How much of an edge does AI have in marketing content or micro-communications?
The concept of ‘AI’ writers has been doing the rounds for a few years now. While it takes away the originality of writing and that itself triggers a debate on whether they should be used or not, but out of the sheer necessity of creating multiple blogs some marketers have tested them out. I have not been an exception either, but let’s just say that the experience has been shallow at best. While the role of AI in marketing cannot be overstated anymore, as most of the marketing decisions are now data-led or data-based, the art of writing itself has remained largely out of bounds for writing.
Apart from writing, AI has been creeping up everywhere else. Using the multitude of SEO tools at your disposal you can identify which points in your website are attracting attention. As marketers, we have all had a look at Hotjar heatmaps to pinpoint what is it in the website that is making people click. If your website team is at your disposal and do not take years to make small changes, this tool has probably been a boon for you too. Buzzsumo has generated story ideas at ease to come up with your next blog topic, if not always the title. However, we have not really thought of outsourcing the content to AI at scale before — because effective blogs need enough knowledge and empathy to make an impact. An information led catchy title, such as ‘6 Trends that are driving data-led decision making in retail’ can make the retail marketer catch on to the website, but a story without substance can hardly keep him or her hooked.
AI has increased ‘listening’ to considerable extent. From social media to retail stores, using a multitude of tools, marketers are now able to listen to their customers. The sentiment analysis that runs at the backend of these tools have ensured that the responses are apt if written by a word-wise marketer. Listening at this scale have probably never been achieved before. Tools like Locobuzz augment the marketer’s listening ability by creating intelligent alerts that trigger conversations between the marketer and the target market and provide invaluable insights both before and after a conversation. However, the marketer still needs to intervene and create that interesting copy or post that can drive virality.
Which brings me to the second platform that I have started following, Persado. Persado, takes the AI in writing journey a step further — by clustering words and phrases in multiple combinations to generate effective response. When you look at the cluster of logos in their website, you can be well nigh impressed. However, logos apart what caught my attention was the way Persado approaches content creation. To some extent, it seems the larger a conversation, the chances of Persado’s AI getting you somewhat through also increases. While some of the programmer’s bias may still be present which only time will prove, the whole idea of focusing entirely on the power of words and micro-communications such as a response email, a customer service follow up, a chat-response, an alert, etc. is what makes the usability of a Persado something to be looked at.
While creating the next company blog is still in your hands as a marketer, Persado can empower the micro conversations that happen both internally and externally in an organisation. After all, the devil will always remain in the details… and if micro conversations with empathy is implemented across scale throughout an organisation, it is no longer a marketer’s realm (or even headache) to maintain and build a brand, the entire organisation can build on top of it. Imagine automated AI micro-communications being used by the customer success teams or even the product support teams — which can tone down staccato factual answers and wrap them up in an interesting layer of empathetic content.
Are you aware of similar tools in marketing content? Do feel free to connect to me at https://www.linkedin.com/in/tannistho/ and share.
