Gone are the days of science fiction, touching on AI as something in the distant future. Instead, the current marketing climate is filled with examples of AI, doing everything from automating social media posts to generating captions and post topics. 

Understanding AI Marketing

AI marketing is a form of marketing that relies on artificial intelligence to generate, automate, or manage marketing tasks. Artificial intelligence can take a background role in marketing practices, offering actionable insights for changes according to your analytics, or it can take on more significant roles, such as generating entire images or videos on behalf of marketing campaigns. 

Artificial intelligence helps take digital marketing strategies to new heights, and has rapidly become an invaluable tool for marketing professionals from all backgrounds. What exactly is AI marketing overall? 

Brief Overview of AI Marketing

AI marketing integrates artificial intelligence technologies–machine learning, natural language processing, and image recognition, for instance–to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of marketing efforts. By leveraging artificial intelligence, a business is able to analyze vast amounts of customer data, personalize marketing messages through direct messages, comments, and emails, and automate various marketing tasks. 

Using AI, marketing professionals can improve customer engagement and conversion rates, both of which are essential for furthering marketing campaigns and experiencing growth. 

Importance of AI in the Marketing Landscape

Artificial intelligence enables businesses to gain valuable insights into the behavior of their customers and their preferences. Analyzing these insights, AI and marketers can create highly targeted and effective marketing campaigns that more effectively resonate with their audience. While digital marketing campaigns have long worked without artificial intelligence, AI has made numerous tasks much easier for marketing teams. 

AI-driven automation of routine marketing tasks, for instance, saves time for marketers, reserving resources where possible. This allows businesses to focus on strategic initiatives and make better informed decisions. 

The Potential Impact of AI on Marketing Strategies

The impact of AI can be truly huge on a company’s marketing strategy. Marketing channels rely on a constant stream of incoming data and subsequent data-driven decisions, and AI can assist in making those decisions.

AI has the ability to transform marketing by providing businesses with different real-time insights into their customers’ behavior and preferences. Personalized and relevant marketing messages can then be delivered directly to those customers and drive engagement.

AI can also help businesses optimize marketing efforts by automating repetitive tasks, identifying any areas in need of improvement, and predicting future trends and behaviors. When all of these insights are put together, marketing strategies are more efficient and effective when put into practice. 

The Role of Artificial Intelligence Technologies in Marketing Today

Initially, much of the tasks assigned to AI involved data mining and simple, repetitive tasks. The past few years, however, have seen enormous strides in the field of artificial intelligence, many of which have significant applications in the marketing industry. AI-driven insights abound, but artificial intelligence can also be used to conduct deep learning, process and generate language, and even recognize images and serve as voice assistants. 

Let’s take a closer look at each of these practices, starting with…

Machine Learning and Deep Learning

Machine learning is a type of artificial intelligence learning that is used to sift through structured, rigid parameters in order to learn more about a given subject, and deliver insights. This type of learning allows AI to evaluate large amounts of data with identifiable patterns and make predictions to help businesses understand customer behavior and preferences to optimize marketing efforts. 

Deep learning is similar in its scope, but approaches learning differently. This type of learning describes the process by which AI sorts through unstructured data, in order to arrive at data-driven conclusions. While machine learning relies on mathematical applications and statistical data, deep learning goes one step further and develops neural networks to interpret data. 

Further Reading: AI vs Machine Learning: Why the Difference in Meaning Matters for Marketers

Natural Language Processing and Natural Language Generation

Natural language processing and language generation call within the same basic purpose: to understand, interpret, and generate human language. As you can imagine, the applications of this type of AI in marketing are substantial. 

More effective communication with customers through personalized content, chatbots, and voice assistants are some of the most common uses of this form of artificial intelligence, but there are other ways to use language generation as well, including generating captions, creating topics, and more. 

Image Recognition and Voice Assistants

Image recognition can be used to complete sentiment analysis among your social profiles, in order to determine which posts and creations are best loved among your audience. It can also allow businesses to interact with customers through visual content to improve user experience and engage with customers. 

Voice assistants, too, provide improved communication with customers and potential customers through voice commands. The most significant application of voice assistants for marketers involves customer service, allowing businesses to further streamline and personalize established customer service habits and practices. 

