AI is hitting the boardroom - why and what next for marketing?
Leading marketing teams are using digital platforms and AI to gain insights into customer wants and needs and to transform the way they work. What is driving their success? The 2019 Marketing Trends – Nine factors reshaping marketing and how you can stay ahead of them report has identified some of the trends shaping the future of marketing.
Key points
- The emergence of the tech-savvy 'martecheter'
- AI and machine learning making hyper-personalisation a reality and on a mass scale
- Tightening up data hygiene to create an opportunity to build more customer trust
- Because AI can analyse tone it can 'listen in' on chatbots, enabling analysis of personality and social media and meaningful customer recommendations
- AI and emergent technologies are liberating humans to make better-informed decisions on their own. It’s also setting them free from mundane tasks so they can focus on being more creative and strategic
Of all the tech solutions IBM offers, AI is the one I’m asked about most often.
And why are we talking so much about AI now? AI has been with us for 50 years, but back then, who could have imagined a world in Australia where digital humans, like UBank’s MIA, could help us with our home loans or help the Melanoma Institute / Mole Map find a cure to one of our deadliest cancers.
Today AI is being discussed at the most senior levels in organisations. The data phenomenon is driving this: We are at a historical inflection point – when data is growing at an exponential rate and changing the way we work and live.
The future of AI looks even brighter. That is, if we use it in ways that are ethical and avoid bias. In January 2017, IBM Chairman Ginni Rometty issued an initial set of Principles for the Cognitive Era. These are:
- Purpose - we said that AI systems will revolve around augmenting human intelligence, not replacing it
- Transparency - we will detail when and for what purposes our AI will be developed and deployed. In addition, data used to train AI will be transparent and encourage customers to protect their data while adopting similar practices
- Skills - and that AI deployments need to consider the human side of the equation and help workers and citizens acquire skills needed to use new services
Rometty has also emphasised that companies must “do more than digitally reinvent themselves. They need to act as responsible stewards and work to build new levels of trust.”
Today AI is being used in ways unimaginable 50 years ago. At IBM, we created Project Debateran AI system that can debate humans on complex topics. You could also find us at Wimbledon, where ground-breaking AI systems served up highlight packages within two minutes of a match finishing. AI has the potential to radically transform how we live and work. In marketing, it’s transforming customer relationships with hyper personalisation and creating the rise of the tech-savvy 'martecheter'.
AI is just getting started and has the potential to radically transform how we live and work.
