AI has gone mainstream, and it’s slowly creeping into the day-to-day lives of marketers.

Although this technology is still in its early stages, it’s already changing how we work. With the help of AI-powered tools, marketers can automate a variety of tasks, from drafting email subject lines to scaling entire marketing campaigns.

If you’re curious about where AI is going — and how you can leverage it — we’ve listed six AI predictions to watch in 2023.

1. AI will give content marketers a significant lift.

Sure, artificial intelligence isn’t close to writing the next New York Times best seller. But it can streamline many content marketing tasks. Specifically, it can give marketers a lift in the writing process.

For example, picture a content marketer stuck in the content ideation stage. Instead of waiting for inspiration to strike, she inputs a prompt into an AI chatbot — such as, “Provide a few blog ideas about TikTok marketing” — and receives a list of ideas to get the ball rolling.

AI tools — like ChatGPT, Jasper, and HubSpot’s content assistant — can also do much of the legwork when it comes to research. These tools use complex algorithms to gather, analyze, and interpret information from across the web, identifying patterns and trends in a matter of seconds.

For example, suppose you need to write a video script to promote a product. To get started, you paste hundreds of customer reviews into an AI chatbot and ask it to summarize the key takeaways. Then, you use its output as a rough draft. In the end, you have a new ad highlighting everything your customers love about the product — and you did it in a fraction of the time.

Ultimately, we predict that AI will assist content marketers by executing tedious, repetitive tasks — like coming up with ideas, writing rough drafts, and summarizing large amounts of data.

2. Consumers will demand more personalization, and AI can make it happen.

78% of marketers say personalization has a “strong” or “extremely strong” impact on customer relationships.

While it was once extremely hard to create these experiences with older marketing techniques and technology, AI has opened the door for more pinpointed personalization opportunities.

Right now, AI is primarily used to help us “get things done,” but it has the power to help marketers scale faster, personalize more, and find target audiences easily.

We’re already seeing heavy AI personalization in the marketing industry. For example, many tools allow brands to send marketing emails with names and personalized information based on contact list information. In retail, consumers regularly get emails or e-commerce recommendations for certain products based on what they’ve recently viewed or purchased.

With evolving technology and our ability to capture data on prospects and customers, it’s not shocking to think that AI-based personalization trend will grow stronger in the near future. In 2023 specifically, expect AI to be used more and more to create solid one-to-one personalization.

3. We’ll see an influx of mediocre content generated by AI.

Because AI can churn out content at lightning speeds, some marketers may ramp up their content demands too quickly. As a result, we’ll see an influx of AI-generated content that’s far from perfect.

This leads to an important point: AI is better left for the first draft, not the last. For example, AI-written content may look flawless on the surface, but it lacks critical human elements, like humor, empathy, and cultural context.

Copying and pasting it’s output into your marketing isn’t enough. You need to add your own brand voice and perspective.

On top of that, generative AI works with limited data, so the information it uses may be outdated, incorrect, or even biased. To get around this, marketers must put guardrails in place to maintain quality.

4. Companies will embrace “Responsible AI.”

To state the obvious, AI systems rely on data to make decisions. This data comes from various places, including social media posts, online databases, public records, and general online activity (e.g., posting a review on Yelp).

While this process seems harmless enough, it can reveal a lot about a person’s life. What’s more, consumers may not be aware that their information is being used to make decisions that can affect them.

Currently, companies are expected to self-regulate when it comes to using AI. But as privacy concerns continue to mount, we predict more companies will implement their own AI guidelines.

For example, Microsoft has developed its own Responsible AI Standard which relies on six principles: fairness, reliability and safety, privacy and security, inclusiveness, transparency, and accountability.

Ultimately, data is the fuel for most AI systems. The problem? If consumers don’t trust AI, they’ll keep a safe distance. Therefore, accountability and transparency from companies will go a long way in 2023.

5. AI will become a secret weapon for SEO strategists.

We predict SEO strategists will reap huge benefits from AI in the coming year, thanks to its ability to automate time-consuming tasks.

This type of self-driving technology can identify relevant keywords, conduct competitive analysis, and optimize webpages, such as fixing broken links, duplicate content, and incomplete meta descriptions.

For example, Campbell’s Soup uses AI-powered SEO automation to compress 75,000 images in a single day. This allows the brand to rank on page one of SERPs for 4,000 keywords within a few weeks.

The best part? AI is helping human SEO marketers rather than making their jobs obsolete. AI technology allows SEO experts to get results that aren’t possible without machines. Not worrying about a mountain of SEO-related tasks frees them up to work on more intensive projects.

Because it benefits web traffic and results, expect the investment into AI-powered SEO tools to grow.

6. AI will fit more naturally into the daily lives of marketers.

AI is already having a huge impact on the marketing industry. That said, many marketers are still exploring AI and its potential.

Those who embrace this technology — and integrate it into their workflow— can maintain a competitive edge while saving time in the process. 

As AI tools get more user-friendly, eventually they’ll becoming so natural to your work that you don’t notice it. As John McCarthy, one of the fathers of AI, once said, “As soon as it works, no one calls it AI anymore.”

Back to You

It’s 2023, and AI has gone mainstream. There’s no denying its potential to transform a variety of industries, and marketing is no exception. It can help companies create more, scale faster, and build more personalized experiences. But to pull it off, marketers must stay agile as they embrace and innovate with AI.