The Rise of Autonomous Marketing

This Week

It’s been a busy week for AI and marketing.

Apple hosted its WWDC keynote, a16z shared its thoughts on autonomous marketing, and Gartner claims today’s Martech stack is falling short of expectations.

You’ll also find the best TED talks on AI and the latest news on LinkedIn’s AI ad features below. Oh, and an all-female live discussion on AI and marketing that’s happening today.

The Rise of Autonomous Marketing

According to a16z, the evolution of GenAI in marketing can be divided into three distinct phases: the development of marketing copilots, the introduction of marketing agents, and the rise of an autonomous marketing team. 

In the copilot phase (where we are today), AI is already transforming marketers' day-to-day tasks. Instead of spending hours crafting generic email and newsletter copy or outsourcing SEO-friendly blog posts to copywriters, marketers can now rely on tools like ChatGPT to generate first drafts, allowing them to focus on higher-level tasks. 

Once we arrive at the second phase, marketing will shift from a one-to-many model to a hyper-personalized, one-to-one approach. By leveraging audience and preference data, marketers, as an example, can create highly tailored ads for each customer— driving better performance compared to generic content shared with a broad audience.

In the third phase, we will see the emergence of AI agents that can recreate or supplement a team's full-service capabilities. These agents will optimize and integrate single-purpose agents across all mediums to produce comprehensive marketing strategies and assets. 

Are you worried you’ll soon be obsolete? A16z says not to. Humans are still crucial to the process. At least for now.

You can read the article at the a16z blog. 

Will AI Kill Marketing? [Live Discussion]

Will AI Kill Marketing, hosted by Heather Murray, offers a glimpse into what marketers can achieve today with AI. 

"95% of what marketers use agencies, strategists, and creative professionals for today will easily, nearly instantly and at almost no cost be handled by the AI" - Sam Altman, CEO, OpenAI 

Is he right? Should we all be running around panicking?

Murry will interview an all-female cast on AI’s impact on marketing and whether you need to panic (hint: probably not).

Grab your spot here. The live stream will happen directly on LinkedIn.

8 Marketing Lessons From WWDC

AI and strategic marketing expert Liza Adams shared the eight strategies Apple employed during this week’s WWDC keynote.

“It wasn't just about new products and features. It was a masterclass in how to position your brand and compete on your own terms in the age of AI,” Adams said. “As marketers, we can learn a ton from Apple's approach.”

Here are the 8 strategies:

► Know your audience - Apple emphasized how its AI is "for the rest of us," appealing to users who care about ease of use and privacy. Example: "Apple Intelligence is AI for the rest of us, personal intelligence you can rely on at work, home, and everywhere in between."

► Stay true to your vision - Apple didn't chase AI trends, but rather took a thoughtful approach that aligned with its goals and values. As Steve Jobs said, "It's really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them."

► Play to your strengths - Apple leveraged its expertise in UI/UX design and privacy to create an AI experience that resonates. Example: "Apple Intelligence has to be intuitive and easy to use. It has to be deeply integrated into your product experiences. Most importantly, it has to understand you and be grounded in your personal context."

► Differentiate your brand - Apple positioned itself as a trusted keeper of user data across apps, a key differentiator in the AI space. Example: "With Apple Intelligence, powerful intelligence goes hand in hand with powerful privacy."

► Turn perceived weaknesses into strengths - Apple positioned its on-device AI, a contrast to cloud models, as a privacy win that protects users. Example: "You should not have to hand over all the details of your life to be warehoused and analyzed in someone's AI cloud."

► Reframe the conversation - Apple avoided buzzwords like "AI," "artificial intelligence," and "generative AI," instead using terms like "machine learning," "personal intelligence," and "Apple Intelligence." This helped them communicate their AI progress in a way that resonated with their brand and users.

► Don't be afraid to be different - Subtle humorous jabs like "Apple Intelligence is AI for the rest of us" differentiated Apple's approach. The Seinfeld "Festivus" reference underscored how Apple is intentionally taking a different path.

► Partner strategically - Integrating OpenAI's ChatGPT allowed Apple to level up its AI capabilities with a proven technology while staying focused on what it does best. Example: "We built support into Siri, so Siri can tap into ChatGPT's expertise when it might be helpful for you."

Apple showed that competing in the AI era isn't just about chasing the latest models or buzzwords. It's about understanding your users, playing to your strengths, and having the guts to chart your own path.

For more strategic AI and marketing content, you can follow Liza Adams on LinkedIn.

Today’s Martech Stack is Falling Short

According to Gartner research, today’s martech stack isn't meeting marketers' needs, with tool usage dropping from 58% in 2020 to 33% in 2023. Both integrated suites and best-of-breed approaches show low usage rates.

“The teams that chose the best-of-breed approach and the teams that chose more of an integrated suite approach did not have different results when it came to their levels of marketing technology utilization,” said Ben Bloom, Gartner VP analyst.

One way to combat this? By taking a data-first approach. 

Gartner reports that the highest-performing brands are most likely to store data in a Cloud Data Warehouse (CDW) and that marketers must be part of the CDW decision-making process. 

If you want to get the most out of your Martech stack and you’re ready to evaluate a CDW, Gartner recommends following these four steps:

1. Embed marketing owners in the decision-making process.

2. Audit your use cases so you can align your martech stack to future growth.

3. Cull poor-performing martech vendors.

4. Accept data duplication as part of the process.

You can read the full article at Martech.

LinkedIn Launches New AI Ad Features

LinkedIn is introducing new features to attract B2B marketers, including video ads, AI optimization, and design tools. As part of the program, marketers can now promote video ads next to content from publishers like Barron's, Bloomberg, and The Wall Street Journal.

LinkedIn says its new AI tools cut campaign creation time by 15% and costs by up to 52% compared to traditional campaigns. 

Despite budget cuts and ROI pressures, they say B2B marketers remain optimistic — almost 90% are confident they can hit their revenue goals this year. 

Visit eMarketer for the full report.

The Best TED Talks on AI

I love a good TED Talk, but which ones should I watch? With more than 200 talks on AI, it’s hard to know.

Jonathan Parsons has created this handy cheatsheet that highlights all the best TED Talks covering AI.

You can find all the AI Ted Talks here.