In the first half of 2020, generative artificial intelligence (AI) has gained considerable attention, captured the public’s attention and created a buzz in a variety of industries, including marketing and advertising.
AI market is growing
By 2022, total global enterprise investment in artificial intelligence (AI) reached nearly USD 92 billion. In 2023, the global AI market was worth USD 142.3 billion, and is expected to reach approximately half a trillion USD in 2024 and USD 1.5 trillion in 2030. Much of this funding comes from interest in startups focused on AI technologies. These investments are mainly aimed at helping companies focused on chatbots and generative AI.
Marketing quickly recognised the opportunity
The creative possibilities offered by AI have quickly become of interest to marketers who believe that using AI can lead to more cost-effective, faster and virtually limitless methods of product promotion. According to statista.com, one-fifth of brand marketers in the United States surveyed in early 2023 said the main goal of their most recent AI deployment was to improve creative content production. Seven in 10 marketers also said they were most excited about implementing AI in marketing because of its ability to conduct rapid market research with potential and existing customers.
Advantages of using AI in marketing by brands in the US in March 2023:
Source: statista.comAI benefits for advertising
An effective ad is one that resonates with consumers, and it is AI that can reveal the context in which an advertiser’s message can reach the consumer’s heart and resonate with their needs.
But artificial intelligence is also finding huge application in solving other challenges. It can help marketers with an incredibly wide range of activities, whether it is generating creative graphics for advertising, streamlining internal processes, making better decisions by analysing big data, increasing interactivity and better personalisation, simplifying and improving user experience, increasing consumer engagement across multiple channels, optimising content or better measurement and targeting. With cross-screen analytics and targeting, advertisers can find audiences where they live and work and know which ads were served to viewers and when, reducing accidental duplication and its impact on reach and engagement.
Another advantage of AI is cost-effectiveness. Creating ads is a complex and expensive process. Many companies are finding that using generative AI can help reduce the financial and time overhead spent on marketing and advertising.
Current use of AI in marketing
The Artificial Intelligence (AI) Marketing Benchmark Report 2023, which aimed to gain greater insight into the impact of AI on marketing today, summarises the views of more than 2,700 marketing agencies, brands and other relevant experts on the current state of AI-enabled marketing and includes forecasts for how it will evolve. What does the current situation look like according to this document?
- 61.4% of marketers use AI in their marketing activities.
- 44.4% of marketers used AI in creating content.
- The most commonly used AI tool by marketers is Jasper.ai (32.8%)
- 54.5% is optimistic that AI is likely to significantly improve their marketing activities.
- 71.2% of respondents believe that AI can do a better job than a human.
- 19.2% of respondents spend more than 40% of their marketing budget on AI-driven campaigns.
- The ChatGPT app reached an estimated 100 million monthly active users in January 2023, just two months after its launch, making it the fastest-growing consumer app in history.
- More than 60% of respondents plan to use AI or ML in their campaigns.
- 42.2% of respondents believe that if AI took control of marketing operations, high-level strategy and decision-making tasks would remain with human marketers.
- The main reason why respondents do not use AI yet (41.9%) is lack of understanding and high implementation costs (23.7%).
Watermark to distinguish AI-generated works
As more and more brands have started to use generative AI to create more ads, the question has arisen whether people have to know that the ad is generated by AI. In July 2023, the White House reported that a group of major US AI companies (including Amazon, Anthropic, Meta, Google, Inflection and OpenAI) had committed to a series of rules to ensure the safety of the technology, which includes, among other things, watermarking content created using AI tools. These measures were motivated by concerns about the negative social impact that could arise, for example, if systems such as ChatGPT were misused to spread misinformation. This rule could therefore theoretically apply to AI-generated advertisements. There is also to be an EU AI authority to oversee compliance with the new rules (in addition to national supervisory authorities).
AI in TV advertising
Despite the huge increase in competition from streaming services and social networks, linear TV is still the true advertising queen due to its large reach, perceived quality and long-form video. However, there are opportunities for improvement, especially when combining TV and digital campaigns. Artificial intelligence offers a helping hand: big data and predictive analytics can not only reduce frequency imbalance but also help ensure that ads are delivered at times when people are most likely to watch them. Campaigns targeting TV can combine linear TV viewership data with digital viewership data and then analyse it through AI tools for optimal predictive ad delivery. AI can thus predictively optimise audience segmentation when buying media space.
In addition to improvements in media space buying, AI also offers a wide range of creative opportunities, and many brands have already started to take advantage of this in their ads. Let’s take a look at a few examples.
Ito En (Japan)
Beverage producer Ito En has placed a character created by artificial intelligence in a TV ad for its Oi Ocha Katekin Ryokucha green tea drink. According to AI Model Inc., the company that produced the ad, it is the first TV ad in Japan to use an AI-generated “actor”. The ad, which has been airing since early September, shows an older woman holding the product and saying, “I’ll start now for my future self,” before turning into a young woman.
