AI-Powered Image Validation for brand audits
Use Case
A telecom company operating through thousands of partnered retail outlets needed to streamline its brand audit process. Maintaining consistent brand visibility through posters, banners, pamphlets, and other promotional materials was a critical requirement. Field employees frequently visited these outlets, captured images of the displayed materials, and submitted them to brand auditors for validation. Previously, brand auditors manually reviewed these images to determine whether the audit passed or failed, making the process time-consuming and difficult to scale. As a result, the audit cycle became slow and resource-intensive, limiting the company's ability to review submissions quickly and ensure consistent brand compliance across all outlets. Often, if an image submission failed after the employee had already left the store, the field employee had to revisit the outlet to capture and resubmit the required images.
Requirements
The telecom company required an AI-powered system capable of validating images automatically to reduce the operational workload on auditors. The system also needed to provide real-time feedback to field employees at the time of image submission so that invalid images could be corrected immediately and field employees could avoid repeat visits to retail outlets. To ensure fairness and reliability, the validation process had to follow standardized criteria to eliminate inconsistencies caused by subjective manual reviews. Additionally, the solution had to support large volumes of image submissions, as the number of retail outlets and daily audits continued to grow. From a usability perspective, the image upload interface needed enhanced capabilities such as previewing, editing, cropping, and resetting the images directly within the interface. The final requirement was a seamless integration with the existing Zoho CRM-based field operations and the Zoho Creator-based portal while leveraging Zoho Catalyst services for automated image processing and validation.
Solution
Features in use
To address the limitations of the manual review process, an automated AI - powered image validation solution was implemented using Zoho. The system enabled real-time validation of images during upload, eliminating the need for manual review after submission. This ensured faster validation and provided immediate feedback to field employees while they were still at the retail outlet.
Technology stack used
The solution was built within the Zoho ecosystem, with Zoho CRM being the foundation for field operations; leveraging Custom Modules, Activities, Calendar View, and RouteIQ to plan and optimize sales executives' schedules and journey across retailers. Each retailer was represented as an individual record in a Custom Module, where a custom button would redirect the executive to Zoho Creator, which served as the primary platform for the image update portal and for storing the brand's audit data. A custom widget developed using React.js was embedded in Zoho Creator to handle image capture and upload, replacing the default image fields that lacked validation and editing capabilities. The widget was built using internal AI tools, and used a Node.js environment for backend operations. Zoho Catalyst handles the processing of validation requests, while Catalyst QuickML analyzes the uploaded images to determine whether they meet the defined audit criteria.
Journey Optimization
The custom module handles sequencing of retailers to visit on a given day. Assigning this to an executive allows them to track these visits as activities in their Calendar View, and enables RouteIQ to optimize a travel route for the given daily plan. Once they visit a retailer, a simple Custom Button takes them to Zoho Creator where they can proceed with image processing.
Widget integration
The custom widget was integrated into the brand audit form within the image upload portal built on Zoho Creator. It enabled additional capabilities to the uploaded images such as preview, editing, cropping, and validation before the image was submitted.
Image Validation Workflow
During the audit process, the user first selected the City and Retailer fields populated from Zoho Creator. The user then captured or uploaded an image through the widget. After the upload, the system allowed the user to preview and edit the image by cropping or rotating it. The user could also retake the image or reset any edits if needed.
Once the image was saved, it was sent to Zoho Catalyst QuickML for validation. This AI model evaluated the image for quality and compliance with the audit criteria such as blur detection, clarity, and visibility of required elements, and the validation result was displayed within the widget. If the image was blurred, damaged, or did not meet the requirements, the system displayed the reason so the user could correct it immediately. Based on the prediction, images are automatically classified as either validated or damaged, enabling consistent and objective audit outcomes.
Result
The AI-powered implementation automated the image validation process and eliminated the need for manual review by brand auditors, who were previously reviewing an average of 1,788 images per month. Field employees received immediate feedback on image quality during submission, allowing them to correct issues on the spot and avoid repeat visits to retail outlets. The solution also enhanced the user experience by enabling image preview, editing, and retake functionality within the workflow. Overall, this significantly reduced operational effort, improved audit turnaround time, and enabled more efficient management of brand compliance across many retail locations.
"Please note that the solution described here is developed for a real use case of a Zoho customer. All names, identifying details, and screenshots have been anonymized to retain privacy."
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