Artificial intelligence is getting cleverer and, at long last, it may be the means by which marketing folks finally find out which half of their marketing budget is working. The micro-targeting Facebook and other social media allow and the subsequent tracking online of consumer behaviour means data-driven marketing is at last a reality.
The trouble now is which tool to buy and how to use it in an integrated manner. There are still lots of emerging options out there and marketing teams are, I am sure, awash in vendor proposals for the magic that said tool will make happen. But will those marketing teams have sound judgement in making the purchase? Andrew Stephen, a professor in marketing at the University of Oxford’s Saïd Business School, is of the opinion,
“Like any technology that comes into marketing, we often find executives succumb to the ‘shiny new toy syndrome’ and put technology innovation ahead of value-creation, purpose-based and customer-driven innovation that can be facilitated by new technologies.”
I would love, as a procurement person, to be confident these exposures to vendor hyperbole were happening with a procurement person in the room but I know this is often not the case. Nevertheless, it is vital marketing folks are commercially savvy when it comes to assessing what tools will assist in achieving business aims. It seems this topic is, like articles about AI, also popular. The UK’s Marketing Weekly has just concluded its Festival of Marketing conference at which Steffan Aquarone, consultant head of best practice reports at Econsultancy gave the following advice to marketeers looking to buy new toys…errrm…tech:
- Dig deeper than the sales pitch and ask questions about how the tech works;
- Consider what the supplier is asking for. If it’s a one way ask, they may want your data for their purposes rather than yours;
- Think about the tech stack. Are there smaller components or microservices that can co-exist with your existing tech investments?;
- Don’t fall for protracted roll-outs – things should be ready to play with now:
- Check that you and learn as you go, rather than having to invest significant training time and/or expense. (my paraphrasing)
To this list, I would add two more pieces of advice:
- Make sure you get what you are buying in writing.
- If it’s a pilot, think about how the risks change once the pilot if finished and how that is reflected in the paperwork. Differentiate the risks between pilot and production systems.
- Many vendors will want you to use their contract terms as their commercial offer is likely covered by the contract. If you agree, make sure your risks are covered in the paperwork – don’t just sign.
- Document what happens if the product doesn’t give you the benefits you expect after a period of time.
- Think, in particular, of how you exit this relationship. It will be easy to lock yourself into a technology space that is still emerging. Imagine if you had committed to the Nokia 3310 as your mobile marketing device instead of waiting for the iPhone? Same applies here. What AI offers marketing WILL change in the very short term. Make sure you can extricate yourself from these early experimental forays and that what you want to walk away with is documented.
The only way to learn is to experiment. But by putting on training wheels, maybe we will prevent a few scraped knees.