Artificial intelligence (AI) works behind the scenes in many ways, impacting our day-to-day lives. For those of us working in the realm of digital marketing, the impact has become even more clear over the last few years. To put things into perspective, 61% of marketers say AI is the most important aspect of their data strategy, according to MemSQL.
What is Artificial Intelligence?
Oxford Languages defines AI as the theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making and translation between languages.
The power of AI has boosted productivity across all industries and has improved the average user experience. AI’s ability to analyze an abundance of data and utilize precise algorithms allow it to enhance digital marketing strategies. While it’s driving countless transformations, there are three key ways AI is changing the digital landscape that marketers must understand, including:
- Improving personalization for targeted content marketing
- Enhancing data processing
- Transforming user experience
Improving personalization for targeted content marketing
Have you ever searched for a particular product and then all advertisements you see after that search are for similar products? That’s AI at work. The power of DMPs (Data Management Platforms) allows AI to gather data from across the Internet – not just a particular website. This data then fuels predictive analytics, which empowers digital marketers to truly personalize their marketing campaign strategies to ultimately generate high-quality leads. Stronger leads = stronger ROI.
Another way AI is affecting the digital marketing world is the use of responsive search and display ads with the Google Marketing Platform. This practice is where advertisers create between three and 15 different ad layouts. Google’s algorithm then uses the data that it has collected to create a combination of advertisements that consumers are most likely to engage with.
However, Google is not the only one participating in this practice. Netflix’s most recent algorithm update has brought this into play with the thumbnails that are displayed to each user. Their algorithm collects data based on your search and watch patterns and determines what thumbnail is most likely to capture your attention. When running your own digital campaigns, don’t be afraid to trust the data! Through routine monitoring, your campaigns will be set up for success – whether it’s through these automated or manual optimizations.
This AI-powered approach to personalized marketing goes a step further by creating different audience segmentation. There are several ways to segment your audience; it could be via traffic source, new or returning customer, demographics, location, time spent on your website, average order value and many more. By narrowing down your audience into smaller and smaller segments your marketing strategies become smarter and impact the return seen from every campaign.
With more audience data at our fingertips than ever before, these insights can be used to A/B test email marketing campaigns, whether it’s through a personalized subject line, various creative or send times. A Campaign Monitor report found that marketers saw a 760% increase in revenue from segmented campaigns.
Emails with personalized subject lines are 26% more likely to be opened and marketers have found a 760% increase in email revenue from segmented campaigns.
Source: Campaign Monitor
Enhancing data processing
We are currently in the age of Big Data, which consists of multisource content, such as images, videos, audio and text. Despite Apple’s latest iOS 14 update, which requires permission from the user before tracking them across websites and apps, the amount of data that is available to marketers is still massive. It is far too much data for any human or organization to properly analyze. This is where AI tools and algorithms come into play.
Some of the tools that make processing this massive amount of data include computer vision, natural language processing (NLP), social computing, speech recognition, data analysis in Internet of Vehicle (loV) and real-time data analysis in Internet of Things (loT).
While the specifics of how these tools work is a bit complex (and honestly, over our heads as marketers at times!), the important thing is recognizing as these tools continue to grow, so will marketing personalization.
Transforming user experience
All this AI development is being done to make user experiences easier across the board. What’s one AI tool we all encounter on a regular basis? Chatbots. These are used for everything from customer service to driving sales. Chatbots are becoming so sophisticated that according to a study done by Marketing Insider Group, two-thirds of consumers don’t know they’re interacting with these AI tools vs. actual humans.
In an eerie experiment, Researchers at the Facebook AI Research Lab (FAIR) found the chatbots had deviated from the script and were communicating in a new language developed without human input. (Read more on that here!) These examples show just how powerful this kind of technology can be and that it’s continuing to advance before our eyes.
Another rapidly evolving AI-powered technology enhancing the user experience is voice search. According to a study from Bright Local almost 60% of consumers have used voice search to find business information in the last year. As the world has become largely mobile, voice search enhances the user experience, unlocking hands-free access to accurate data and results. Google’s algorithms can understand human speech with 95% accuracy which is nearly equivalent to human-to-human interactions. With this in mind, embracing a humanistic SEO strategy is more important than ever before. In addition to considering traditional search keywords, digital marketers must also lean into an approach that keeps voice searches front and center.
Google’s algorithms can understand human speech with 95% accuracy.
Source: Vox
As AI tools and software continue to evolve, so will digital marketing strategies. Strategies will become much more focused and personalized to enhance user experiences through content and targeted marketing. Customer support will continue to improve with evolutions in chatbots and real time support. Despite privacy issues, data processing will become more precise, which will lead to more intelligent audience segmentation.
If your business has not yet started to embrace the power of AI, then you need to start now. Connect with us today to learn more about creating a digital strategy that works for you.
Ryan Solecki is a Paid Search & Digital Marketing Specialist at Franco. Connect with him on LinkedIn.
