AI's Impact on Marketing Strategies

I've spent 12 months ruthlessly testing AI tools for market research at Impact Theory. What did we learn? We identified market opportunities 6 months before competitors. We 10X'd our research capabilities. We turned market analysis from guesswork into science. But most people get AI market research completely wrong. They're passive. They wait for the perfect prompt. They expect AI to do the work. Those who are killing it with AI take a different approach. I use what I call the "Market Intelligence System": Step 1: Problem Verification Use this prompt: "List the top 5 urgent and painful problems faced by [your target market] with supporting evidence from Reddit, Amazon, Facebook, or other real sources." Step 2: Competitive Gap Analysis "Identify primary competitors and evaluate their strengths, weaknesses. Highlight clear opportunities to meaningfully differentiate my product." Step 3: Market Demand Assessment "Assess current market size and potential for growth. Evaluate key trends indicating increasing or declining demand with evidence from search volumes, surveys, industry data." Step 4: Pricing Intelligence "Suggest realistic pricing strategies and benchmarks. Analyze customer willingness to pay based on real data." Step 5: Validation Framework "Recommend actionable validation experiments to verify all base assumptions. List early warning signs of potential product-market misfit." The nuclear question: "What do people who disagree with these trends say? What are their best arguments?" This process takes me from zero market knowledge to expert-level intelligence in hours, not months. In a world where everyone has access to data, the advantage goes to those who know exactly how to extract insights from it. Most are drowning in information. Be the one who turns data into decisions. I built a free GPT that walks you through the whole process in 30 minutes. It will give you a step-by-step roadmap to launch your business. Try it out here: https://buff.ly/WQHxGFU

Fidji Simo, OpenAI’s new Applications CEO, just published an essay that has important implications for advertisers. In the essay, Fidji -- a former Facebook and Instacart leader who joins OpenAI next month -- describes AI as the biggest force for empowerment in history. Here are 3 of her points that will impact how marketers do business: 1. AI is making expert-level knowledge accessible to everyone. Fidji encourages us to think of AI as the new front line of consumer decision-making. People are using platforms like ChatGPT to research, compare and understand complex topics, and they’re expecting fast answers. What that means for brands: Make sure your information is clear, useful and structured so AI can surface it. If AI is answering questions about your product, it's absolutely critical to get the answer right. 2. AI is saving people time and changing their expectations. Just like Instacart turned grocery delivery into something mainstream, AI os doing the same for activities like researching purchases, planning events and managing tasks. What it means for brands: If your path to purchase takes too long or is hard to navigate, you’ll lose people. Assume consumers (or their AI agents) have no patience for friction. 3. Creativity is no longer limited to trained professionals. AI is powering image generation, writing tools and video editing, and more people are expressing themselves with those tools. And some consumers are now expecting brands to play along. What that means for brands: The impact of AI on advertising creation is impossible to ignore. Whether you create fully AI ads or just use AI as part of the process, you'll want to start thinking about how you can still control the narrative but use AI as part of the story. Those were my big ahas. What I think Fidji left out (and what many people will jump on) is the negatives of AI, such as the ethical challenges of granting control to AI or the risks when AI is used for bad rather than good. What did you take away from Fidji's essay?

There’s lots of buzz about how AI will impact marketing.   So it came as no surprise that when I recently asked readers of my posts what strategic marketing topics they’d like me to write about, Barb Girson, RCC, PCC brought it up.   She wanted to know my thoughts on the topic.   Well Barb, as with all major paradigm shifts, just because we see it coming, doesn’t necessarily mean that early on we’ll understand all the ramifications of what will happen after it's arrived.   But here are some of the immediate ways AI is already impacting marketing:   ✅It enables marketers to deliver 𝐡𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐥𝐲 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐳𝐞𝐝 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐬 to consumers by analyzing vast amounts of data to understand their preferences allowing for tailored messaging.   ✅AI-powered tools 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐚𝐬𝐤𝐬 such as email campaigns, social media management, and, ad optimization freeing up time to focus on strategic initiatives and creative endeavors.   ✅AI algorithms can help 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐜𝐭 𝐭𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐭 𝐝𝐲𝐧𝐚𝐦𝐢𝐜𝐬 in real time.   ✅AI is used for 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 by analyzing the voice of the consumer (VoC) data in social posts and reviews in order to inform what content a target audience is most interested in.   ✅AI tools can create 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐡𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 to help spot opportunities to improve products and services, fill in market gaps, and, compare a company’s social performance to that of their competitors.   And then there are some major potential red flags signaling risks that shouldn’t be ignored:   🚩Ethical considerations can undermine customer trust with 𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐚 𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐮𝐬𝐞 and privacy breaches.   🚩AI is susceptible to 𝐚𝐥𝐠𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐡𝐦 𝐛𝐢𝐚𝐬 which can lead to discriminatory outcomes and unfair treatment of certain demographic groups. In the context of marketing this could lead to perpetuating stereotypes, exclude marginalized communities, and/or reinforce existing biases.   🚩While AI can enhance efficiency there is a 𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐤 𝐨𝐟 𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐡𝐮𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐢𝐭𝐲 in customer interactions. Automated chatbots and virtual assistants lack empathy and emotional intelligence.   🚩As AI becomes increasingly integrated into marketing practices there is the risk of an 𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐞𝐜𝐡𝐧𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐡𝐮𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐢𝐭𝐲 and intuition.   Bottom line, AI offers transformative capabilities for marketers …   BUT …   It also presents significant challenges that require careful consideration and proactive mitigation strategies.   Illustration: Engati   Ring the 🔔 on my profile to follow Linda Goodman for marketing strategy and business development content.   #MarketingStrategy #Sales #BusinessDevelopment #EmotionalTriggerResearch #EmotionalIntelligence #Leadership #CEO