As artificial intelligence technology evolves, it’s beginning to be implemented across a range of different industries. That’s because it’s a technology that has the potential to streamline processes and revolutionize all kinds of business systems.
One of the biggest industries that AI is already having a significant impact on is marketing. Digital marketers are beginning to understand the power of AI, and putting the technology to use when coming up with marketing strategies. From search engine optimization (SEO) to content generation, AI technology has all sorts of exciting applications.
In this article, we’ll take a look at how AI is already being used to subtly improve marketing strategies and get results. In addition to that, we’ll examine some of the ways in which AI can potentially be utilized in the future by marketers to achieve data-driven results. So, without further ado, check out these fascinating AI marketing trends.
Chatbot Integration
When properly utilized, chatbots can be a valuable tool for taking pressure off a company’s customer support team and delivering an improved customer experience. That’s because chatbots can provide customers with an immediate response to their questions, problems, and inquiries. That means no waiting on hold for hours to speak with a representative, or sending an email and waiting days for a reply.
In addition to providing the consumer with a better experience overall, chatbots make it easier on the company, too. Large companies that receive thousands of inquiries every day may find it hard to respond to them all in a timely manner. Or, if they do find a way to quickly respond, it’s typically because they employ an expansive — and costly — team of customer support representatives.
Chatbots can greatly reduce the demand placed on the customer support team. When placed on a company website (see the below example, taken from Vapor Empire’s homepage), a chatbot can make it easy for customers to connect with your company.
Image courtesy of www.vaporempire.com
You can program a chatbot to answer frequently asked questions and solve basic problems. In the case of more complex issues, a chatbot can collect valuable user information — such as their name, email, order information — and pass it on to a customer service representative. With that information, a representative can more quickly and effectively solve a customer’s problem and provide them with excellent service.
Automated Content Generation
Content marketing has seen huge growth in recent years, with many companies making it a central part of their overall marketing strategy. And one of the most important parts of an effective content marketing campaign is consistency — your company has to generate content such as articles, blogs, videos, and more on a regular basis in order to stay connected with your target audience.
However, creating content can be both time-consuming and capital-intensive. First, you have to hire writers and other creators to generate content for your company, and this can end up being a big expense. Second, it can take hours for a writer to generate a single blog post, or days for a videographer to film and edit a promotional video. Even a simple landing page, like the Intuit one shown below, can take a significant amount of time and money to produce.
Image courtesy of proconnect.intuit.com
Thus, creating content is a long and expensive process, and companies have to pour money and other resources into their content marketing strategy. But what if you could quickly generate content without having to hire writers or editors?
AI technology may make that a reality in the near future. While current AI programs generally aren’t sophisticated enough to write long, in-depth articles with the same fluency as humans, the programs can generate basic content. For instance, AI machine learning algorithms can put together short articles that outline things like stock updates and sports reports.
Even in its current state, an AI content generator could potentially be put to use by marketing professionals and firms. What if you could program an AI program to prompt SEO-friendly topics for human writers? Or even put together rough drafts for the content team? You would still need humans to edit the drafts, make them readable, and perhaps add more information, but this system would still likely be more time-efficient than having writers start from scratch.
Voice Recognition
Voice recognition technology has been a big trend in tech for the last few years, and the market for it continues to grow consistently. According to the research and advisory firm Gartner, 39% of the U.S. population uses voice assistants on their smartphones, and 26% use smart speakers at least once a week. And the mainstream introductions of virtual assistants like Amazon’s Alexa and Apple’s Siri have sparked even greater demand for voice-activated systems and voice-enabled devices.
Google even has voice search functionality built into their search bar for mobile and desktop:
Image courtesy of Google
So how does this relate to marketing? As more people begin to lean on their smartphone’s speech recognition technology and bring other voice-enabled gadgets into their homes, they’re tending to order products online via voice commands. With that in mind, many marketing professionals and firms have made a concerted effort to incorporate voice search optimization into their SEO strategy. As the market shifts in the direction of AI-powered virtual assistants and more people do their online shopping using voice commands, marketers will have to figure out the best methods for getting their content to show up in results for voice searches.
Conclusion
Although AI is essentially still in its infancy, it’s already proven to be a useful tool for marketers. Whether through chatbots or content generators, AI technology enables companies to better connect with their customers and understand their needs. And, as the technology evolves, marketers will have to evolve with it if they want to remain competitive. If you’re a marketing professional who wants to get ahead of the curve, it’s essential that you explore the different ways in which you can leverage AI technology to build a more successful digital marketing campaign.
About the author: Samantha Rupp
Samantha Rupp holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration. She is the managing editor for 365 Business Tips as well as runs a personal blog, Mixed Bits Media. She lives in San Diego, California and enjoys spending time on the beach, reading up on current industry trends, and traveling.
