5 Ways AI Will Change the Digital Marketing Game in 2022 What will AI mean for marketers in 2022? From chatbots and other virtual assistants to generating the content, enhancing user experiences and more, AI is already making major changes to the digital marketing landscape. While it may be difficult to predict the future, it's easy to see that AI will continue to progress and play an increasingly central role in digital marketing.
By Thomas Helfrich Edited by Joseph Shults
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Today's digital marketers are swimming in such a sea of data that sometimes it feels like you're simultaneously drowning and treading water. Then, artificial intelligence walks majestically into the sea of data to serve as your life jacket.
There has been a lot of hype around artificial intelligence over the past few years as it plays a massive role in transforming businesses and strengthening industries. It is changing how we do business, especially with the recent crisis' effect on the economy.
AI has gone beyond Rosie the Robot to IBM's Watson and now functions as an aid to humanity. The reality is that technology, especially AI, is making great strides in market penetration and will continue to do so in the years ahead. It's also safe to say that the digital marketing industry is constantly evolving, and new technologies emerge every day. Thus, there is no doubt that some of these technologies can dramatically change our understanding of the online consumer journey.
We've seen a surge in Chatbot technology over the last few years, and it's no news that this trend is set to continue as AI becomes even more advanced. According to recent research by Semrush, 40% of marketing and sales departments prioritize AI technology and machine learning for their success more than any other department.
The question is: how will AI impact digital marketing in 2022?
Targeted marketing
One critical aspect of targeted marketing is convincing your prospect. However, how can you convince someone you don't know?
Whether in virtual assistants, predictive customer segmentation or smart design for personalized customer experiences, AI is the future of digital marketing in the coming year.
Marketing that targets people based on their general preferences is more valuable than traditional advertising. And with artificial intelligence at our disposal, marketers can use individualized data to determine whether customers will be interested in a product before asking them to pay anything at all.
Related Article: 5 Ways Small Business Owners Can Benefit from Artificial Today
Marketing automation and personalization
Wondering if you could automate your content production and have it perfectly personalized at the same time? Yes, you can. Marketing automation and personalization with artificial intelligence is a great combination that brings out a unique level of customization in marketing. With this, businesses can gain a significant edge in the war for clients, driving up sales and revenue in the post-pandemic era.
Can you hear it? That faint sound of artificial intelligence surrounding you as you read this? It's coming from your email inbox — an automated email from the service you signed up for. It is automated yet personalized.
Marketers can use AI solutions to automate pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, display advertising, conversion rates, search engine marketing (SEM), keyword research, SEO, social media marketing (SMM) and website analytics.
Related Article: How AI Is Driving Marketing Automation
Predictive analytics-driven personalized recommendations
The team at Facebook developed a project called Rosetta. This project focuses on leveraging AI and machine learning to understand texts in images and videos to improve the quality of the content users see on their news feed, IOS suggestions and other areas of Facebook. This project explores using AI to enhance the user experience by understanding what people are interested in and optimizing their engagement with Facebook.
Predictive analytics, also known as predictive modeling, provides actionable information that otherwise won't always be obvious. It is a way of learning about the future behavior of individuals based on historical data and testing runs.
With AI in digital marketing, we empower users with personalized recommendations, driving repeat usage and better user retention.
AI-driven content marketing
Advertisers are finding more and more that using tools to help them gain better insights into consumer behavior is giving them a competitive advantage in the digital age.
The key to marketing and growth is reaching the right people at the right time with the right message. Sometimes, this is done by conducting market research to determine what people are concerned about from a cultural and social standpoint and looking at macro-level statistics about your target market (age group, income, education level). Segmenting that information and developing it into something you can pitch to your audience is crucial if you want to give them a reason to read your message. This is where AI comes in.
Artificial intelligence is beginning to play a major role in content distribution. It helps by predicting topics that are likely to attract traffic and distributing content around those themes with pinpoint accuracy.
B2B companies and small businesses use artificial intelligence to make content recommendations to customers based on the customer's past purchases, browsing interests, and demographic data. This approach compares favorably with conventional direct marketing techniques because it reaches customers with much more interesting information and avoids many of the problems associated with the traditional method, such as having to send out tons of catalogs.
Related Article: 3 Ways You Can Use Artificial Intelligence to Grow Your Business Right Now
Customer relationship management (CRM)
Companies like Zendesk, Salesforce, and IBM invest big bucks in developing AI that can interact with their customers more humanly.
Artificial Intelligence helps companies to:
Gain real-time insights into how your customers are interacting with you across the wide range of channels you use to interact with them.
Automatically assign cases to the most appropriate support group, then use predictive analytics to determine the best course of action.
Use chatbots to deliver knowledge through automated workflows, which can be a very cost-effective way to increase your customer base.
Analyze customer data and identify the leads most likely to convert into customers and help businesses nurture these relationships.
From my perspective, the most interesting trends are machine learning, big data, emotional intelligence and the 3 V's (Verification, Validation, and Veracity). As time goes on, some of these trends may begin to wane, but they are hot topics right now. By 2022, digital marketing savvy marketers will capitalize on AI's ability to read sentiment, e.g., how impressed their customers are by their product. Using tools like chatbots, marketers can track views towards their product or service and quickly act on it (whether that means changing their product or offering a return).
Related Article: The How-To: Using Chatbots As A Tool For Customer Service
The takeaway
The fact is, artificial intelligence is not new. Advances in technology have made it possible for more businesses to implement AI. And as more businesses do so, the average B2B entrepreneur will benefit massively. Come 2022, AI will play an essential role in digital marketing and business in general. But just as important is how these businesses can use AI effectively to provide valuable services instead of simply replacing their human counterparts.
Related Article: How Artificial Intelligence is Changing the Landscape of Digital Marketing
