People get overwhelmed by the topic of Artificial Intelligence (AI), assuming it involves complex processes that require major development work. When in reality many AI platforms have a very simple user interface that can be leveraged to make the system learn for you and discover trends that would have taken hours of research previously.
Easy ways to get started
There are quite a few tools on the market that can help boost your marketing with minimal effort. One common way companies are implementing AI is by having a system in place that helps enrich your contact database. There are tools such as Introhive that help fill in blank contact properties as well as identify duplicate contacts to keep your database clean.
Another popular AI use case is SEO topic tools that can help you pair your website content and popular search terms to give you recommendations on what topics you should write about. Tools such as CONCURED can provide great insight into what is working for you and allows you to continue building on that topic.
A slightly more advanced type of AI tool that is beginning to pop up, helps determine the best performing content and displays the version that is most likely to convert. HubSpot recently released for Enterprise level customer called the adaptive page tool.
Original Source: Hubspot
It enables you to create up to 5 versions of a page and learns which page/pages people are most likely to respond positively to. Over time the page is optimized with AI to weigh the top performing versions and displays them more often to your visitors. This not only optimizes your conversion rates but also saves you time because you aren’t running and analyzing randomized 50/50 A/B tests.
In the future, we can expect this feature to be further developed to incorporate a contextualized portion that pairs test results with contact attributes and can display the best option for a specific contact. This will open up the opportunity to deliver a personalized experience for everyone that visits your website.
Trends for 2020
Chatbots
Chatbots have been around for a few years now but the tools that a marketer can use to implement them have become much more advanced.
Chatbot platforms such as Drift have integrated natural language processing into their tool so you don’t have to spend hours thinking about how people will have a conversation with your bot. There still is a bit of programming and mapping involved in creating your bot but AI within the system helps fill in the gaps and creates a more complete experience. 
Original Source: Drift
In 2020 look to see chatbots being utilized across more websites and providing high quality experiences.
Time Optimized Marketing
People don’t want to be marketed to when it isn’t convenient for them. One trend in 2020 to keep an eye on is delivering your messages at the “right” time to your contacts. There are trends for when each of your contacts are most likely to interact and convert on an offer. For some contacts your email may be the first thing they open on a Monday morning and for others they are most likely to take a look late at night on the weekend.
Platforms such as Seventh Sense makes time optimized email delivery very easy to accomplish. The AI system looks at when people are opening and clicking on your email and trickles your send over a set period of time so that it gets in front of as many of people as possible. And because it is constantly learning your open and click rates should continue to rise the longer you use the system.
Time optimized marketing will continue to develop going forward on nearly every platform available. You will have the ability to publish social media posts at the best time for your audience and even have ads display when contacts are most likely to click on them.
“Smart” Everything
A trend with a slightly more abstract use case is that “smart” devices are continuing to become integral part to day to day life. There are smart speakers such as Google Home and Alexa, smart fitness trackers and even smart kitchen appliances. If your company can provide a solution that can be leveraged in one of these ecosystems it is time to start looking into how you can join that AI solution.
People want ways to make their lives easier and more efficient. They are using AI powered devices to accomplish tasks like getting the weather forecast and seeing what they need to add to their grocery list. Companies will need to find a way to seamlessly provide value and leverage smart devices as a way to market to customers.
We are just touching the surface on this trend but we know that more people are going to be using smart devices and that is a new medium to reach people with your product or service.
Future of AI and Marketing Automation
Fully personalized experiences
When you add a new AI system into your marketing you are trying to accomplish one of two things; a better experience for your contacts or customers, or to streamline a manual process to save you time. Eventually this will develop into being able to provide each person who interacts with your company a true personalized experience.
Each person who lands on your website will get a different experience that is tailor made for them based on who they are and their previous interactions. The only way this can be accomplished is with deep AI integration and advanced machine learning. Some companies are already implementing this technology with advanced home-grown systems that are extremely complicated and require world class developers to accomplish. However, it won’t be long until there is an easily accessible enterprise solution that companies can bolt onto their current systems.
Once this technology is available to the masses you will be able to provide a better platform for your contacts to interact with and will ultimately lead to more conversions and sales.
How we can help
AI is still in its infancy and has a long way to go before it takes over the world. The best thing you can do right now is to be aware of what technologies are available and see how you can implement it into your existing website and marketing strategy.
If you aren’t sure where to begin we can help get you started with your AI journey to deliver your customer’s a better experience and reduce the time you spend on manual processes.
