Artificial Intelligence (AI) is increasingly becoming a part of our everyday reality, and most of us are now familiar with its capabilities and potential. Interestingly, the greatest value of AI is found in marketing, with 60% of AI initiatives adopted by companies being marketing-related (Deloitte). For marketers, AI is a game changer, enabling the personalization, streamlining, and automation of many key marketing initiatives. You see it in TikTok’s “For You” feed, your latest Netflix recommendations and even when you’re checking out your online cart. But what about generative AI — how can it help you improve creative content development in your respective fields? And how can you best put it to work for your brand? Let’s delve further by also looking at various, interesting local case studies!
What is generative AI?
It is a type of AI technology that taps on deep-learning models or algorithms to generate new, varied types of content — such as text, images, and audio — within seconds. In turn, this has helped marketers transform the way they approach content creation.
With the use of generative AI, the content that marketing creatives churn out is not only at a faster rate, but also much broader in scope now. They range from chatbots, to marketing collaterals, to social media graphics, and beyond. Even here in Singapore, a 2023 survey highlighted that about two in three small- and medium-size enterprises are either using, or planning to use generative AI to generate texts, documents and videos.
This need for generative AI is unlikely to go away anytime soon so perhaps it’s time to embrace what they can potentially offer.
How can generative AI work for you?
The possibilities are virtually endless now that its role in marketing has become more prominent in presenting new opportunities for marketing professionals and businesses alike. Whether it be unlocking new levels of creativity, improving efficiency, or strengthening the efficacy of your content strategies, there are plenty of ways marketers can now approach content creation in an increasingly productive manner.
Content creation is now scalable
By swiftly analyzing patterns in vast data and trends in existing content, you can generate fresh and engaging content that resonate with your specific audiences and are closely aligned with your objectives. This helps you focus on driving traffic and engagement, while improving conversion rates to boost your overall marketing performance. Through understanding and detecting the nuances detected in consumer behavior patterns, generative AI can also facilitate the market research process. At the end of the day, your brand can produce content fast and yet, also enhance the quality and relevance of your marketing materials.
For example, Synthesia is a great example of a software that allows you to create long-form videos. With over 60 human-like AI avatars, 120 languages, and the ability to generate scripts and edit videos, you’re able to churn out collaterals for your next marketing campaign on a larger scale in a shorter amount of time. Other tools like Adobe Photoshop and Canva now even allow you to edit images and social media graphics with advanced AI photo editor and AI-generated design templates respectively.
Optimizing and streamlining your content strategy
Creating content can sometimes be tedious and intensive, especially if you’re a small business with a comparably limited pool of resources compared to bigger corporations. With generative AI, marketing experts can free up valuable time and resources to focus on more strategic initiatives or tackle larger projects by taking some of the guesswork and hassle out of content strategy. For instance, automating repetitive or time-consuming tasks such as editing and spelling check, so that you can increase efficiency in the content creation process. You’re essentially able to allocate more time for what matters. By unleashing your creativity towards other crucial aspects like storytelling and brainstorming new content ideas, you’re more likely able to deeply connect with your audiences. Ultimately, you want to be able to maintain a consistent and compelling online presence across multiple channels.
Besides streamlining your content production workflows, your content can also be optimized for performance. The next time you’re working on your search engine optimization strategy, be sure to leverage on generative AI’s unique capability as it can offer insights for improving your existing content, resulting in more coherent and effective marketing strategies for your business.
How have different industries embraced Generative AI?
There are myriad ways brands, individuals, commercial corporations and creatives alike have welcomed Generative AI in their work. From streamlining daily workflow to storytelling, it plays a pivotal role in shaping our modern creative landscape. We are all very much familiar with features such as AI-backed chatbots and personalized marketing on e-commerce sites such as Shopee which generate tailored recommendations and promotional content. But did you know that beyond that, there’s an even wider range of industries that have implemented Generative AI? For some, the end goal is to improve their workflow and daily processes. While for others, this groundbreaking technology has even pushed them to pioneer bolder and increasingly innovative ideas.
Take for example, Trivago’s interesting ad campaign powered by generative AI. Instead of casting actors across countries and running multiple productions just to reach different markets around the globe like it used to, the popular hotel search engine employed a single AI actor to produce localized TV ads in more than 10 different languages. This innovative marketing strategy still maintains unique messaging that is culturally tailored for each market, and yet, also allows the company to improve their creative production on a much larger scale than before.
In Coca Cola’s “Masterpiece” campaign, creativity and reimagination intertwined to produce something quite out of the ordinary, thanks to generative AI. Set in a museum, the ad features Andy Warhol’s iconic 1962 Coca Cola (4) masterpiece and depicts the bottle journeying across different canvases that feature culturally diverse paintings brought to life, before finally landing in the hands of an uninspired art student. Eventually, the company even went on to launch an NFT collection based on digital art from this same ad and fetched over $500,000.
AI-based solutions are also progressively becoming more accessible and adopted by other sectors such as B2B and even education. In fact, 8 in 10 of senior B2B marketing leaders in Singapore intend to increase the use of Generative AI to increase efficiency and generate more content in a shorter amount of time.
As such, leading B2B advertising platform LinkedIn has also begun a pilot scheme to roll out a new suite of tools aimed at helping its users measure brand marketing effectiveness. Some of these tools include “AI-generated Copy Suggestions” that tap on Generative AI to create high-performing headlines and text for ad creatives, while “Thought Leader Ads” allow brands to sponsor their thought leaders’ posts in order to project a trusted voice and ultimately build brand equity. Meanwhile, closer to home, our Ministry of Education has also collaborated with the AWS Generative AI Innovation Center to enhance the teacher-student experience by increasing productivity for educators and creating new, advanced learning aids for students.
Staying ahead of the game
How can we seamlessly blend the benefits of generative AI with the irreplaceable human touch when it comes to producing content? On this note, AI content creation tools are not perfect and it’s important to understand that this augmentation tool is built for speed and efficiency. However, it still lacks the warmth, intuition, and empathy of the human brain that audiences will respond to.
And at the end of the day, it’s about prioritizing quality over quantity. Ensuring that your marketing team is dedicated to reviewing and refining your final marketing collateral is still key in maintaining a consistent, high standard of quality.
Content is king — as generative AI continues to advance amidst the competitive landscape of marketing, its potential to transform content creation in marketing paves the way for a more innovative and effective approach to engage with your brand audiences in the digital age. Looking to take your digital marketing content to the next level? Here at cmoCre8, our marketing consultancy service can help you advance your digital marketing strategy to elevate your brand and drive marketing success.
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