. A brilliant celebration of cultures!
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Over 350 pieces of beautiful Youghiogheny Art Glass hand-cut, and now I'm on to wet-grinding the edges! It's a new skill that I'm happy to add to my resume as I take on the responsibility to create a soaring double wall of glass above the Torah ark for Chisuk Emuna Congregation in Harrisburg, building anew after a destructive fire in 2009. Check back in mid-May for a look at the completed wall!
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Getting closer to a new recording! Michael Winograd spent a day in the studio on March 28 with Frank London, Dan Blacksberg, Hadar Noiberg, and Alec Speigelman to lay down horn tracks for my as-yet-unnamed CD. Dan Kahn joined in as a special guest vocalist. Next will come strings and soon after that the mixing and mastering, printing and artwork, and OT AZOY! A new Yiddish recording!
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A whirl of creative activity has sent me to the sewing machine to craft two Torah mantles for Goucher College Hillel. One of the scrolls is a rescued Torah from Czechoslovakia, so armed with a palette of palest greys, golds, silvers, and ivories, I headed to Chinatown in NYC on a rainy day to seek silks! What a delight to discover Belraf Fabrics, owned by an Uzbeki couple. A trip around the world in fabric! Take a peek here are the first days' construction.
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I'll be guest lecturing at Dickinson College in Professor Ted Merwin's class during the week that we commemorate the 102nd anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire. My program on the fire in words and Yiddish song continues to grow as I learn, and to sadly resonate as we all ponder how little has changed in global workplace safely in the last century. See "Upcoming Events" for details.
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Each year as KlezKamp ends, I proclaim, "This was the best ever!" And every year I mean it. And this year I mean it more! The staff concert nearly lifted the roof off what had been, in its glory days The Granite Hotel in the Catskills. My classes (traditional papercutting and "Our Lives are in our Songs") were filled with curious, thoughtful participants who challenged one another to take each idea to a new level. What an experience. Do not miss this next December!! (sneak peek? Check out the KlezKamp post under Upcoming Events for a video clip!)
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December 22, 2012. Kaye Theater in Manhattan. I soared on the energy of dozens of the finest performers of Yiddish song and Klezmer as we paid tribute to Adrienne Cooper's memory in a three-hour concert of the songs she most loved. What a thrill to sing 'Di Arbuzn' a cappella, in three parts with women performers including Alicia Svigals, Lauren Brody, Shura Lipovsky, and Marsha Gildin. It was both a humbling and energizing evening. Sing out!
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I've just been selected as one of ten 2013 Guild of American Papercutters/X-acto Masters. This means over the course of the coming year I will be testing tools and materials and interacting with other artists to hone our skills and increase interest in papercutting arts. Very exciting!
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Are you aware of the Commonwealth Speakers program under the PA Humanities Commission? Every two years, a roster of artists, story-tellers, historians, and musicians selected by the PHC are able to travel the state offering specific programs at no cost to groups (schools, libraries, state parks, etc.!) other than a basic application fee. I just returned from Ohev Sholom in Williamsport and will head to Reading on Thursday to bring Women's Voices in Yiddish Song to the Federation's Friendship Circle there. Visit the website at www.pahumanities.org and check it out! Free programming! What are you waiting for???
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It's been a long time coming, but here I am, immersed in the joy of working in collaboration with brilliant musicians as I prepare a new recording! Production is in the fine hands of Michael Winograd, and the initial tracks have been laid down with David Licht, Jake Shulman-Ment, Carmen Staaf, Garth Stevenson, and Avi Fox-Rosen, with Lauren Brody and others joining in soon! Hmm... mostly Yiddish, with some surprises mixed in, and everything from spare acoustic accompaniment to over-the-top orchestrations. There'll be more and more about the project as it emerges from its infancy, so watch for news! Perhaps a concert or cd release party in your neighborhood down the line...
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Kesher Zion Congregation in Reading, PA welcomed me as artist-in-residence for the weekend of November 9, 2012, as the congregation honored the memories of Dr. Robert Greenberg and Evelyn Blumberg. I was delighted to find myself in the company of the congregation's brilliant Rabbi Minna Bromberg and rooms full of enthusiastic people hungry to experience new 'takes' on Jewish culture. My programming included a presentation of Yiddish songs of spiritual yearning, a lecture on contemporary Jewish ritual art, and then a rollicking concert on Saturday night with the newly expanded Old World Folk Band! Be sure to check the "Upcoming Events" tab to see where else I'm scheduled to spread YIddish culture!
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I can't say enough about the wonderful Tree of Life Congregation in MORGANTOWN, WEST VIRGINIA, where I just spent a weekend as scholar in residence. If you go to my 'coming events' tab, you may see the whole arc of the weekend, but I want to focus here on the response to my "Rage Against the Sewing Machine" presentation on Saturday night, October 27. Among the folks in attendance were physicians, attorneys, and workplace safety experts who each added to a passionate conversation about the effects of completely unregulated natural gas extraction on West Virginians, coal miners' safety issues, and even the plight of disabled people in sheltered workshops who, like the needle workers of 100 years ago, are largely groups without a voice. 'The more things change, the more they stay the same.' And yet we still find inspiration to act for social justice when we learn and sing the songs of our forebears. "Give us bread and give us roses!"
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A radio interview for a BALTIMORE station (WVIE 1370) allowed me to share some insights into the history of labor activism in the United States on September 2, 2012 - Labor Day weekend. So much more meaningful than running to sporting goods stores for sale items, this was a chance to engage listeners in anthemic Yiddish songs and their contexts. So many songs... so little time! But every time a Yiddish song is SUNG, it lives a new life.
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It's late summer, so a trip to the BLOCK AND HEXTER VACATION CENTER in Poyntelle, PA came around on my calendar. My teaching schedule allowed me to alternate sessions with fellow presenter Saul Silas Fahti, as we worked to expand the artistic, musical, polititcal, and in Saul's case, even cosmological horizons of the elders who flocked to the Poconos to participate, learn, and (it's a Jewish camp!) eat 3 squares a day. Whether singing, lecturing, or engaging in issues, I always learn from interactions with program participants. One highlight this year was meeting two Hungarian-born sisters who offered me a macaronic (mixed language) song that alternates lines between Hungarian and German/Yiddish. Will it make the cut on my upcoming recording? Stay tuned!
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A quick trip to MADISON, WISCONSIN as part of "A Bisele KlezKamp" on July 22 was a terrific bright spot in a busy summer season! Over 200 people buzzed around programming by some of the best teacher/artists in the Yiddish folk arts world as Michael Wex, Cookie Segelstein, Lauren Brody, Henry Sapoznik, Sherry Mayrent, Miriam Isaacs, David Spies, Sara Gordon, Kurt Bjorling, Steve Weintraub, and I managed to compress a week's worth of learning into one fabulous day. Keep up-to-date with U. OF WISCONSIN'S MAYRENT CENTER to find out what Yiddish programming will be offered throughout the year before our triumphant return next summer!
On Friday night prior to 'ABKK' I was hosted by Congregation Shaarei Shomayim where I presented an a cappella lecture/recital titled "Healing the World in Yiddish Song." Given the political upheavals and charged emotions in Madison these days, the program was a welcome one. The room was packed with people of all ages, and it was a special joy to me to be singing in a room within Frank Lloyd Wright's historic Unitarian Church, where the congregation meets regularly.
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Lauren Brody and I head to PITTSBURGH on June 3 for two concerts, a family event in the morning, and a full concert in the late afternoon at the JCC, in conjunction with the Jewish Museum's exhibit on the artists who illustrated the works of I.B. Singer. We're working up new material and are delighted that both PennPAT and the PA Humanities Council are supporting the program with generous grants. Come celebrate Yiddish culture!
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Healing the World in Yiddish - This lecture/recital program drew people from a wide variety of backgrounds and ages to a program sponsored but DICKINSON COLLEGE, the Literary Heritage Fund, Association for Jewish Studies, and the Jewish Federation of Greater Harrisburg on April 24. With PowerPoint translations and even a visit from Dan Kahn and the Painted Bird on screen, we explored the drive for human rights that infuses Yiddish song, and the activism that the songs inspire. As part of a series titled "Telling Jewish Stories through the Arts," the evening's riches were obvious as participants lingered over tea and cake and shared the stories that bubbled up in response to the presentation. What a great night!
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On Sunday, April 1, the Jewish Federation of Greater DAYTON and the Lynda A. Cohen Yiddish Club welcomed Lauren Brody and me for a concert. It was the first time that Lauren and I had the opportunity to present a full concert and we felt like siblings on the stage, finding parallel expressions of meaning and intention in her accordion and my voice without even a nod or a word. Utilizing the full range of her instrument, Lauren crafted a unique setting for each song, and the 'whole cloth' was fantastic.
We're already warming up for an upcoming event in June, so stay tuned for details!!
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MAURICE SENDAK! I write this on the day of Maurice Sendak's passing. (If you haven't heard both the recent Fresh Air interview and the hilarious pair of Colbert interviews with the incomparable Mr. Sendak, go find them NOW and come back here in an hour...) I am grateful and humbled to have had the opportunity to spend several months immersed in the life and work of Mr. Sendak, preparing for a program built around the Rosenbach's exhibit of the influences of his Jewish world on his life's work. So on Sunday, April 15, the Haverford Public Library swelled with the sounds of Klezmer as I took over the children's wing of the library to present "Yiddish in the Nutshell" with Ken Ulansey on clarinet and Heath Allen on keyboard. Sendak's early life in a Yiddish-speaking immigrant neighborhood in Brooklyn, the awareness of evil in the world, and the fears and bravery of children shaped much of his life's work, and I blended his personal life into songs and stories for a rollicking hour. The program was interactive, with sing-alongs, props, costumes, and wild Sendakian tales abounding. It was a Yiddishe Vilde 'Rumpus' for everyone's inner child! Pick up a book by Maurice Sendak and look deeply into it. You may be changed!
