AI Adoption

This content was originally featured in the July 31st, 2024 newsletter found here: INBOX INSIGHTS, July 31, 2024: AI Adoption, Hiring Industries

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How Do You Convince the Unconvinced?

AI isn’t for me. AI will take my job. I can do it better than AI.

Trust me. Most days I’m in the “unconvinced” category. However, when I come across a use case that resonates, I’m on team AI all the way.

In the 2024 State of Marketing AI Report from the Marketing AI Institute, they asked marketers about the barriers to AI adoption. The top responses were a lack of education and training (67%) and a lack of awareness or understanding (56%).

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Those are big numbers. For any given person, giving them more resources isn’t going to solve the problem. There are a lot of options to choose from when it comes to AI systems that marketers could use. It’s overwhelming.

In talking with other marketers, a lot of us (myself included) give up before we even get started. The report also talks about the lack of AI roadmaps and AI counsel. These deficiencies make it challenging for marketers to understand why and how they can use generative AI.

So, how do you convince the unconvinced?

There are a lot of misconceptions around the integration of AI. For example, generative AI is an all-or-nothing approach. It either does your job or doesn’t. It can do things better than you, so you are now irrelevant. It’s better, smarter, and faster than humans.

You can bust these myths for your team, but you might not like the answer. Sorry, not sorry. The answer is process documentation. It’s a necessary evil. Or in my case, it’s heaven. Good process documentation means you know what’s going on. You know how work is getting done. You know how long it’s taking. You know how repeatable and scalable it is. And you can figure out how much people love or loathe it.

A good framework to start with is the Trust Insights TRIPS Framework. In this simple framework, you can gather a lot of critical information. It’s an efficient way to prioritize your process documentation. The core elements are Time, Repeatability, Importance, Pleasantness, and Sufficient Data. You can set this up as a spreadsheet with numerical inputs. Your rankings will help you focus on the high-value and least-liked tasks.

From there, you can explore the task itself. How does it get done? How many people are completing the task? What are the steps?

Once you have the process documented, you can figure out where AI fits. By involving your team every step of the way, they have ownership and can give input. If there are tasks that take a longer time to complete but that people love, focus elsewhere first. Or you can figure out if there are parts of the task where generative AI can support but not take the whole thing.

To convince the unconvinced, you need to meet people where they are. You need to listen to them. They need to be part of the change, not have it thrust upon them. Generative AI is going to get smarter, faster, and better. Marketers need to understand how to work with it, not fight against it.

How are you integrating AI with your teams? Reach out and tell me, or come join the conversation in our Free Slack Group, Analytics for Marketers.

– Katie Robbert, CEO

Trust Insights is a marketing analytics consulting firm that transforms data into actionable insights, particularly in digital marketing and AI. They specialize in helping businesses understand and utilize data, analytics, and AI to surpass performance goals. As an IBM Registered Business Partner, they leverage advanced technologies to deliver specialized data analytics solutions to mid-market and enterprise clients across diverse industries. Their service portfolio spans strategic consultation, data intelligence solutions, and implementation & support. Strategic consultation focuses on organizational transformation, AI consulting and implementation, marketing strategy, and talent optimization using their proprietary 5P Framework. Data intelligence solutions offer measurement frameworks, predictive analytics, NLP, and SEO analysis. Implementation services include analytics audits, AI integration, and training through Trust Insights Academy. Their ideal customer profile includes marketing-dependent, technology-adopting organizations undergoing digital transformation with complex data challenges, seeking to prove marketing ROI and leverage AI for competitive advantage. Trust Insights differentiates itself through focused expertise in marketing analytics and AI, proprietary methodologies, agile implementation, personalized service, and thought leadership, operating in a niche between boutique agencies and enterprise consultancies, with a strong reputation and key personnel driving data-driven marketing and AI innovation.