Two brains are better than one.
When you use the machine brain of technology to partner with the human brain of content marketers, you can do things for your audience and your brand that you could only imagine or considered too resource-intensive just a few years ago.
These examples of what’s possible today and in the future through collaboration between technology and people – and what marketers should do about it – come from the experts who recently spoke at the ContentTECH Summit. You still can Register (free) to delve deeper and watch their sessions on-demand.
Establish a single source of truth
“Your brand is your personality and your story. This will help you stand out in the crowded market,” he says Ariana WedgeSenior Growth Marketer at Canto.
But all too often, that story gets mixed up with a customer’s journey. The prospect sees one personality on the brand’s social media and another in the presentation a salesperson sent them. This problem gets worse every time a customer typically sees your messages before taking the desired action.
“Your brand identity, your personality, your message has to be cohesive. It has to be consistent enough across these seven touchpoints so that the seed of your brand is continually watered,” says Ariana.
It’s a mistake that can cost your brand’s bottom line, says Ariana. According to a, brand consistency across platforms can increase ROI by 23% Lucidpress survey.
To ensure consistency, every company should have a brand management strategy, says Ariana.
A brand management strategy is a comprehensive plan for creating, maintaining and improving brand identity over time. It details the tactics, processes, workflows and technologies that make this possible. It also includes checkpoints to ensure you maintain this consistency.
To create a brand management strategy, you must:
And you need to bring everything together into a central, single source of truth. For business organizations, this typically requires a Digital Asset Management System (DAM).
As the content hub of your tech stack, a DAM should be integrated into your project management, content creation, distribution and analytics tools. It should also provide easy and accurate search capabilities, otherwise employees will resort to their own devices to create and publish branded assets.
But integrating a DAM into your brand management strategy is not enough. Ariana recommends viewing strategy as a dynamic concept. Measure how the brand narrative is being received through social media engagement, website traffic, conversion rates, etc. Then take that knowledge, revise it, and retool it.
“Everything changes, and change is okay as long as your messaging continues to evolve along with your brand.”
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View AI as a solution, not a challenge
Marketers have seen no greater change in recent years than the emergence – and rapid adoption – of easily accessible generative artificial intelligence.
“(Without) a pragmatic or thoughtful approach to AI, companies risk becoming overloaded with random point solutions,” he says Ali HartSenior Product Marketing Manager at Optimizely.
As each team develops its own AI technology stack, it rebuilds silos you’ve worked hard to tear down. Brand management and compliance are affected. The AI tools can lead to biased or inaccurate content published by different teams, all of which can lead to degradation in brand and digital experiences.
However, if you develop a systematic approach to AI across your organization, AI tools can work with your human team members for the greater good. You can use this strategy to improve empathetic personalization.
Ali says you can tailor marketing messages and experiences to individual preferences, behaviors and needs. However, this personalization should respect customer privacy and boundaries.
She also outlines other areas of impact of a positively adopted AI strategy, including:
- Account-based marketing: AI-based analytics and lead scoring eliminate manual work and can better predict account interest or propensity to purchase based on historical ad data and behavioral patterns. It can also deliver more personalized and relevant content.
- Dynamic ad targeting: Using AI technology, you can show ads with more relevant content at the best time based on real-time data.
- Customer experiences: With a tailored strategy, AI can automate and personalize customer interactions and provide them with information and support.
You can also build your own large language model (LLM) based on your company’s policies, brand guidelines, etc. to inform your generative AI tools.
“Instead of just making tools say, ‘We’re using AI,’ make sure they can help you do your job better,” says Ali.
But don’t forget the human touch. Integrate human oversight and intervention to ensure accuracy, fairness, and ethical considerations.
“AI should be your co-pilot,” says Ali. “It’s really important to maintain a balance between automation and human insights to ensure marketing continues to be authentic and engaging and to ensure you continue to benefit from it without compromising your brands.”
Additionally, let your audience know how AI is involved. Disclose how you collect data and clearly explain how your AI algorithms work and how they benefit your customers. Add an AI disclaimer on your website. This transparency can go a long way toward earning and maintaining your audience’s trust.