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LAFAYETTE COLLEGE Hillel hosted me on Tuesday night, March 20 for a program in song and story on the actual history of the Sarajevo Hagaddah. It was a real one-woman show as I demonstrated design, lettering, and gilding techniques of the centuries-old masterpiece, as well as recounted its improbable story interspersed with songs in the Sarajevo dialect of Judeo-Spanish, in Yiddish, and in Hebrew, along with a Moroccan chant - all related to the Hagaddah. The audience included students, college faculty, and local residents, and there was a lively Q and A at the conclusion of the program. Lafayette has a gorgeous old campus perched above the city of Easton at the confluence of the Delaware and Raritan rivers. I hope to return!
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LAUREN BRODY will join me in presenting a full concert in Dayton, Ohio on Sunday, April 1 for the annual event honoring the memory of Lynda A. Cohen. We are thrilled to have the opportunity to share the stage and have been working up two terrific sets for the Yiddish club and expected gathered throngs!
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A presentation of my concert "Women's Voices in Yiddish Song" at Penn State University in Middletown, PA on February 23 drew people from Lancaster, York, Lebanon, and the greater Harrisburg area. Having been interviewed for an upcoming article in a Dayton, Ohio paper the night before, I kept thinking during the concert of a particular question I was asked: "What do you want people to take away from your performance?" So I'll tell you: I want people to be so surprised and touched that they come away with a desire to dig a little deeper into Yiddish culture and discover something about themselves. The values and history that are packed into our songs go far in teaching us how to know ourselves if we just open our hearts a bit. That's why I sing. Oh, and also, I sing because I can't NOT sing!!
Only a week to go before Kerhonkson, NY becomes the temporary capital of Yiddishland! This year at KlezKamp I'll be teaching the hands-on papercutting course and a four-session a capella lecture/recital course.
I'm especially looking forward to the time I'll be carving out with fellow PennPAT artist SUSAN WATTS to work on some vocal duets and arrangements, and to begin taking concrete steps towards my NEW RECORDING, which will be produced by the amazing MICHAEL WINOGRAD! Check this website regularly for announcements, too, of a new duo in the works featuring MICHAEL WEX and Susan Leviton. Use your imagination for now - details to follow soon!
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On Sunday, November 20, 2011, I presented a "Conversation with the Artist" in conjunction with the "Making it Better: Folk Art in Pennsylvania Today" exhibit in which one of my papercuts is featured. I demonstrated the art of Jewish papercutting and shared insights into its history and contemporary expressions with about 30 museum-goers. On exhibit through April 29, 2012, Making It Better tells the stories of over 30 master artists whose works represent a wide array of traditions such as African dance, stone wall construction, Native American clay flutes, Pysanky eggs, contemporary blacksmith work, woodcarving, and Vietnamese funerary portraits. I'm honored to have been chosen to have my work represented among so many brilliant examples of folk arts.
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Groundbreaking for Chisuk Emuna Congregation's new synagogue took place in Harrisburg on Sunday, October 16, 2011, and over 350 people celebrated with a block party that featured kugel in a sukkah, carnival food, games and abundant crafts for children, and an afternoon of outstanding music: klezmer, jazz, and old-timey. Bands set up on a concrete pad at one end of the soon-to-be-a-shul property, and music filled the air! I had the pleasure of singing once again with the Old World Folk Band, which has recently welcomed several new musicians as regulars, and which added additional guest performers for the outdoor event.
The synagogue was destroyed by an accidental fire in 2009, and more recently was left homeless when The Flood of 2011 forced the congregation from temporary quarters in the JCC. The sense that the next plague was waiting in the wings was banished by the wonderful welcome to a new neighbrhood, and it looks like the block party may become an annual event!
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A whirlwind few days at the 14th annual IAYC (International Association of Yiddish Clubs) conference in Novi, Michigan offered me the opportunity to perform and teach, and to meet people from all over the country who gathered to celebrate Yiddish culture. Highlights for me were presenting my powerful lecure/recital, "Rage Against the Sewing Machine" in this 100th anniversary year following the Triangle Fire, and joining Dan Kahn on the bandstand following my solo concert.
To see parts of one of my programs at the conference, please visit www.yiddishlives.com/susanleviton
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