Skip to main content

Marketing and AI

Marketing and AI

Suddenly, everyone is talking about artificial intelligence (AI). It is constantly in the news now. It suddenly is looming like some intimidating Terminator. However, AI is not a toggle switch that was suddenly turned on one day this year. AI is everywhere and has been around for far longer than most of us are aware. We just didn’t realize it.

Ever think about how Instagram shows you reels based on your past views? Youtube does the same. Amazon makes recommendations based on your browsing and purchase history. By the newest standard, that is old hat AI, but it is AI. Lately, significant advances have been made that increased the power of these learning algorithms exponentially. The new tools Chat GPT, BARD, Well-said are examples very widely covered in the media.

Why are businesses so interested?

There are a wide variety of uses for AI in the business space, from project management to customer service.
A bit of background, it might be helpful to take a quick survey of places where AI is being deployed.

Before looking at examples, let’s discuss why use AI in any area at all?

Given technology, any organization has the capacity to collect–from the perspective of a human–an incomprehensibly large amount of data on almost any subject. This data can be used to do many things, but there is so much of it, we have a limited capacity to see patterns and synthesize. AI has the capacity to do that.

Three examples:

Demand forecasting in retail: Who doesn't want the magic bullet to decide how much to stock for each season? However, just observing how much sold this month last year isn't a sufficient predictor. What about the weather? Bad economic news. Construction on a nearby road that is now finished this year. The endless factors that may influence buying decisions can be used to forecast demand more accurately.

Disease screening in healthcare: AI has the capacity to potentially use data to identify or eliminate certain diagnoses that an individual medical professional whose experience is necessarily finite, might be able to do. Like much else, there are ethical issues that can make AI a complex tool, but there is much potential.

Customer retention: Like other areas, you probably can collect more information about your customers than you can make sense of. So, why did they leave? You may have the answer, but it may actually be a calculus of many factors. AI can help identify all of the issues that may have led a customer to leave. Without AI, you may incorrectly attribute it to one single factor.

Why are marketers so interested?

AI has potential applications in the marketing end of any business, large or small. Marketers, in particular, may find AI useful in these three general categories-

Collecting Data about prospective customers - Even small businesses can collect a significant amount of data. AI can allow you to analyze that data. No matter how much data you collect, it is useless unless you can synthesize it, see patterns, etc. The human capacity to make sense of the massive amount of data we collect is limited.

Using data to market more effectively - Even the most novice marketer knows that the more you know about each prospect the easier it will be to target them. The more you know their needs, the more you can explain how your product or service meets those needs. AI allows you to do more with the data you collect- to make sense of it so you can use it.

Generating the right message - AI may be also able, to a certain degree, assist you in creating the messaging to reach your target. However, it is important to recognize that AI is not a silver bullet.

In short, AI may offer you some new tools to more effectively market without expanding your present marketing resources.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Leveraging your business data to drive better business outcomes

Leveraging your business data to drive better business outcomes Smaller firms may hear about AI and how data is driving the big corporations of the world, but they often don’t realize that they can do the same. The size and age of your business doesn’t have to be a limiting factor in whether you use data. Today’s blog is a quick look at data management for the small firm. The first lesson is: don’t take your data for granted. The basic business model for some large IT companies is monetizing the data that they collect. While this may not be your goal, you probably collect a great deal of data about your customers, prospects, and operations. An MSP can help you make better use of that data. Here are just three examples: Marketing Data tells you who is interested, when they're interested, and in what they are interested. Data can tell you where each individual prospect sits in the sales funnel, so your marketing messages reach them exactly where they are. It can also track the...
Post a Comment
Read more

How Can an MSP Keep Your Business Safe?

How Can an MSP Keep Your Business Safe? Are you a small- or medium-sized business that is in need of a more complete, dependable IT solution to support your business than you presently have? When your main focus is running your business, everything else becomes an afterthought. Other support operations tend to take a backseat. However, your business depends upon a reliable, stable “always running” IT infrastructure and you probably find that isn't always the case. Even if you have an in-house staff, it isn't large enough to put out fires and handle strategic planning and provide 24/7 support when something goes wrong. That is why many businesses large and small rely fully or partially on the support of a Managed Service Provider (MSP). So what are the typical services available from an MSP? There are many different types of support that can be provided to clients. In this e-guide we will break them down. Managed IT Services This is the overarching set of services that ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Like it or not, you business relies on technology

Like it or not, your business relies on technology Technology isn’t just something used by Silicon valley firms and large corporations. Even the smallest start-up is now reliant on technology and the virtual marketplace. A business cannot function without operating in the digital world. At the very least, it means having a website, a social media presence and an online database of customers and prospects. Most likely it means conducting business online, which means you’re responsible for the security of client data: names, credit cards, addresses, and probably more information. Much of that information may be personal Information that you have an obligation to keep secure. That duty brings along many challenges because cyber criminals and even benign human error could mean that data is compromised. Data breaches can bring litigation, possible regulatory sanctions, and very importantly, damage to your brand and reputation. Because so much rides on the stability and security of your di...
Post a Comment
Read more