Daniela Martucci, specialist in integrated marketing communications. Founder and CEO of DMH Americas.Fluent in English, Spanish and Portuguese.
Integrating AI into my daily workflow has been nothing short of transformative, dramatically simplifying tasks and increasing my productivity and that of my business.
In the dynamic landscape of running an integrated marketing communications agency, serving diverse clients across multiple industries, geographies and languages, integrating AI tools has become indispensable, revolutionizing every aspect of our work and performance while expanding, rather than replacing, our expertise.
When I finish my day, I hear “Unstoppable” by Sia in my head: “I am unstoppable, I am a Porsche with no brakes, I am invincible.”
I think most marketing teams can benefit from integrating AI into their work. Since the options are endless, I suggest choosing the tools that work best for your team, especially day-to-day activities, and integrating them into daily processes. Here’s what that might look like.
Where to integrate AI
In an industry where time is of the essence and in an industry where you’re only as good as your last shot, adopting AI-powered tools can enable agencies to streamline tasks, dramatically reducing turnaround times without compromising quality or creativity.
At my agency, we’ve found that we can complete projects in less than 50% of the time it used to take us, and we can deliver higher quality content, briefs, ideas, and campaigns with greater accuracy. We’ve also been able to reduce typos and improve content flow, leading to better media placement, better social media engagement, and faster analysis of collected data.
This has generated a healthy competitiveness among staff to stay on top of their game.
If you write a lot of content, AI writing tools can serve as your personal, dedicated editor. If you give speeches, read them to an AI that can detect filler words, clarity, conciseness, pacing, and integrate them into your training and presentation.
Automatic summarization of notes facilitates quick decision-making, and AI-generated graphs refresh the visual appeal of original campaigns. These tools not only help us keep track of what we said, who said it, and what each person should do next, but they also give you advice on your speaking pace, filler words, biases, and non-inclusive terminology, and even measure your charisma.
The heart and soul of integrated marketing communications agency operations is creativity and ideation, and tools like Jasper, Headline Hero, and Copy.ai can inspire and generate tailored ideas. These AI-powered platforms can accelerate daily brainstorming processes and also boost creativity, allowing you to explore new concepts and rework existing ones with unprecedented speed and efficiency.
How to integrate AI
The key to making AI work is research. Look for tools that meet your needs and practice giving it the right commands or prompts. Once you master this, you’ll find that your work will be better and faster every time.
In marketing, AI can help you produce unique images and videos using avatars that can reduce production and casting costs and times, producing texts for your multiple sources and channels (website, social networks, blog), but this involves integrating the knowledge that you and your team have to make your project a reality. It is important to be careful about how to use these tools, because simply providing them with information will not be enough.
Marketing agencies work on many activities: creating ad copy, generating content for social media and blogs, creating promotional emails, sending promos and newsletters, developing scripts and video editing, among other tasks. Each of these activities requires specialists who are skilled in their respective fields. These specialists must integrate AI tools into their skills to complement and enhance their activities.
The best advice I can offer you is to use these five steps to integrate AI into your workflows:
1. Identify: Find the right tools for your needs. Identify areas that can benefit from AI integration. Select the available AI tools that best meet these needs and implement them.
2. Training: Make sure your team receives proper training on how to use the tools you choose. This includes mastering command entry and integrating AI suggestions into work.
3. Test: Start with pilot projects to test the tools in a controlled environment. This allows you to understand the capabilities and limitations without risking compromising the client’s work.
4. Adjust: Make adjustments as needed. Continuous modifications and improvements are essential for successful AI integration.
5. Incorporate: Once the team is comfortable using the tools, roll them out across the agency.
Remember that AI tools are not perfect and can be difficult to use. Make sure you have clean and accurate data to feed into the tools. AI tools are only as effective as the data they are fed is accurate. Remember that AI should complement, not replace, human knowledge.
Finally, always have a team member review the work you’re doing to ensure it’s accurate and aligned with your brand voice and business goals. Having team members review each other’s work increases transparency and accountability. It’s important not to be rigid.
Conclusion
By mastering AI tools, marketing teams can improve efficiency and maintain high-quality results while remaining competitive in an ever-changing digital landscape.
I admit that I was also skeptical when AI arrived, wondering what impact it would have on marketing communications when concerns about originality and authenticity were raised.
I can honestly say that I can’t wait to see what else I can incorporate into what we do. Having a super productive team brings our ideas to life with precision, speed and flair, ensuring that every piece of content reflects the brand identity and unique message of the companies we represent.
From video creation to interactive messaging experiences, we have the opportunity to engage audiences in new and previously unattainable ways. I would be remiss if I didn’t say that we need to remain vigilant about fact-checking and the risks associated with these tools, but today, I see AI as an enabler of innovation, pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in integrated marketing communications.
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