I Asked ChatGPT for a Marketing Plan and Was Shocked at the Result Generative AI can give us mountains of information on any topic under the sun in seconds — but is it any good at marketing? I had to find out.
By Joy Gendusa Edited by Chelsea Brown
Key Takeaways
- I asked ChatGPT to recommend marketing strategies that could help generate new leads and sales for small businesses.
- The advice that ChatGPT's offered was a good start, but it missed three crucial recommendations that can significantly improve the trajectory of your business.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Many of us expected robots to be a part of our future, but perhaps not in the way we imagined. Instead of doing our chores and serving us hors d'oeuvres (like Rosey the Robot from The Jetsons), AI wants to think for us.
ChatGPT and other virtual assistants can give us mountains of information on any topic under the sun in seconds — but how useful are they?
I wanted to see what ChatGPT had to say about marketing. My business, PostcardMania, has helped 118,342 small business owners all over the country with effective marketing strategies for over 26 years. How did ChatGPT's advice compare to what we've learned?
Related: ChatGPT Is Powerful — and Can Wreak Havoc If You Don't Know Its 5 Fatal Flaws
I put this prompt in ChatGPT and was surprised by what I found.
Prompt: Recommend marketing strategies that will generate new leads and sales for a small business in 100 words or less.
This is what ChatGPT advised:
Content marketing: Create valuable content (blogs, videos) that address customer pain points.
Social media advertising: Targeted campaigns on platforms like Facebook and Instagram.
Email marketing: Engage potential customers with personalized newsletters and offers.
Referral programs: Incentivize current customers to refer others.
SEO optimization: Improve search engine rankings with targeted keywords.
Partnerships: Collaborate with complementary businesses for mutual promotion.
Local events: Host or participate in community events to build local awareness.
It's a good start. However, ChatGPT missed these three recommendations that can improve the trajectory of your business (I know because they were key to my journey to $100 million in annual revenue).
They neglected reputation management and social proof, which 93% of consumers check before buying
An overwhelming amount of people check Google reviews. One report found a whopping 93% of buyers look to them before making a purchase. This means that you could be losing 93% of prospects if generating good reviews isn't a priority.
The good news is it's not as complicated as you might think. People most often go out of their way to leave a negative review — 95% — while only 47% take the time to post a positive review.
The key is simply asking! And this isn't even a challenge when you can automate requests through email or text message. According to research, 70% of consumers will leave a review if asked.
The online platform Podium was a game-changer for us because you can send review requests for several different platforms from one central dashboard.
After we started using Podium in 2020, the number of our reviews increased 250% from 2020 to 2022. As of July 2024, PostcardMania has over 2,795 five-star reviews on Google, the BBB and Trust Pilot.
Related: 6 Proactive Ways to Promote Good Reviews and Supercharge Your Online Reputation
They didn't recommend direct mail marketing, which generates 6x more revenue per lead than digital sources
Since 1998, I've mailed postcards every single week to generate leads and connect with customers. Since then, I've only increased my mailings, and we're now up to 232,000 postcards a week. The only time I cut my direct mail marketing was in 2008 during the recession, and that mistake crippled our revenue until we corrected our mailings.
I've also tracked the growth that mailing postcards has created. From 2019 to 2023, I increased our own mailing volume by 16%. Simultaneously, our revenue has grown an average of 15% each year. This is a perfect example of how the amount of marketing you put out guides your return.
I've also found that direct mail leads generate six times more revenue than digital leads. We analyzed 114,373 leads that converted to sales in 2023 and found that postcard leads generated 600% more revenue per lead ($229.41) than leads from digital sources ($37.09).
There is a science behind direct mail's effectiveness, though. One study that tracked each participant's eye movement and heart rate while engaging with mail found that people experienced more excitement and desire while interacting with printed advertisements as opposed to digital.
Due to the tangible nature of mail, people also recall printed ads better than digital ads. One study found that when asked to cite the brand of an advertisement they had just seen, 75% of participants could recall the brand behind the direct mail piece. Only 44% of recipients could recall the brand behind the digital ad — a 70% difference.
With so much data backing direct mail, leaving it out of your annual budget would be a huge mistake.
They failed to mention the biggest factor of success: how much you should be marketing — a massive amount
ChatGPT neglected to inform readers exactly how much time, money and effort they should allocate to marketing.
In my decades of experience running a business with over 380 staff, I understand marketing plans might end up on the back burner. So much goes into running a business that all too often entrepreneurs think a simple marketing plan is sufficient. This is the farthest thing from the truth.
In fact, most of my clients hate when I tell them this...
Marketing is the biggest differentiator between businesses that survive and those that thrive.
You need to market like you are an athlete training for your last chance at the Olympic gold medal. The survival and ultimate longevity of your business are on the line; why would you market like you were playing T-ball?
Even if you have a limited budget, put as much money into your marketing as possible. I even suggest you find areas where you could cut back and reallocate the funds to your marketing (as long as it doesn't put jobs at risk).
Whatever you decide to do — whether it's social media ads, SEO, direct mail — just give it all you've got. You won't regret it, and you'll likely not only beat out your competition but win the gold … that is, the gold of increased revenue.
