AI, or artificial intelligence, used to be the stuff of science fiction. We've all seen it -- the mad scientist creates a robot with some sort of artificial intelligence, and it reads into the horror that the human race has inflicted, and decides it needs to take over and end humanity, or something like that.
At least, isn't that the premise of pretty much any AI sci-fi film?
However, artificial intelligence isn't a futuristic apocalypse anymore. In fact, we're growing closer and closer to AI systems every day.
But what we've got now is AI marketing. Of course, this isn't full blown robots and artificial brains, but it is artificial intelligence concepts, and some implementation of machine learning to achieve marketing goals.
Now, what does this mean?
Let's dive into what integrating AI marketing with digital marketing actually means for your business.
Don't start getting too freaked out about artificial intelligence, because the truth is, you probably already interact with it on a regular basis and you don't even realize it.
For example, online algorithms are a form of artificial intelligence. Although these algorithms are being programmed with what to look for, these tools are able to pick and choose what to share based on learned experiences, like what people are interacting with and what they like to see.
So let's explore a few more uses for artificial intelligence in marketing.
1. Improving your PPC conversions.
Most businesses who are utilizing PPC platforms like Google AdWords have a specialist in-house or via an agency that is able to keep an eye on the campaign and adjust it according to the audience response.
However, there are new AI-powered systems that are allowing businesses and marketers to create PPC ad campaigns with less human touch, and more machine optimization. This means businesses with a lower ad budget or smaller marketing team can start to keep up with the big dogs, regardless of the tasks on their marketers' plates.
2. Improving website user experience.
No, you're not likely to find an AI that can build you a complete website from the ground up. However, there are tools and software now that are able to take a look at who each specific website visitor is, and show them the most relevant offers available.
This is the perfect way to find exactly where your customer is at in their journey, and offer them precisely what they need at the exact time they need or want it. We can't do that with a regular website, but artificial intelligence certainly can.
3. Content creation.
I'm sorry, what? Never having to write your own blog post again?
Yes please.
Again, the fully AI-automated content creation process is still in the future. But there are certain types of content that AI can create for you.
These include profit/loss summaries, quarterly reports, stock insights, and recaps. We can all agree that saving time is a big advantage; as the saying goes, time is money.
Although AI is not taking over our content marketing efforts and creating all of our content for us, we are getting somewhere. The bottom line is, if AI can streamline processes in some way, such as analyzing data and creating reports, time is saved and your business wins.
4. Chatbots.
Chatbots are the current up-and-coming digital marketing strategy. The most common one is utilized via Facebook Messenger and is set up to create automated conversations between your customers and your Facebook Pages.
Innovative technology makes it possible for you to set up auto-responses or input answers for some of your business's most frequently asked questions. But AI marketing tactics offer even more. With AI, chatbots can learn more about your business via your customer's questions and learn more and more responses on their own, without you having to input the answers yourself.
5. Improving customer engagement.
Utilizing an AI in your customer engagement monitoring strategy can help you to locate customers who are starting to become disengaged before they leave for a competitor so that you can address the situation and work to keep them loyal to your business.
Artificial intelligence can learn behaviors from your customers that show they may be disengaging. One example of such a behavior may be a low-usage time. Particularly if your business offers a SaaS (software as a service), an AI would easily have access to data such as usage times, be able to locate customers who tend to be skewing lower and lower than their past behavior, and greet the users with re-engaging digital content.
6. Generating customer insights.
We all want as much information about our customers and potential customers as possible, right? Giving an AI access to customer and prospect data allows the AI to create personas, and look into each person's online behavior to create patterns.
Although this type of insight isn't anything new, what is new is the method of obtaining it. And, more importantly, the time frame. AI can put together a precise customer profile in a fraction of the time it would take an individual to create the same profile. An AI has access to and is able to put together patterns that simply aren't as easy for the human eye to catch.
Every single one of these strategies is possible for humans to do, and is already done by humans in any good marketing department and strategy. But consider the increased productivity of your marketing team and the amazing results your marketing strategy could provide with the assistance of an artificial intelligence software.
If you're ready to learn more about how AI marketing is coming to digital marketing, please contact us! We'd love to talk to you about putting together a marketing strategy of the future. After all, artificial intelligence is no longer just science fiction--it's alive!
Written By: Doug Milnor
