The future of AI in Marketing: Q&A with Mohammed Seedat of IN4 Group

pro-manchester’s Creative Conference was sponsored by technology business, IN4 Group, the operator of innovation hub HOST, the Home of Skills & Technology in MediaCity, Salford. HOST offers four floors of innovation support for individuals, freelancers, start-ups and SMEs, through to established businesses. With labs, research and design, prototyping environments, specialist advice, technology training and social spaces, it is an ideal place to connect and collaborate.

HOST is home to innovation labs, Vodafone’s first and only UK Multi-Edge Computing Lab which is enabling technology developments of the future, and a state-of-the-art Gametech Campus, which includes the Media City Esports Arena.

Mohammed Seedat, Web3 and Metaverse Specialist from IN4 Group spoke on the Future of Digital Marketing panel as part of the Creative Conference. He has supported the development of the Gametech365 programme for IN4 Group. Gametech365 is a rolling 12-month scale-up programme supporting immersive content entrepreneurs, innovators, creatives and developers. It is designed for indie video game studios and immersive technology startups that are not only developing their product but also their business.

We sat down with Mohammed to hear his insights into the future of AI in marketing.

Q. There’s a lot of worry about AI taking people’s jobs following the surge in popularity of content creation platforms like ChatGPT, but what impact do you think this will have on the way marketing teams work?

First, chatbots, Artificial Intelligence (AI) are not new. AI is already in our lives. Search is an AI product, recommendations, news aggregation, social media or e-commerce are all AI products. These are all autopilot, the Blackbox is dictating how our attention is focused. However, moving forward, the thing that excites me about this generation of AI is the move from autopilot to copilot. We can now prompt AI!

Business data is siloed, but now, marketing teams can prompt internal databases to find out about the business customer, for example, can you bring up all the documents related to this customer? When was the last time this customer interacted with our business? How much does x customer spend? This will assist and elevate marketing teams to be more creative and productive.

OpenAI has an Enterprise version of ChatGPT which offers enterprise-grade security and privacy, unlimited higher-speed GPT-4 access, longer context windows for processing longer inputs, advanced data analysis capabilities, customisation options, and much more.

Q. How do you think marketing teams can foster an AI-friendly, data-first culture?

First and foremost, marketing teams should not fear AI but embrace the technology. Every department within an organisation should understand the foundational knowledge of AI and its potential applications in their retrospective areas. That does not mean, every employee needs to be a data scientist, but having a general understanding of AI’s capabilities and its impact on business strategies will certainly help. Tailored courses, workshops, or masterclasses on AI’s role in marketing can be an excellent starting point.

Secondly, decision makers must centralise data sources to ensure that employees have a holistic view of their customers and stakeholders. Creating synergies between the marketing teams and AI experts/data scientists can pave for more effective AI-driven campaigns. AI insights should be readily available, and marketers can harness them effectively.

Thirdly, experiment with different AI-powered tools and strategies. See what works and what doesn’t. This will eventually refine approaches.

More importantly, consider data privacy, ethical AI and marketing. Marketing teams must be trained not only to use AI efficiently but also ethically.

Q. What do you recommend marketers do to ensure they have developed key competencies and are upskilled to meet the digital skills demand?

The world of AI, especially in the context of Web3 and the Metaverse, is continuously evolving. Marketing teams should remain proactive by keeping themselves updated with the latest advancements, applications, and best practices in the realm of AI.

Continuous learning and professional development are also important, especially when you can enrol on specialised courses focused on AI marketing practices. A good place to start is the FREE certified Google ‘Introduction to Generative AI’ course. Organisations should host workshops that delve into hands-on training in specific areas of AI marketing. If CPD budgets are low, then marketers should try and attend conferences like pro-manchester’s Creative Conference at HOST where we discussed everything about AI.

Also, don’t be afraid to experiment with tools and platforms. Marketers should familiarise themselves with the plethora of digital marketing tools, data analytics platforms, and AI-driven marketing solutions available today. Practical experience can be invaluable.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recommends: “Resilience, adaptability, high rate of learning, creativity and familiarity with the tools.”

Q. What are your top tips for marketers on how they can maximise the potential of AI and effectively use it to save time?

Understand the generative AI through prompt engineering on ChatGPT, Google Bard and Claude. Build a database of prompts and instructions for generative AI and provide the AI-powered language model with more context.

For example:

1. Instruction prompting is the simplest way of prompting; from simple to complex instructions – “Explain the use cases of AI….”
2. Role prompting assigns a role to the AI. This is a very powerful way of getting better responses – “Can you act as a digital marketer…”
3. Question prompting, so instead of giving an instruction or a task, a question is asked – “What are the ethical implications of AI….”
4. Context prompting by giving as much context as possible is crucial, as the results become much more predictable – “I am a university lecturer at the University Campus of Football Business, Manchester. My students join a three-year programme in football business and marketing. Explain concept x to first-year students studying the principles of marketing.”

Q. Which online marketing tools do you most recommend businesses use?

My top marketing tools:

Search Engine Optimisation and Keywords

• Ubersuggest by Neil Patel – https://neilpatel.com/ubersuggest/

• Answer the public and get instant, raw search insights, direct from the minds of your customers – https://answerthepublic.com/

For Creativity
• Midjourney Midjourney generates images from natural language descriptions, called ‘prompts’ – https://www.midjourney.com/home/
• Canva – https://www.canva.com/

Generative Artificial Intelligence – generating text, images, or other media
• Google Bard – https://bard.google.com/
• ChatGPT – https://chat.openai.com/
• Claude – https://claude.ai/

Q. How do you see the development of the future of digital marketing and AI in the Greater Manchester region?

Greater Manchester is known for its history of innovation and now as a burgeoning tech hub in the UK, it has significant potential when it comes to the intersection of digital marketing and AI. The presence of tech start-ups, established firms, and innovation centres is likely to attract talent and investment in AI and digital marketing fields. The ripple effect will be a surge in local expertise, research, and the application of AI in marketing. There’s immense potential for academia-industry collaborations and such synergies could drive research, innovation, and the practical applications of AI in marketing.