The company also used AI to create the packaging design for a series of green tea drinks in plastic bottles, and subsequently evaluated this, noting that with the use of AI, they were able to consider three times the usual number of images within a short timeframe.
BMW 8 Series Gran Coupé
The BMV in this ad isn’t just an elite car that catches everyone’s eye. It’s a spectacular work of art designed by artificial intelligence...
Video: BMW – The Ultimate AI Masterpiece
Swiff Life Select (05/2023)
The financial advisory company Fincentrum & Swiss Life Select has changed its name to Swiss Life Select as of 1 May 2023 and its real estate subsidiary to Swiss Life Select Reality. The brand unification was accompanied by a massive marketing campaign. The advertising spot, created by the agency Ydeal, combines real footage with images styled and created using artificial intelligence. The live-action part symbolises the state of the now and the recent past, while the transition to the virtual world depicts the vision that each of us should pursue and the associated happy climax of the story.
The agency divided the video production into three parts. “In pre-production, the most challenging part was matching the AI capabilities of Stable Diffusion with what we needed to actually shoot and what would be easier to tackle in post-production. The biggest complication was figuring out how to get a stylisation that doesn’t just look like a filter and is also stable. We ended up moving away from the original style of the Midjourney AI tool to some extent because it was too realistic. Everything is mostly based on Dreamshaper, our Lora trained on Midjourney and a few offsets,” commented Martin Komárek, Client Service & Product Director at Ydeal.
Video: Swiss Life Select - TV spot
Cosabella
Cosabella, a brand that champions fine lace and sumptuous silk, decided to get personal and created AI-powered ad campaigns that are on the same page with female consumers. The ad spot below was created based on Albert.ai’s designs:
Video: Cosabella – Inspired by the Modern Woman
Adobe
Adobe launched a new ad in October 2023, showcasing the capabilities of Firefly, its collection of generative AI models. The ad focuses on the Generative Fill tool, which was released in beta in May and is now generally available. It allows users to add, extend or remove content from images in Adobe Photoshop using text-based instructions. The prestigious promotion also allowed Adobe to show its AI leadership against competitors such as OpenAI’s DALL-E in the increasingly competitive generative design space.
Video: Adobe – Photoshop and Firefly
Nike
Nike also used artificial intelligence to create an ad campaign called “Never Done Evolving” featuring Serena Williams. They created an AI-generated match between Serena’s younger self, specifically her first Grand Slam in 1999, and a more modern version of her from the 2017 Australian Open.
This eight-minute video ad, which won the Digital Craft Grand Prix at the Cannes Lions Festival, commemorated Nike’s 50th anniversary.
Video: Nike – Never Done Evolving
Concerns about using AI
The development of generative artificial intelligence is not without a certain amount of concern. The main concerns of US marketers related to AI stem from the cost of its implementation, as well as legal vulnerability and privacy issues.
There is also the problem of “attempts” to use artificial intelligence to create ads by ordinary users. The problem is low quality and often rather comical, sometimes bizarre results due to unnatural faces or strange characters, often with multiple fingers. Plus the fact that unsuccessful ads of this type (for example for Mc’Donalds) can damage the brand.
AI before the courts
The idea of using artificial intelligence to steal celebrity likenesses is a relatively new phenomenon, so the legal implications are still being worked out. Celebrities can sue over the use of their name and likeness without consent, but most such cases have so far been settled by a demand to stop and withdraw the ad.
In October 2023, Tom Hanks, for example, spoke out against the misuse of AI on his Instagram profile. His face and voice - created by AI - appeared in a dental insurance advert without his knowledge or permission.
Similar problems have been faced by Bruce Willis in connection with a Russian communications technology ad or by Indian actor Anil Kapoor. Keira Knightley has also come out strongly against AI.
American actress Scarlett Johansson even recently sued an AI app developer for unauthorised use of her voice and face in online advertising.
It is therefore clear that the moral, ethical and legal issues surrounding artificial intelligence need to be thoroughly addressed in the future.
AI has a future
Despite the initial hiccups and unresolved issues that are common and expected when introducing any new technology, it is clear that AI is a powerful strategic weapon and a unique opportunity in marketing and advertising. And those who haven’t jumped on the AI train yet shouldn’t hesitate much longer.
Artificial intelligence enables precise targeting and makes sure that the advertising message reaches the consumers who are most likely to be interested. In addition, it makes the whole advertising process easier and more efficient, so that the advertiser can be sure that their advertising spend is being invested in the right direction. Add to this a better user experience, maximum personalisation, and a highly effective way of capturing consumers’ attention and increasing their satisfaction, and it is clear that brands looking to make their mark in today’s dynamic and crowded marketplace cannot do without the use of AI.
