‘Intelligence demonstrated by machines’ is one of the most advanced examples the technological world has in the present day. The ability for machines to learn and act upon those learnings is something that the business world has already started to implement. (Campaign Asia-Pacific, 2016)
Machine learning, for example, can help firms learn more about their customers. The proper utilisation of machine learning could enable advanced search techniques that “identify, categorise and gather user-defined data elements corresponding to search criteria”. This type of artificial intelligence can ultimately improve efficiency in scoring, forecasting and classifying.
Artificial intelligence is a technology that threatens to replace human workers for a wide range of jobs in a range of industries. There are suggestions that artificial intelligence could be both beneficial and threatening. This paper examines this challenge in terms of marketing professionals.
The vast majority of business executives believe that artificial intelligence will revolutionise their industry at some point. The majority feel that this revolution will occur soon.
As the utilisation of AI in marketing appears almost inevitable, marketing professionals must look at ways jobs in the industry can remain. For example, it is reported that 50%-80% of marketing professional work time usage is mired in the mundane labour of ‘collecting and preparing unruly digital data’. Considering these tasks could become automated by machine learning it could eliminate certain jobs whilst creating space and time for other marketing professionals.
By utilising uniquely human traits professionals can remain valuable. Creativity, storytelling and execution are just three traits a professional can use that artificial intelligence can’t. Although the three traits can be optimised by AI, it “cannot drive the development and growth” of the three variables.
As the frequency of micro-targeted customers increases, it is apparent that this is an unsustainable approach to marketing for the long term without utilising developments in technology. With more traditional technological tools it is more unachievable, hence the utilisation of AI.
All in all, the mundane tasks of a professional could disappear given the rate of machine learning adoption. However, if professionals can direct the uniquely human traits to the benefit of a firm, there is the reason to believe that certain marketing professions and marketing areas will remain to be led by humans.
(Cramer, Downs, Kudbya et al, Campaign Asia-Pacific)