By Will Novosedlik
Since the launch of generative AI ChatGPT-4 dominated the news cycle back in the spring, the race has been on for marketers and their agencies to make it part of their toolsets and processes.
By now everyone is aware of its potential value as a productivity enhancement tool. Indeed, a recent report by McKinsey suggests that generative AI could add up to $4.4 trillion USD annually in value across all industries. For marketers, it should create efficiencies in terms of both ideation and production, enable personalization at a much grander and more granular scale, identify the most effective channels and messaging for different customer segments, allow them to optimize their strategies on the fly, maximize sales and ultimately drive a greater return on marketing investment.
At least that’s the pitch.
As might be expected, some are diving right in while others are approaching the tech with great caution. Mattel, for example, is using AI image generator DALL-E as an idea generator for its Hot Wheels product. Instacart is using ChatGPT to deal with customer inquiries. Coca Cola is hoping to put generative AI to work creating marketing content. Destination BC uses it as a lead generation and recommendation engine.
As a report by the Conference Board has revealed, 87% of marketers and 85% percent of communications professionals have experimented with at least one application. While marketing professionals use AI more for personalization and customer experience, communications professionals use it more frequently for content and image creation. One commonality across the agency/client divide: exploration and experimentation with generative AI is happening at the mid-level, often without a clear strategic mandate from above.
On the agency side, we see various applications in use. Agencies in Plus Company’s creative entrepreneurial network are using AI for both driving efficiency and augmenting creativity. PR arm Citizen Relations mines huge data sources, using AI to gather conversational intelligence, identify trends and create suggested content and reports. We Are Social is using an AI-powered measurement and attribution tool to automate reporting. Branding agency Mekanism uses AI to help prepare pitches for potential clients with creative ideas and visuals. AI also helps Mekanism predict both the questions they might be asked about a proposal and the responses a competitor might give. Influencer marketing specialist Kobe’s AI-driven management system creates more efficient influencer plans for brands using a wide range of data including historical pricing, followership size, engagement rates and more to increase campaign effectiveness.
On the media side, companies find themselves exploring the intersection of generative AI and the ad server. “The creative brief says here’s the audience we’re talking to and here’s what we want to accomplish, and then we ask ChatGPT to create ad copy for target x, with this particular emotion and within these defined parameters,” Devon MacDonald, president of media agency Cairns Oneil, explains about their use of AI. “It produces headlines for us, which we then optimize by putting them out on the internet to figure out which ones are good, which ones are bad. We run with the winner and tell ChatGPT which was most effective. And it does it again, so that those two systems talk to each other and learn from each other to create high performing copy.”
On the client side, British Columbia’s tourism office, Destination BC, is showing real leadership. A historically a data-rich organization and with a mandate to promote the entire province as a travel destination, it supports over 19,000 tourist businesses and manages 130 visitor centres across the province.
AI is helping it supercharge the mountain of data it’s sitting on, explains Maya Lange, the crown corporation’s vice president of global marketing. “Tourism is ripe for AI. The most immediate opportunities are in marketing. But there are two other arms to our organization. One looks at destination management, which means the building of experiences and improving access to various regions and areas around the province. The other is research and analytics. We’re using it to help us be better at predictive modelling and forecasting, so that we can ultimately generate more leads to the businesses we support.”
As part of their lead generation effort, Lange’s team is using AI to understand what images from their vast library generate an interaction. Says Lange, “It helps us see which ones are performing best. And then we’re able to use those insights to create better content.” To keep things fresh, Lange and her team are looking at how AI can help build a “destination library” that tourists can access themselves for trip planning purposes.
Destination BC is also setting an example in the way it collaborates with its agencies on how AI can enhance content creation and brand messaging. For example Lange recently invited Zulu Alpha Kilo and her media and web agencies to join her team of 60 marketers at workshops facilitated by Google to look at the application of AI to content creation and deployment. “I have teams that spend a lot of time writing content for our website and for our other owned channels. We are encouraging them to use these tools to get a first draft. It saves time in people’s workflow. And then you can proofread, edit copy or fact check. I think that’s what’s got people most excited. The increase in productivity it will create is our biggest opportunity with this technology,” she says.
As wholeheartedly as organizations like Destination BC or Plus Company are embracing the promises of AI, it is still very early days. Very few of the marketers that strategy approached for this article were able to participate simply because it’s still too early for them to share any meaningful results. But the pressure is on to harness this technology that many of their employees and customers are already tinkering with.