Building an AI Marketing Strategy

Whether you are new to AI marketing, or you have used artificial intelligence in some capacity for years, building a robust AI marketing strategy can be difficult without fully understanding all of the options at your fingertips and having a clear strategy in mind. AI digital marketing tools can be built and integrated effectively by following a clear outline of your goals and intentions. 

To build your AI marketing strategy, consider the following steps: 

Set Marketing Goals and Objectives

Before selecting any marketing tools or new software, make sure you have clear marketing goals and objectives. Establishing clear goals and objectives ensures that businesses can successfully measure AI-driven marketing strategies, track progress, and make any data-driven adjustments necessary to optimize efforts and achieve desired outcomes. 

Setting your goals can be simple, and include only a handful of ideas (increase follower count by 10,000, increase revenue by x amount, etc.) or can be more substantial, and involve a complete overhaul of your current marketing strategies. Either way, make sure that your goals and objectives are clear and actionable. 

Define Target Audience and Customer Segmentation

Your target audience must be defined before developing a dedicated AI marketing strategy. Your target audience will impact the groups being evaluated by AI, so make sure you have a clear picture of what it is you are looking for in your audience. 

Customer segmentation should also be completed prior to developing your AI strategy. Identify which customers fit within different matching parameters, for more effective AI analysis.

By completing both of these tasks, businesses can create highly targeted marketing campaigns and ensure that the right message reaches the right audience. Over time, this will lead to increased engagement and improved conversion rates. 

Develop Marketing Messages and Content Optimization

After you have put the boundaries in place, you can begin to develop your marketing messages and optimize new and existing content. This step will not require additional steps prior to implementing artificial intelligence tools, however, as the competitive intelligence of these tools is able to develop both with the learning conducted in the previous steps. 

AI-powered content optimization tools are able to help businesses develop marketing messages that resonate with their audience. By analyzing customer data to identify trends and preferences and generating subsequent personalized content, engagement and conversions can soar. 

Leveraging AI in Marketing Campaigns and Channels

Marketing campaigns and marketing channels can benefit from a healthy dose of artificial intelligence. By bringing AI into marketing campaigns, businesses can optimize email marketing and subject lines, manage social media marketing, and put automation practices in place to free up time and effort to invest in other, more pressing arenas of business. 

I have compiled the different ways to leverage AI in marketing campaigns and channels below. First, consider leveraging AI in…

Further Reading: 25 Ways How to Leverage AI in Digital Marketing Today

Email Marketing and Subject Lines

Email marketing and subject lines can be optimized by artificial intelligence, making them far more enticing to recipients and more likely to actually be opened. By analyzing historical data and predicting what will resonate with a business’ target audience, AI can help increase open rates and make these campaigns far more effective.

Many marketing experiences are stodgy or clearly scripted. AI can improve the traditional marketing email and make it a more personalized experience for customers and help your business stand out in an inbox full of marketing materials. 

Social Media Monitoring and Scheduling Posts

Social media monitoring is the practice of monitoring social channels and social posts to identify trends in customer sentiment and general performance of a company or brand. Social media monitoring is time consuming and difficult when handled individually, and AI makes the process a streamlined, straightforward one. These tools can also track brand mentions and identify trending topics to help marketers make informed decisions. 

Once those decisions have been made and integrated into their social media strategies, AI can be used to schedule posts. By scheduling posts, businesses can batch create content, streamline social media marketing, and focus more attention on acquisition and retention. 

Digital Marketing and Marketing Automation

Automation is one of the most significant contributors to digital marketing, as it allows businesses to focus attention on the things that matter. AI-driven marketing automation platforms offer excellent ways to streamline and optimize digital marketing efforts. Email campaigns, social media posts, and ad targeting can all be completed using AI tools, which frees up time for marketing teams to focus on strategic initiatives.

AI is most effectively used for digital marketing campaigns, though some other forms of marketing can benefit. Automation and digital marketing go hand in hand, and businesses can support and maintain digital marketing campaigns effectively using AI tools. 

