The Use Of AI In Advertising, Commerce And Marketing AI is kind of the second coming of software, which has gained significant momentum in the last few years, acting as personal assistants for some, while processing business transactions and providing technical services to others

By Saurabh Singh

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Artificial intelligence (AI) has been making waves in recent years, enabling us to solve problems faster than traditional computing could ever allow. In recent times, the number of organizations utilizing AI has exploded, innovation has been rapid and results have been astounding.

AI is kind of the second coming of software, which has gained significant momentum in the last few years, acting as personal assistants for some, while processing business transactions and providing technical services to others. AI systems have the ability to manage large amounts of data in a number of ways. It's a form of software that makes decisions on its own, that is able to act even in situations not foreseen by the programmers. AI has a wider latitude of decision-making ability as opposed to traditional software.

While some AI technologies have been around for more than 50 years, advances in computing power, the availability of enormous quantities of data and new algorithms have led to major AI breakthroughs in recent years. AI has now provided a critical competitive advantage for those organizations that are able and willing to use it.

Many businesses have invested in AI to improve efficiency, reduce costs, and automate various tasks. In terms of logistics, an AI can optimize the routing of delivery traffic, thereby improving fuel efficiency and providing faster delivery times. It has become a valuable response tool, providing customer service centers with a phone answering service. The usability is beyond just one avenue, one can use artificial intelligence to dramatically improve their overall performance with just the right combination of information and metrics.

In the world of marketing and sales, combining customer demographics with past transaction data and social media, results in recommendations tailored to the customer. For example, imagine a favorite local restaurant, where the staff knows your go-to meal before you even look at the menu. They also know your taste so well that they can always offer a recommendation that appeals to you. By using predictive analytics, Netflix is able to offer better recommendations to their users, allowing them to make the most of their subscriptions. This results in great customer satisfaction and increased value proposition. Similarly, Under Armour, an American sports apparel company uses IBM's Watson and combines the data from its Record app with data from third-parties to deliver more personalized training to their users.

Unlike multichannel marketing, where messages largely remain static, marketing with the help of AI is dynamic: keeping each channel updated with each customer engagement to provide insights dynamically through finding patterns and making predictions over a huge amount of data points. This AI technology effectively analyzes a visitor's behaviour and enables real-time campaign optimization for an audience that is likely to convert. According to Seer Interactive, big brands such as Kellogg's have benefited from the programmatic buying and increased their targeting across channels.

The latest in the usage of AI in commerce is the possibility for consumers on the web or on mobile to "search" for products (or similar products) to images. This might be as simple as snapping a photo of a pair of shoes you want to buy, or using a Web app to select a certain image that you found within a Google search. Myntra, one of the leading platforms for fashion brands, offers a search feature on its mobile app that lets the users search for similar products simply by uploading an image.

AI is changing the industry as we know it and it plays a crucial role in the digital transformation of the society. With more and more companies investing in research and development of AI and integrating it into commerce, marketing and advertising, Automation mechanism will dominate sales and marketing domains, helping businesses save resources, and drive more value to their customers in the long run. That means now is the time to get started with AI, to do so means you build a potentially insurmountable competitive advantage and to delay means you risk getting left behind.

Saurabh Singh

Co-Founder & CEO of Flickstree

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