This Week

• Long Read: Top 4 AI Tools for Productivity

• AI Tools: ChatGPT, Grammarly, Read.ai, Canva

• Chart: Digital Advertising Behemoths

• Around the Web: What’s Next for AI, A New Search Platform

• Invest: How to Unlock Funding in 2024

4 AI Productivity Tools I Can’t Live Without

As a long-time marketer, I know how overwhelming it can be to grow a company from its first few customers into a promising unicorn or acquisition target. Keeping up with trends and technologies, selecting the right strategies, and optimizing tactics — it’s an awful lot to juggle.

I’ve discovered that the right tools aren’t just nice to have — they’re a necessity. They help you deliver more with less, streamline your workflows, track deliverables, and make you a better communicator.

So, let’s dive in and explore how these AI powerhouses can revolutionize your work just as they have mine.

Read on at Medium.

The AI Tools

#1. ChatGPT: Jack-Of-All-Trades

What ChatGPT Does:

ChatGPT is a conversational AI that can generate text and graphics based on your prompts. It can read graphics, analyze spreadsheets, and chat via audio if you’re on the move. It’s worth upgrading to the pro account, so you can access the more advanced model and the full set of features.

AI-Driven Productivity Boost:

I use ChatGPT for everything from research and planning to content outlining and image generation. It’s especially good at helping you identify gaps in strategic plans, rating your content development, and even giving you a pep talk when you’re feeling overwhelmed.

Let’s say you need to draft a prospecting email that requires a professional but approachable tone and is catchy enough to solicit a meeting request. You can create multiple versions in seconds by inputting the context and requirements into ChatGPT. Rather than starting with a blank page, you can refine and personalize the most promising option for your BDRs.

#2. Grammarly: Your Personal Editor

What Grammarly Does:

Grammarly is a writing enhancement tool that uses AI to check spelling and grammar and improve your tone, style, and clarity.

AI-Driven Productivity Boost:

Grammarly’s AI analyzes sentences for structure and readability, offering suggestions that enhance your writing. This real-time feedback speeds up editing and helps you communicate your ideas more effectively.

With Grammarly, you can enter a first draft of a proposal into its editor (or integrate the tool into your word processor of choice). As you type, it will highlight complex sentences, suggest synonyms for overused words, and even help rephrase passive voice constructions. When finished, your document is grammatically correct, polished, and professional.

#3 Read.AI: Your Meetings Coach

What Read.AI Does:

Read.AI provides AI-generated summaries, transcripts, and highlights of meetings. It captures the main themes of discussions, identifies key points, and evaluates the sentiment and engagement levels throughout.

AI-Driven Productivity Boost:

Read.AI helps you identify what matters most, from action items and critical portions of the meeting to questions asked. It also provides handy coaching notes that include your talking speed (I have a habit of speaking too fast), filler words, and any bias you showed in the meeting.

Consider a scenario where you’ve just finished a lengthy client meeting. Instead of manually writing notes, Read.AI provides a comprehensive summary and transcript. All you need to do is hit the forward button. Everyone is on the same page and can act on the decisions made during the meeting.

#4. Canva: Design for Non-Designers

What Canva Does:

Canva is a free graphic design tool that uses AI to speed up your design work. It provides a vast library of templates, images, and design elements to get you started.

AI-Driven Productivity Boost:

Canva’s AI algorithms assist in tasks like selecting templates, layout suggestions, and color palettes. It automatically removes backgrounds and adds visual effects. It even has a built-in image generator, although I prefer the outputs from Midjourney and DALL-E for that functionality.

If you’re responsible for executing your company’s social media campaigns, you know just how time-consuming it is to create posts for all the different channels. With Canva, you can select a template, apply your built-in brand elements, and then Canva will auto-resize your design for each channel.

Chart of the Week

Amazon continues gaining share from leaders Google and Meta in digital advertising. 

Visit CB Insights for the full article.

What’s Next for AI in 2024

MIT Technology Review’s What’s Next series looks across industries, trends, and technologies to give you a first look at the future. Here’s what they think you need to watch out for in 2024:

1. Customized chatbots

2. Generative AI video creation

3. AI-generated election misinformation

4. Robots that multitask

Read the full article here.

How 2024 Will Be AI’s Next Leap Forward

According to Cade Metz, New York Times reporter, The AI industry is set to be defined by one main characteristic: a remarkably rapid improvement of the technology as advancements build upon one another. We will see new kinds of media, AI mimicking human reasoning and multimodal chatbots.

Head over to the NY Times here for the full article. 

The New Search Platform

Jeff Bezos has backed a startup poised to disrupt Google's search engine supremacy. Perplexity AI, the startup in question, has recently raised $74 million. This AI-powered venture, now valued at $520 million, says it aims to revolutionize online information searches. 

Perplexity's product, developed by a team of fewer than 40 people, is designed as an "answer engine" where users can "ask anything."

Read on here.

How to Unlock Funding in 2024

According to Contrary Research, companies that are still unprofitable and dependent on venture funding will have to be able to address four key areas simultaneously:

1. GTM repeatability

2. Efficient growth

3. Profitably unit economics

4. Large / expanding TAMs

Read the full post here.