Further Reading: 25 Best AI Tools for Marketing and Business

Enhancing Customer Experience with AI

Customer service can also experience a boost with artificial intelligence. AI can provide valuable insights regarding customer experience, including how to most effectively personalize interactions with customers, increase customer satisfaction, and deliver service to customers as a whole. 

AI can enhance customer experience through…

Personalization and Personalized Experiences

Personalization and personalized experience are both excellent ways to use AI to improve customer experiences. Personalization allows marketing materials, customer service requests, and more to directly address customers and create a customized experience. Using data surrounding preferences, behaviors, and past interactions, AI can tailor a customer’s experience. 

When customers are given highly personalized experiences, they may be more likely to respond positively. AI can help increase engagement and drive higher conversion rates through personalization and improved customer experiences. 

Customer Journey Mapping and Customer Satisfaction

Customer journey mapping tools are able to analyze different customer interactions across various touch points. By analyzing these interactions, AI can identify any point of pain or opportunities for improvement, which leads to enhanced customer satisfaction. 

Completing this process manually requires a lot of man hours and power. AI streamlines the process by having a constant metaphorical finger on the pulse of your customers’ experiences. Even while you are offline or your business is not actively engaging with customers, your tools can learn how to best serve your audience. 

Chatbots and Customer Service Agents

Chatbots are incredible tools offered by AI. Chatbots can efficiently handle the most routine customer inquiries and complete support tasks. A chatbot is able to provide quick and accurate responses to common queries, which can result in improved customer service and reduced wait times, further bolstering customer satisfaction. 

Marketing tools can seem like a dime a dozen. If you go in search of a marketing tool, you are sure to find at least a solid handful of tools that are able to achieve the goals you have laid out.

That being said, AI marketing tools do set themselves apart from standard tools, in that they can more efficiently break down and complete marketing tasks that can be automated or streamlined, and lessen the amount of time and energy that a marketing team puts into actual marketing practices. 

Some of the most effective AI tools and techniques include…

Data Analytics and High-Quality Data:

Data analytics allow businesses to gain and evaluate insights into the behavior, preferences, and trends associated with their customers. Having these insights helps companies make better informed marketing decisions in order to improve overall marketing performance, and see a change in any areas that have grown stagnant or ineffective. 

High-quality data ensures that AI-driven marketing tools can function to the best of their ability. Accurate insights and predictions are two of the key features of high-quality data, which can result in better decision-making. 

Predictive Analytics and Predictive Modeling:

Predictive analytics is a type of analytics that uses historical data and machine learning algorithms to accurately forecast future outcomes. These types of analyses help businesses identify trends and anticipate customer needs, to effectively plan campaigns and meet needs competitors may be overlooking. 

Predictive modeling is similar, but enables marketers to identify any potential customer segments that have not been covered, optimize marketing efforts, and ultimately allocate resources more evenly and effectively, to improve marketing ROI. 

Further Reading: 33 Leading AI Marketing Tools to Explore

Recommendation Engines and Personalized Recommendations:

Recommendation engines utilize algorithms powered by AI to analyze the behaviors, preferences, and purchase histories of customers to deliver personalized product or content suggestions. This type of data gathering and recommendation service can quickly enhance customer experience and drive engagement higher.

Think about it this way: if you were to visit a site and experience static pages you had to click on yourself, but saw another site that offered personalized recommendations, which would you gravitate toward? 

Personalized recommendations increase the likelihood of customers either making a purchase or engaging with content. Both can result in higher conversion rates and improve rates of customer satisfaction. 

10 Case Studies: Successful AI Marketing Strategies

I have taken you through the basics of AI and how it can be applied to marketing in all of its forms. Now that you have an understanding of AI’s applications in the marketing sphere, I will walk you through what AI looks like in action, and how it has been applied in many different marketing campaigns from different industries and niches.

First up: Netflix. 

1. Netflix Uses AI To Deliver A More Personalized Customer Experience

Netflix‘s AI-driven suggestion mechanism scrutinizes numerous data aspects, and encompasses an individual’s watch history, search records, and evaluations. Together, these can be used to recommend certain viewing options on the app, as well as content-related data such as the genre and filmmaker. 

Netflix has suggested that 80% of material viewed by users comes about as a result of their recommendation engine–a truly huge number. The streaming giant has estimated that its recommendation system has saved the company over $1 billion in customer retention expenditures, and has had a hand in maintaining the popularity of the platform. 

