The world can’t stop talking about artificial intelligence, with all the big technology giants already having invested a large chunk into creating AI-powered applications.
But automation isn’t something new to marketers. After all, what is marketing without being able to measure the efforts and results?
Tools like Marketo, Hubspot and Google Rankbrain have made marketers’ lives easier by scheduling repetitive tasks, keeping track of data and giving enough insights to plan and schedule digital marketing initiatives. AI can enhance the holistic experience for marketers by automating content curation, execution and customer relationships through insightful and deeply-studied behavioural patterns.
Beyond digital marketing, AI can conjure a supreme and granular offline marketing experience that could lead to improved sales and customer retention.
Marketing professors Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein classify how marketers can use AI into three categories: analytical, human-inspired and humanized intelligence.
Analytical AI is already part of 21st century marketing tools. Marketers today are indulged with insightful analytical tools to help make better decisions for digital, social and even offline marketing. Advertisements can shift from being annoying uninvited guests to more personalized brand interactions with potential customers. In fact, insights and analytics can streamline content curation, planning and execution of campaigns to target various demographics based on behavioural study and predictive analytics.
Human-inspired is the next level of AI for marketers. Human-inspired intelligence is predominantly cognitive intelligence coupled with emotional intelligence. Chatbots are great examples. Consider a chat about your food being delivered—maybe your delivery got delayed or the quality wasn’t as expected. The food delivery app’s bot can sense the dissatisfaction from the conversation, apologize and suggest other restaurants. The bot can also decide on remedial steps such as free coupons, discounts for the next order or free delivery of the same order with improved quality—all of this decided by AI without any human intervention.
Humanized intelligence is the most advanced form of AI for marketers. This is receptive to changes and responds accordingly. It could prove to be a great tool to offer the best customer-centric experience churning positive marketing and sales for the brand. Let’s say the food delivery app’s bot can now talk to your intelligent agent, like SIRI or Google Assistant, and keep it updated about your favorite restaurant being opened in another city. Another example could be that your health app is connected to the food delivery app so can start ordering food more responsibly. If you’re down with the flu, the food delivery app will pick up the data and can now suggest healthy dishes.
No technology can replace human reasoning and personal touch. However, AI can enhance that human experience. Besides being intelligent enough to study patterns and suggest perceptive market strategies, AI helps avoid human errors and delivers accurate results that improve the business.