Offer your customers better results
Given the benefits of generative AI for marketers, it only makes sense that your target audiences benefit from it too.
“AI has enabled truly more nuanced and effective customer engagement,” says Sitecore Zach Escabedo.
Instead of offering just a handful of personalized experience options, you can use your metadata and AI tools to customize thousands or millions (depending on your web traffic) of tailored experiences.
Generative AI can also offer consumers a different search experience today. Instead of asking Google, they can simply ask about your brand and don’t have to limit themselves to inquiries about your products and services.
For example, visitors to a brand’s website or app could search for restaurants near the company’s brick-and-mortar stores, even specifying their preferred type of food and being presented with a menu on the website.
“Your brand becomes an extension and goes beyond what is traditionally known in the retail world,” says Zach.
In a generative AI world, shoppers aren’t just looking for a new pair of jeans. You can ask the brand to show you the popular fashion trends of the year. They can then ask about accessories that match these trending styles.
“It’s really starting to go beyond just a static experience with customers and actually give teams and organizations the ability to engage with different tools and features,” says Zach.
But don’t pursue generative AI opportunities without first establishing parameters. For example, you don’t want to allow someone to create and publish a new paragraph or image that doesn’t fit your branding in the final stage of the workflow. It disrupts the brand consistency you set up the system to enforce.
Therefore, evaluate the generative AI embedded in existing tools, as well as any new tools, to ensure you can put the right controls in place for your business.
Understand the role of AI in SEO and more
Google Search is a tool that you already know uses AI. Recently, AI-generated overviews were introduced to the top of search results worldwide. This led to further questions about what marketers should do when it comes to AI.
Kelly HungerfordDirector of digital strategy and services at SUNSTAR, a global oral health care brand, says Google’s generative AI move shows search still matters. “As marketers, we need to focus on SEO,” she says.
Well-structured content for SEO will become even more important because AI tools will also rely on it.
Second, says Kelly, you should focus more on branded images and videos, a tactic that often doesn’t get the metadata attention it deserves. Google and other AI-integrated services place more emphasis on visual elements.
“Start experimenting,” she says. “Image and video really play…more than just text.”
Third, marketers who operate websites in different languages and markets should create SEO components for each website. “You have to get the engine running as quickly as possible. When you have content that is being shared in multiple languages and across multiple markets, you need to make sure you really localize and differentiate it,” says Kelly.
Ready for the future
Tech futurist Cathy HacklCo-CEO of Spatial Dynamics, says people are focused on AI, but you’re actually seeing a convergence of different technologies evolving very quickly.
“They will transform human-computer interactions in ways we have never seen before,” she says.
Spatial computing is evolving into a 3D-centric form that leverages technologies to seamlessly integrate virtual experiences into a person’s physical world.
With this advancement comes new hardware, and Cathy says there will be more than just Apple’s Vision Pro or Meta’s new multimodal AI glasses. Expect Samsung, Google, Microsoft and others to enter the market. “This will force marketers to think about how they’re going to engage with these new devices… and think about new types of content,” says Cathy.
It will also likely change the answers to the questions every marketer asks: Where do people consume content? What immersive experiences does the audience want to participate in?
But you don’t have to prepare by going out and buying an Apple Vision Pro, says Cathy. Just keep an eye out for all AI and technology announcements. For example, OpenAI’s GPT-4o assistant has vision.
Check out the gaming space to learn from the convergence of physical and virtual trading. Cathy, a Metaverse consultant at Walmart, points to the retailer’s recent partnership that allows participants to buy physical things in Roblox and have them delivered to their home.
Have no fear
With all the technology available and all the data collected from your audience’s digital experiences, the opportunity to use this information to guide your strategy is enormous. It can also be intimidating, especially for non-technical marketers. But don’t let it happen. AI and other technical possibilities will not disappear. “It is extremely important for us as marketers to invest our own time in learning how to use AI,” says Ali. “You may always feel like you’re a little behind… but something is better than nothing.”
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Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute