The marketing paradigm has changed, and those who aren’t yet noticing it are those who are most likely to fall behind as others rise in visibility and authority. Artificial intelligence has changed a lot about how online business runs already, but perhaps the biggest change is in consumer behaviour; how people search, compare, buy, and interact with brands. While it might be a controversial topic around the dinner table, the truth is that the majority are already interfacing with AI when they browse online, so knowing how to integrate it into your marketing strategy is a truly wise move.
Use AI to improve, but not replace, human-made content
First of all, let’s address the elephant in the room: poorly managed AI-written content has spread across the internet like a plague and rather than helping businesses build their organic marketing strategies more easily, it’s resulting in lost interest from audiences. The truth is that human insight is always going to be what audiences find the most value in when they’re looking for value in their content beyond a simple factual yes-and-no answer. Even when content is factual, it needs human oversight. You can use AI to improve your research, to create outlines, test headlines, and help you adapt content, but the insights should be your own and, more importantly, they should have your own brand’s voice.
Start considering AI search visibility
Beyond the content itself, the way that most consumers interface with AI is by consulting it directly or indirectly. This might happen through dedicated LLMs like ChatGPT and Claude, but also through Google and other search engines that have leaned hard into including AI summaries in their search results. Working with AI-powered SEO teams can help you ensure that the content you write is not only appealing to your readers but also to the AI engines that grab and recontextualise snippets from them, often using your website and brand as a named source. This means making content clear, structured, authoritative and easy for AI systems to understand by answering specific questions, defining key terms, and including evidence when possible.
Utilise AI-driven chatbots on your site
Your relationship with AI shouldn’t be just about making your content more likely to be sourced by AI. You should also consider how you use AI tools to further flesh out your customers’ journey beyond discovery. For instance, using conversational marketing through chatbots on your website allows you to influence their journey and inch them closer to the point of conversion, bit by bit, the longer they are on your website. Empowering AI tools to answer basic questions and to direct your customers where they need to go makes them a lot more likely to complete their customer journeys without interruption or distraction.
Consider new AI-era metrics
Traditional marketing metrics such as clicks, rankings and impressions are still useful, but they do not tell the full story in an AI-driven landscape. Customers may discover a brand through an AI-generated answer, a summary, a comparison tool or a zero-click search result before ever visiting the website. As such, many businesses are starting to track other metrics, like branded search growth, AI-assisted conversions, AI platform mentions, and share of voice search results, as well. This can help you see how effective you are at tapping into AI mentions within platforms, and whether or not those mentions lead directly to revenue.
Have a clear policy on AI use
While the public reaction and outcry against AI may be relatively overblown, and more a measure of high-information social media users than the standard consumer, that doesn’t mean that it’s not something to think about. PR nightmares have snowballed from less before. There are going to be people who disagree with some forms of AI use, such as AI-generated content in products and services, or AI-generated marketing materials, such as videos and art. However, some disagree with the use of AI across the board, often on ethical and environmental levels. Deciding which level of AI use you are comfortable with associating with the brand and having a clear set of principles makes it easier to navigate the discussions that can crop up, especially when confronted directly, rather than simply experimenting and seeing how it goes.
How the marketing environment shifts alongside AI and changing attitudes towards AI has yet to be seen, but there’s one prediction most can make with confidence: it’s not going anywhere. Integrating it into your marketing campaign now can make it much easier to make whatever adjustments are necessary down the line.
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