How Artificial Intelligence is Transforming Digital Marketing

Artificial Intelligence is gradually becoming an important part of our everyday lives. We’ve grown accustomed to talking to Alexa, Siri, Cortana or any other AI-powered digital assistant – we rely on them when we search for information and we trust them when we’re making choices.

Still, the way AI is transforming digital marketing transcends the use of digital assistants and goes far beyond what meets the eye.

AI has become an integral part of every digital experience – internet queries, online shopping, recommendations and the offers we receive.

It became a helpful resource for digital marketers too, as it helps them get to know their customers better, create the right message and get it through using the right channel. AI can help them streamline digital marketing campaigns and optimize them while reducing the risk of human error.

Read on to learn about the top five ways AI is transforming the world of digital marketing.

Personalized Ads

Consumers are overwhelmed with irrelevant content and ads delivered to them on a daily basis. Statistics show that 74% of online customers get frustrated when the content doesn’t fit their interests, while 77% would choose, recommend or pay more for personalized user experience.

Enter AI, the tool digital marketers use to better match their offers to the demands of their customers. Everyone who has ever used Amazon or Netflix gets a clear idea of how these work – consumers get recommendations and offers based on their preferences, needs, and desires. This results in a more satisfying user experience. The right kind of ads can now be placed in front of the right audience, saving advertisers money.

Thanks to AI and its capability to collect, process, analyze, and interpret huge amounts of customer data, marketers can improve their ads and really make them work. With the help of this powerful technology, they have an insight into which marketing techniques perform the best.

Content Creation

AI has an enormous impact on content marketing, too. Various AI-based tools can be used to automatically gather information online and generate different types of content – news, blog posts, social media posts, etc.

In September 2017, The Washington Post expanded its use of Heliograf to cover the demand for hyperlocal content. Its own in-house storytelling technology has made it possible to report on the results of all high-school football games, every week, and provide unique value to their readers.

Although this technology now functions on a very basic level, it won’t be long until AI starts generating viable topics for writers, sketching their drafts, etc.

AI has also made it possible for marketers to identify the most engaging and relevant topics in their niche on a regular basis, as well as to collect data about their target audience.

Algorithms are used so that marketers can find out what their customers like to read about, their questions and their concerns. All this knowledge is used when curating content relevant for their customers at each stage of the marketing funnel, resulting in better engagement and ultimately, more conversions.

Smart Searches

Thanks to AI, users can now get more accurate and relevant search results for their queries. When a user searches for information, the algorithm takes into account several other factors, such as previous searches, location and time of day to deliver useful results.

Digital marketers can significantly benefit from smart searches. Just a couple of years ago, a prospect needed to know the exact name of the product to be able to find it online. Now, with advanced searches and auto-suggest corrections, they get tens of suggestions as soon as they start typing, making their searches much easier.

Even if the prospects don’t know the exact name of the product, they can still find it, using alternative search terms.

But that’s not all. Nowadays people can snap pictures of, say, an item of clothing they like and use this image to find the item on the internet easily.

The Use of Chatbots

Chatbots are game-changers when it comes to the world of digital marketing. AI-powered chatbots are now able to provide answers to customers’ product-related questions and meet their demands in an accurate and timely manner.

The main advantages of using chatbots are:

• 24/7 customer support – having good customer support all around the clock has a positive impact on customer satisfaction and retention.
• Instant response – customers don’t want to wait for a response from a customer service rep, and they hate being put on hold. With chatbots in the picture, they can get an immediate response, whenever they need it.
• Reducing the costs of live chat support agents – while chatbots can address and solve minor issues, human agents can focus on handling more complex issues that require critical thinking, all resulting in better customer satisfaction of the customers.
• Better lead qualification and nurturing – chatbots use data they have on customers to give personalized offers based on the stage of their customer journey.

Some of the predictions claim that in 2020 chatbots’ conversational engagement will intersect with AI-powered automation, in order to automate underlying tasks that are required to completely fulfill customers’ needs.

Behavior Analysis

Combined with machine learning and big data analysis, AI is now able to provide businesses deep insights on their customers. Companies can now have a clear idea of the behavior of their consumers and even predict it.

One of the great examples for predicting customers’ needs is the popular Sephora App. As it has facts on your previous transactions, the app knows when you need to make the next purchase and will recommend the product that you now can virtually try out too.

Besides, companies are one step closer to truly anticipating customers’ needs and even exceeding them. Amazon’s anticipatory shipping is supposed to predict and ship products to the nearest shipment hub before the order is even placed,  considerably reducing delivery time.

Using these intelligent tools, brands can now predict the demand of the market, so they fill their stocks, as well as decide how much to invest in marketing to get their sales up. An increasing number of businesses opt to adopt AI as it simplifies their marketing efforts and at the same time creates new opportunities to attract and keep their customers. With all the benefits it brings to both customers and companies nowadays, it’s great knowing that the best of AI is yet to come.