Setting the Stage: A new series on AI-related considerations for marketers
Artificial intelligence (AI) has become an increasingly important tool for marketers, fueling data analytics, content creation and personalization, and helping companies to better understand customers and improve their experience at every touchpoint. While it’s still too early to determine the magnitude of its impact, AI’s imprint on marketing is undeniable already. In the end, the true impact of AI on marketing will depend on how well we can embrace the technology while simultaneously managing its risks. Against this backdrop is a complex interplay between consumers, regulators and companies deploying AI.
Governments around the world, including Canada, are developing regulations to govern and shape the use of Al. In the meantime, an important conversation is happening at the industry-level. The CMA’s AI Working Group intends to cut through the noise with a new thought leadership series. The series will explore where AI and marketing intersect, unpack the short and longer-term implications of leveraging AI to support marketing activities, and most importantly, suggest key considerations for marketers as they aim to leverage AI effectively and ethically.
The use of AI in marketing so far has focused significantly on the production of marketing material, whether that be images, videos and voice overs, as well as on the execution of sequential tasks and data processing. Driving this interest is the promise of cost savings, personalization, speed of execution and more. What remains unknown is how effective these AI-generated creations will be at generating real results for companies – from increases in sales to positive changes in brand perception. It is important for marketers to be cautiously optimistic about their use of AI, paying special attention to measurement (including tightly defining desired outcomes), and the affect of the AI on how they reach and react to their customer’s needs.
Below is a primer to get marketers thinking about the impact of AI on their activities. It is not intended to be exhaustive, but rather a preliminary inventory of AI uses within the marketing ecosystem, categorizing them, outlining a few of their immediate impacts, and exploring some of their long-term impacts. The final column begins to explore risks and considerations marketers should be thinking about as they implement various AI capabilities into their workflows.
This mapping exercise will serve as the launching point for follow-up articles on a variety of topics – from generating creative content to managing the combination of data processing and content generation (specifically for prospecting and customer service management) and getting consumers’ attention in an AI-driven marketplace.
Do you have insights to add to the primer below? Share them with us.
