Generative AI is a type of artificial intelligence capable of creating brand-new material such as images, text, music, and more without human assistance. It analyzes data sets and uses neural networks and sophisticated algorithms. Perhaps the best-known example of generative AI is ChatGPT, which was released to the public in late 2022. ChatGPT gained over 100 million users in just 2 months, making it the fastest-growing application in human history.
Generative AI is an extremely powerful technology that has the potential to impact many industries. But, it could also eliminate many jobs, especially in the field of marketing. Generative AI’s ability to replace human workers such as writers has raised some ethical questions as the technology becomes more mainstream.
When it comes to marketing, companies are constantly looking for new ways to gain an advantage over their competitors. Recently, a technological advancement called “generative AI” has occurred, and now there is a race to find the best ways to implement this technology to improve marketing.
Generative AI can be used successfully to automate many different marketing tasks. For example, articles, blogs, scripts, social media posts, ebooks, and more can all be written by this AI. Using generative AI for these tasks enables marketers to dramatically speed up their content creation process.
Certain customer service tasks, such as answering customer questions, can also be handled by generative AI. Using this technology to handle content creation and customer service tasks saves businesses ample resources. It also frees up marketing team members to focus on more complex tasks.
Because generative AI can perform many marketing tasks significantly faster and at a fraction of the price of human workers, it is likely that many companies will take advantage of it. Therefore, AI will have a substantial impact on the way that marketing is done from this point forward. Many marketing roles will be automated and replaced by AI, which will likely result in a large number of people losing their jobs. In fact, it is estimated by Goldman Sachs that ChatGPT and other similar AI programs could result in 300 million full-time workers losing their jobs around the world.
However, new roles will also be created to help manage the AI tools that will be put in place to perform marketing tasks. The vast majority of marketing teams will integrate AI into their marketing processes in order to increase efficiency and overall productivity. There will be a rise in marketing professionals who specialize in understanding how to use and manage AI tools to optimize marketing efforts.
Some marketing companies have already started using generative AI with great success. For example, a digital marketing company in Washington state called Enleaf is using generative AI to create content libraries for their customers. Now, human workers are only needed to edit the content, not write it.
The founder of Enleaf, Adam Chronister, is on the frontline of the adoption of generative AI for marketing purposes. He recently shared his insights on this topic with a panel of other marketing experts in Austin, Texas.
"While the introduction of technologies such as ChatGPT shifted how we do things, it has ultimately made our content team more efficient once we adapted. Most of our writers have transitioned from working on purely content creation to instead learning how to become expert prompt engineers and editors,” says Chronister. This shift aligns well with Google's recent emphasis on promoting high-quality, helpful content, regardless of how it’s created.
Google simply prioritizes high-quality content. It does not currently matter for Google search rankings whether the content was produced by AI or a human being. The primary concern of Google is to prioritize content in its search rankings that show “EEAT.” which stands for expertise, experience, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness.
- Danny Sullivan, Public Search Liaison at Google.
So, no, Google is not against AI content. In fact, Google has actually created its own AI chatbot called Google AI BARD, which will be a competitor to ChatGPT. This product is currently in beta testing. With the rise and evolution of AI chatbots, it becomes increasingly important for marketers to not only adapt but also effectively harness the potential of these advanced technologies to stay competitive in the industry.
First, marketing leaders should advise their teams to begin with small campaigns that they will not find overwhelming. They should also only use data inputs that are high-quality.
Second, goals need to be specified clearly, and the parts of the marketing strategy that AI can help with the need to be identified. As mentioned earlier in this article, written content such as articles, blogs, scripts, social media posts, ebooks, and customer support are all important use cases for generative AI. So, start with these. However, you can also test out AI for help with other marketing tasks such as researching competitors, generating product ideas, and more. Some trial and experimentation will be needed to get the best results.
Generative AI is here to stay. It is an extremely powerful technology that has the potential to radically transform the way that marketing is done across many industries. It will also help them to avoid having to do monotonous tasks. The content that AI can create can be highly engaging and personalized. This can improve the bottom line for both marketing professionals.
Ultimately, generative AI should be used to augment rather than replace marketing staff. When marketing teams start implementing generative AI, the output of the entire team can dramatically increase. There is limitless potential for generative AI in marketing. But to get the most out of it, marketing leaders will have to adapt to the technology and train their workers to use it optimally instead of simply trying to automate them.