AI is now the main driver of increasing martech budgets, but its adoption tells a different story. Research on martech performance reveals that only 49% of martech tools are actively used, and only 15% of organizations are considered high performers, that is, those that achieve their strategic objectives and demonstrate a positive return on investment.
This has a downstream effect on marketing teams, as Greg Kihlstrom explains, write in MarTechcalled “workslop”. This proliferation of low-quality generic products occurs when marketing teams are forced to use AI to deliver more volume with less time allocated to quality control and critical thinking.
The expectation that AI would act as a silver bullet to solve all of marketing’s problems has created operational conditions that impose unrealistic performance pressures, flooding lines with mediocrity rather than increasing productivity.
A big part of the problem is that leaders often fail to define how to use AI and what success looks like. Marketing departments must take the lead in owning AI adoption themselves.
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Who Owns AI Adoption?
When leaders are not responsible for AI adoption, they are not responsible for its outcomes, leading to confusion about who is responsible for what.
But even if marketers are given a clear executive mandate, they still need to make the decisions about how AI works within their departments, even if they face many challenges.
Deciding who is responsible for AI and its results is often not the responsibility of the marketing department. Questions about security and access can be left to an IT department, questions about productivity and tools to an operations department, etc., all without marketing intervention.
Additionally, marketing departments are often just consumers of tools and programs, not their designers. When a platform doesn’t do what’s needed or expected, marketers often aren’t able to fix it themselves.
But marketing departments can help guide the use and implementation of AI by becoming more involved in decision-making early on in its adoption.
What it takes to have an AI
Think big when you embrace AI and view it as a transformational tool that can unlock new products, new customer relationships, and new categories of work. Here’s how you can adopt AI in your business as a marketer.
Run an AI Usage Audit
Create an inventory of how AI is currently used by your marketing team: who is using it, on what workflows, with what data, and on what budget to see where your company and department is currently using AI before developing it.
Write a one-page marketing AI charter
This mission statement will give a marketing department a plan for using AI, a solid plan to bring to the executive table when AI is discussed and planned.
Draw clear boundaries
In your organization, establish a clear line of handoff and indicate which decisions marketing is responsible for, as well as those of IT, legal, purchasing and others. Ambiguity as to who is responsible for what will result in failure of the work.
Create a cross-functional AI working group
Involve all departments in AI adoption so no one works in silos. If there isn’t a cross-departmental group in your organization, create one. Model operations and assign clear roles so everyone knows what their job is and there is no confusion about who is responsible for what.
Build, Buy, Wait
A foolproof strategy for using AI involves building brand equity, optimizing AI-mediated discovery, and increasing marketing velocity through capacity investments.
This strategy is constantly evolving as AI advances, but it is important for marketing to master and implement it. Otherwise, they will have no say in their department’s involvement and could inherit a strategy that does not suit them.
Own the AI and make a game plan now
Marketers need to take ownership of AI adoption, whether executives do or not. Marketers have the ability to avoid work mistakes and create an AI strategy with measurable results. It’s important to get involved early in the adoption process to help shape and decide what and how AI is used.
