The Future of Marketing: More Relevance through Artificial Intelligence

The term “artificial intelligence” makes many people shudder at first. Memories of robots and self-controlled computers spark cinematically staged ideas of a higher, evil power. An intelligence that does not originate from our brains can only have the destruction of humanity in mind. Or maybe not?

Storytelling revolutionized: Through Data Analysis into the Heart of the Customer

At business level, the establishment of artificial intelligence in business processes is becoming increasingly popular. And this despite the fact that development is still in its infancy. The new systems have already shown initial success, particularly in the marketing sector. The interplay of data and intelligent technology influences the personalization of marketing measures. Companies can suddenly tell stories that are tailored to individuals. Storytelling based on individual customer needs is a bit like watching your favorite series – and only with your favorite characters. What exactly does that mean in detail? And what are the specific benefits behind this?

The Gateway to Knowledge: Competent handling of Big Data

Data of all kinds is a brand’s greatest asset. Both demographic values and the interests of the target groups help to play out the individually relevant messages at the right time. However, as digitization progresses, user information is no longer a single commodity. Especially for marketers, they are available in surplus. The volumes of data must therefore be processed efficiently and intelligently in order to be able to offer the company added value in the first place. Data expertise is therefore even more important and valuable. The accumulation of observations must lead to insights and these in turn to new strategic actions.

Unfortunately, this ability has hardly been available to date and often overwhelms even the most experienced marketers. The Wunderman study “Future ready” from 2018 shows that 62 percent of all companies surveyed do not believe they are able to derive concrete measures from digital information. And this despite the fact that 99 percent of all participants agree that data is crucial for marketing and sales success, for example. Individual storytelling is no longer a secret to success and the only thing that is often difficult to find is the corresponding input.

Stories create Lasting Brand Loyalty

This is where artificial intelligence comes in. The technology can store, analyze and use information entirely on its own. One area of AI is particularly relevant to success: machine learning. This is because it is able to filter the right data, but also to recognize similarities and create patterns and regularities. Digitally initiated knowledge is thus generated from experience. The whole thing happens in real time and on a scale that is not feasible for the human species. The AI uses this to develop individual solutions and ideas. This amount of knowledge results in never-ending creativity with ideas that are both target group and competition-oriented.

The analyses of surfing and purchasing behavior lead to valuable insights. The stories about individual users can be analyzed, told and established in your own brand presentation. And personalization is known to be the key to long-term customer relationships.

Reveal and Drive Willingness to buy

Particularly successful marketers have long since discovered this twist for themselves. A 2019 study by Google also shows that leading marketers invest in AI technologies more than twice as often as their traditional colleagues.

The vacation rental platform HomeAway also benefited from the artificial intellect in 2017. With the help of machine learning, the acquired system was able to segment customers in real time, allowing the automatically displayed offers to be customized. For example, only the buyers with the highest turnover were sent advertisements and other promotional measures. Expenditure on wastage was therefore minimized. This change in marketing technology helped the company to increase sales by 115% compared to the previous year.

Artificial intelligence: The Advantages in Marketing

• Customer needs are better understood and updated in real time. Through customized advertising measures, all users receive offers that go hand in hand with their own wishes, goals and preferences. This personalized storytelling takes the customer journey to a whole new level.
• Purchasing behavior can generally be better predicted and supported with the right means at the right time. It is possible to personalize offers as well as mailings, campaigns and sales.
• Marketing expenditure is reduced by the precise targeting of advertising measures. Money is also only invested in customers who have a potentially high purchase probability. The immediate exclusion of people who are unlikely to be interested in buying reduces wastage. Less marketing also means less expenditure.

We understand our Customers – all of them!

Perhaps it is time to move away from the idea of malicious machines. At least from a business perspective. Artificial intelligence appears to be the future of corporate competitiveness. To date, there is no comparable tool or human skill that is capable of making the customer experience so effectively genuine, private and therefore also emotional. The mere hoarding of customer information brings neither a benefit for the business or the consumer nor an advantage over the competition. The wealth of information must be intelligently clustered and used in solutions. Only then can big data help companies to understand their buyers correctly and master emotional storytelling by fulfilling personal needs.

Find out here whether artificial intelligence can also do PR.