Netflix relies on artificial intelligence to enhance its content production procedures as well, demonstrating its willingness to take up the case for AI in business. 

2. Sephora Uses AI To Transform the Beauty Industry

Sephora integrated a chatbot into its website and mobile app, which utilized machine learning algorithms to effectively tailor customer journeys and deliver both assistance and suggestions to customers. It is a full-service form of AI, providing function every step of the way. 

Sephora also boasts the Sephora Virtual Artist, which is a chatbot. It employs facial recognition technology to allow clients to test different makeup items and explore diverse appearances, before recommending products based on those appearances. 

An AI-driven chatbot can also be found on the customer inquiry section of Sephora’s site, in order to address those inquiries and assist shoppers in locating the products they desire. 

3. Coca-Cola Uses AI To Deliver More Personalized Marketing Campaigns

Coca-Cola collaborated with a data analytics company to develop an AI system able to examine sales information to detect trends in customer tastes. In so doing, they developed the idea of tailoring product packaging and distribution approaches for various markets and different demographics, according to the data gathered by AI. 

Coca-Cola’s venture was successful. Sales and distribution efficiency were enhanced by as much as 30%, which reduced costs and increased profits at the same time. The company was also able to refine its marketing strategies using those data-driven insights to create more targeted campaigns and messaging options. 

4. Unilever Uses AI to Develop a Personalized Shopping Assistant

Unilever used AI to develop a personal shopping assistant, a helper identified as “Peggy.” This form of AI employs natural language processing to comprehend different client queries and deliver tailored product suggestions and assistance. Unilever has enhanced customer interactions, increased sales, and developed far more robust connections with its clientele. 

Further Reading: Generative AI in Ecommerce: 17 Ways to Boost Your ROI

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5. Amazon Uses AI to Implement Dynamic Pricing Strategies

In a shift that is likely not at all surprising to anyone reading this, Amazon also uses AI to help implement dynamic pricing strategies. Amazon is a giant conglomerate now, with its hands in virtually every pie. One way that Amazon is at the forefront of business is its policy regarding pricing.

While most stores offer pricing as a relatively static concept, Amazon’s use of AI allows the site to regularly (one might even say constantly) update the pricing of its products, according to customer behavior, supply and demand, and even inventory. 

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6. Starbucks Using AI to Humanize the Customer Experience

Starbucks has used AI to deliver improved customer experience in the form of improvements to machines and overall changes made to the rewards program offered to regular customers. Machines are using AI to optimize the efficacy of espresso machines and make it possible to determine when a machine is malfunctioning or in need of maintenance. 

AI is also being used to improve customer experience on the company’s rewards program by using AI-driven insights to improve personalization and services. With the help of AI, Starbucks has seen a 15% increase year over year in rewards program memberships. 

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7. Nike Leverages AI to Improve Personalization and Engagement

Nike‘s relationship with AI is a longstanding one, and the brand has witnessed significant growth as a result of its AI programs (reportedly improvements in both engagement and loyalty). Personalization services came in the form of basic direction of design as well as personalized services in stores. 

Perhaps most significant, though, is Nike’s use of AI to develop completely personalized shoes, which can be created and delivered same-day in stores. By using AI in this application, Nike demonstrates its commitment to improving customer experience, chasing innovation, and listening to desired changes. 

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8. ClickUp Uses NLP AI to Boost Blog Traffic by 85%

ClickUp is a project management solution that utilizes Surfer SEO’s natural language processing tools and machine learning technology to identify any possible content optimization opportunities. The tool also helps determine the appropriate keywords to use in articles (including their optimal density), and acquire insights into how articles should be structured. 

ClickUp can be expected to include aspects such as the number of images and the length of subheadings in its suggestions, all of which can come together to boost traffic by up to 85%. 

9. Heinz Launches Its First Ad Campaign With Entirely AI-Generated Images

Heinz collaborated with the marketing agency Rethink Ideas to launch something truly unique. Billed as “the first ever advertising campaign featuring visuals created entirely by artificial intelligence,” Heinz was working hard to make sure it was keeping innovation and wonder at the forefront of its marketing efforts. 

During different experiments with the AI image generator (DALL-E 2), Rethink Ideas found that any ketchup-related prompts–think “ketchup in outer space,” or “ketchup scuba diving”–were typically accompanied by images resembling Heinz bottles, suggesting that there was already a powerful link to the food item and the Heinz brand overall. 

10. Magnolia Market Bridges Online-to-Offline Customer Experience with AI and AR

Joanna and Chip Gaines own a brick-and-mortar store called Magnolia Market. The store is renowned for its exceptional customer service, as much as it is admired for its proprietors. Not everyone can visit the Magnolia Silos, however, and Magnolia Market’s marketing team believed it was essential for the brand’s e-commerce platform to deliver an experience similar to the experience found in the physical store. 

In collaboration with Shopify Plus, Magnolia created a storefront and an augmented reality app that allows users to view products they are interested in in 3D, and subsequently virtually “place” them in their homes to determine the likelihood of seeing a good fit. AI technology allowed Magnolia to then provide the highest possible level of realism for its products, including photorealistic images. 

Magnolia was immediately set apart from its competitors and reinforced its e-commerce sector. It is the latter that functions as a crucial factor in the company’s growth and restrengthened e-commerce arm. E-commerce is a key driver for company growth, making this a worthwhile investment of time and funds for the Magnolia brand. 

Challenges and Precautions Surrounding AI in Marketing

As you might imagine, there are some concerns regarding the use of AI in the current landscape, especially as the technology continues to grow and outperform traditional ways of completing tasks. Some of the more common concerns have been gathered below, and I have touched on what they are, and why they might prove problematic. Let’s start with human touch. 

Lack of Human Touch

AI marketing cannot detect the emotional nuances and cultural context found in communication between two rational, human parties. This can lead to messages that appear to be either insensitive or misleading to customers utilizing the service. 

Human touch can also describe the degree of customer service provided; many people experience some level of discomfort talking to someone they recognize is not actually a human. Many businesses adopting AI means that the technology may very well continue to demonstrate a stark difference. 

Data Privacy Concerns

Utilizing AI means that companies are often collecting extensive levels of personal data for targeted marketing campaigns. This can ultimately lead to privacy violations and more, which can make customers feel as though their personal information is being exploited.

Of course, many AI programs have safeguards in place to ideally prevent these types of issues, but the risk of failure can make it difficult to feel comfortable or safe when they know that artificial intelligence is being used to mine their information. 

Bias and Discrimination

AI is based on data and not the nuances unique to human reasoning patterns. AI algorithms, then, can inadvertently perpetuate harmful stereotypes and biases if they are trained on biased data sets. This can lead to unfair targeting or exclusion of certain demographic groups and make it difficult to recover from. 

High Initial Costs and Resource Requirements

AI solutions are still somewhat new, and as such, they are not cheap. Implementing AI marketing solutions frequently requires a more substantial upfront investment to secure the requisite technology, infrastructure, and skilled personnel. This can be cost prohibitive for smaller businesses who are not able to keep up with the cost of AI and have to make do without as a result. 

Over-Optimization and Creative Limitations

The reliance AI has on data-driven strategies forms the basis of its powerful uses, but can also lead to a focus on short-term results and the neglect of long-term changes. Brand building, stifling innovation, and potentially even rehashing tired ideas can result in repetitive or uninspired campaigns. 

Unpredictability and Lack of Control

AI marketing systems are autonomous entities, which can make it difficult for marketers to truly predict or control campaign outcomes. This is a deeply concerning issue for anyone who wants to have a firm hand on their own marketing practices and habits. An autonomous nature can lead to unintended consequences or misaligned brand messaging. 

Conclusion

Artificial intelligence is becoming a ubiquitous entity, found in all walks of life and all niches. The applications for AI are diverse and range wildly, helping companies with everything from answering some basic questions about a product to delivering personalized recommendations based on online behavior.

As the examples I have gathered here can attest, AI can be enormously beneficial in virtually all walks, helping a makeup company sell its wares as effectively as developing a new algorithm for pricing across an entire website. 

Are you using AI in your marketing efforts? I’d love to hear in the comments! 

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