1. Have a Plan to Grow as AI Evolves, but It's Too Early to Go "All In"
Remember when programmatic came out and some marketers proclaimed that was the only kind of advertising they would be doing? Then influencer marketing happened, and TikTok videos happened, etc. Marketers should never proclaim they’re going all in on the latest thing to appear that they’re forward-thinking. Generative AI is a game-changer, but it’s still early days and should be treated that way.
2. SEO and AI – How is Your Brand Being Represented in a ChatGPT Response?
There is a massive difference between search engine results and chat responses. It is unclear at this time how the future of chat will impact or replace the future of the classic search engine results.
When we asked ChatGPT for the top sparkling water brands it presented this response:
We then asked Google the same question and received “About 29,100,000 results (0.50 seconds)”
The results include a mix of sponsored placements that included media outlets and brands and marketplaces.
Also included were a series of videos, recipes and related searches.
The challenge for marketers is that ChatGPT picked up Perrier, LaCroix, Topo Chico, San Pelligrino and Bubbly. But traditional SEO tactics can’t guarantee placement in the chat response. There are tons of other sparkling water brands that aren’t represented at all in this limited 5 bullet point response.
When we asked how it came up with this information the response was: “As an AI language model, my responses are generated based on a mixture of licensed data, data created by human trainers, and publicly available data. I have not been directly trained on specific sources like websites, books, or databases. However, I have been trained on a diverse range of data, including news articles, books, websites, and other texts, in order to develop a broad understanding of human language. The information I provide is based on this general knowledge. It's always a good idea to verify information from multiple sources and consult specific brands or experts for the most up-to-date and accurate information.”
Not really helpful when you’re planning your SEO strategy and investments for the coming year. Suffice to say the best way to ensure you’re in the “conversation” is to continue to use a mix of relevelent tactics to ensure your brand is well represented in the channels that matter to you the most.
3. Good Design is Good Business
DALL-E is cool and we’ve also gotten early access to Scale’s Forge platform for AI generated images. But you still need photography to integrate the custom images you’ll need for the AI tool of choice in order to fully realize your vision. In other words, you can’t generate brand safe images of your products or people without giving the AI tool something from the real world to work with in the first place.
You also need experienced humans to dictate the proper prompts for the image outputs. Think about it in terms of an equation. AI assisted imagery are part real world images + AI = something suitable for use on digital channels.
Marketers need to also understand that there is an entire cottage industry behind AI image labeling that is powered by humans, which means there could be errors and there could be subjective responses to the labeling. This opens your brand up to situations that could potentially be brand safe especially in certain regions of the world. The best course of action for now is to ensure your design teams are overseeing any AI generatated images or content.
4. Copywriters and Editors Should Fully Embrace AI
Everyone is freaked out about losing their jobs. But being a Luddite is never a good path to take. We’ve all seen the comparisons between human created content and the chatbot’s content. Humans fact check, AI does not. Humans structure the prompts that dictate the AI’s response. Humans enhance the AI response the same way the AI can enhance the human prompt. It’s a partnership and a collaboration that needs to be embraced by all marketers.
5. AI for Advertising is Still the Wild West
A marketers best approach at the time of this writing is to understand AI, embrace it and have a policy and practical human oversight in place to ensure your AI activities are brand safe. We’ve all seen how marketers can make assumptions about how the marketplace will perceive their campaigns.
When it comes to advertising, large-scale generative AI is the wild west. Agencies and advertisers must have control over where their ads appear and assurance that their brand messaging aligns with their intended target audience. There are two major issues with this that should be considered.
This has the potential to cause a lot of problems for brands if bad actors were to try to manipulate this system for propaganda purposes or even just to create chaos for profit.
The other consideration is that advertisers are effectively integrating their brand with an individual’s search history. The results can be effective from a conversion standpoint for sure, but they can also be problematic from a brand safety perspective. This goes back to the potential for the “chaos for profit” exploitation angle.
Advertisers should demand transparency and control over their ad placements to ensure their messaging reaches the right audience in an appropriate context.
Brandy Alexander is Managing Partner of TandemTide, a boutique digital agency that specializes in commerce, media, web development, creative services and digital advertising.