There’s no doubt about it – the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in digital marketing is here to stay. Whether it’s as simple as an automated chatbot or as intricate as using algorithms to curate content for each user, there seems to be no end in how AI will be used to help (or in some ways, hurt) marketers in the long term. When it comes to social media, we are just now seeing how it will affect marketing planning, so today we’re going to delve into the impact AI will have on social media.
Benefits of Using AI in Social Media
There are many ways in which using AI will benefit social media for all businesses large and small. A few years ago we began seeing AI powered chatbots being used in Facebook Messenger. Although it felt a bit clunky, it was easy to envision how it would evolve and be quite beneficial for businesses on Facebook. Instead of either having to pay someone to man the social platform or possibly lose out on conversion due to a prolonged response time, incorporating AI allowed for the basic interactions to be immediate, and it would help funnel the leads into the proper channels for conversions. It became clear to us that AI would help accelerate obtaining revenue, reduce expenses, and enhance the user experience.
Lately, AI generated content has become all the rage, despite “best practices” not having been fully evolved. That being said, using AI generated content can allow for optimization and management for social posts and advertisements using predictive language, allowing for personalized content for users based on search algorithms. Beyond that, AI powered tools can quickly analyze audience information and data in order to improve performance of ads and targeting in order to optimize results.
Disadvantages in Using AI in Social Media
Of course where there’s advantages, there will be disadvantages, and some even go hand in hand. From the onset, there is a lack of transparency. If it’s not clear to the user that they are communicating with a chatbot, they may feel slighted or put-off by the lack of personalization by the AI. As for AI generated content, we quickly saw how the quality of the writing became a concern, especially in regards to possible plagiarism. When using AI to write a blog or a simple social post, it still takes a human to read through and make corrections that only a human can do. While it may save time in the creation of the content, time still is spent on the editing phase. There is also a large consensus that regards this content as becoming devalued when using algorithms. We have always said that quality content is king when it comes to Google ranking a website, so if the content has been pulled from other sources, Google may dock that website for doing so. While this may not be the same for social media, it still shows a lack of creativity which becomes apparent to users when they notice that the account isn’t capable of generating new ideas.
Using AI to Generate Social Media Content
Now that AI generated content is all the rage, there are a number of tools available to businesses in order to create the content. From Chat GPT, to Jasper, to Flick, all you need is a topic to get started. From there, AI algorithms will generate posts, captions, images, videos, as well as entire campaigns. By pulling data and using natural language processing, these platforms can understand not only the interests, but also the preferences and behaviors of a target audience. These posts can be optimized to garner the most conversions, based on click-through and engagement rates. What took SEO specialists hours to do before can now be done in minutes. Just keep in mind that no matter how good the AI is, using a human touch before hitting “post” is still considered a must-do for quality control.
Using AI to Manage Social Media
Just as there are tools to create the content, new resources have emerged to help businesses manage the content as well. Some offer both management and creation, just to help save time and money! By using a management tool, creators can schedule posts via dashboards, and in most cases, they can also respond within the dashboard or even offer analytics on the performance. While the idea of these tools is nothing new, how they incorporate AI is, and can be very convenient for those businesses who don’t have time to spare.
The Future of AI in Social Media
While we don’t have a crystal ball to predict how AI will fare in the future of social media, it’s pretty clear that it’s not going anywhere any time soon. Forbes recently reported that the “AI for social media market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 28.77% by 2028”. We wouldn’t be surprised if it grows quicker than that, but either way, embracing AI now is a good decision for all businesses. Just know that nothing could ever truly replicate the human influence on quality content, so use AI, just be sure to not abuse it and always edit as though a human wrote it.
If your business is interested in incorporating AI in your website, blogging and social media, contact Blink;Tech today through the form below. As your tech partner, we are here to walk you through to success on the web!
