What is Next for Marketing: Artificial Intelligence

At conferences and other marketing events over the past year, one question has always come up: what is next for marketing? The answer is simple: artificial intelligence (AI). From Cortana on a Windows device to AI assistants like Google Home, everyone interacts with AI even if he or she don’t know it. In a recent survey by HubSpot, 63% of respondents didn’t realize they were using AIIAB Canada and eMarketer recently reported that of the people who use voice assistants, over 50% use them more than once a day and one in five millennials in the United States use AI assistants at least once a day.

For marketers, this is an opportunity to deliver more value to customers—from ensuring they can easily find the information they need via AI assistants to leveraging chatbots to engage them at any time of day or night.

Remember for AI to be successful, marketers, we need to understand AI and so that we can provide value to customers. For example, for AI assistants to work, websites must be set up correctly with SEO best practices (e.g., meta descriptions); otherwise, information won’t be correct, which will frustrate customers. 

Also, AI can help us better understand our customers. In the past, marketers often relied on previous successes or “their intuition,” but isn’t the purpose of marketing to find solutions to meet the needs of customers? Remember AI doesn’t only apply to marketing; it impacts businesses in general. In March, the Microsoft Canada team hosted the dynamic conference Future Now to educate and demonstrate how AI can help businesses—from empowering employees in the marketplace to engaging customers by rewriting the customer journey.

Learn more about Microsoft and AI: