Since its commercialization in 2022 with the launch of ChatGPT, artificial intelligence (AI) has become increasingly important for helping companies stay ahead of the competition. “AI has taken the world by storm, promising data-driven insights and automated solutions to elevate marketing strategies and reach target audiences like never before,” the Ronin Marketing agency said in a July blog post. “From chatbots providing instant customer support to predictive analytics optimizing ad placements, AI is seamlessly integrated into many marketing activities.”
For all those benefits, the Forbes Communications Council, a committee of marketing, PR, and communication experts, stressed, “Businesses must … consider the many risks [AI] may introduce … From possible intellectual property and copyright violations to the loss of one’s brand voice, there are many risks to implementing AI that leaders must consider.”
All the same
A top concern is that the content AI generates is “homogenized,” Jen Iliff, founder and CEO of 3X Marketing, told Forbes in April. “This is the direct opposite of the purpose of branding, which requires differentiation and authenticity as core components.”
That invariably leads to “losing [the] marketer’s individual voice,” Kathy Sucich, vice president of marketing at Dimensional Insight, a consultancy, told Forbes in April. Ultimately, that “compromises [the] brand’s voice,” Seema Kalra, founder of The Right Thing Marketing Communications, told Forbes.
Additionally, using AI in campaigns means messaging, structure and tone appear similar every time. “Marketing thrives on creativity, innovation, and originality,” Jonathan Kaufman, senior vice president and chief marketing officer at Sage Dental, told Forbes. “Relying too much on generative AI [risks] losing these aspects.”
Elephant in the Boardroom, a marketing agency, said cookie-cutter outputs “fail to achieve humanlike script formations due to lack of variety.” That would likely cause “frustration” among readers, developing a “negative impression of your brand for not providing quality content.”
That “impersonal nature makes it difficult for the content to resonate on an emotional level with readers,” said GeistM marketing agency.
Those tonal problems are magnified if a company uses AI to interact with customers. The technology “is still simply unable to replicate a human’s ability to deliver personalized experiences that … build trust and loyalty,” said Ronin Marketing.
Laws and ethics
Marketing experts using AI should err on the side of caution. AI can illegally use intellectual property and copyrights in its output, Rafael Schwarz, executive director of sales and marketing at TERRITORY Influence advertising agency, told Forbes in April.
AI also cannot “filter out biases and prejudices in its responses,” Elephant in the Boardroom said. That is critical as “in today’s market setting … people care about a brand’s social reputation.”
Personal data privacy also is an issue, given that AI “isn’t programmed to ask for permission before collecting data from customers, thus ignoring the privacy policies of most users,” warned Elephant in the Boardroom.
Another major issue is “businesses may use AI for unethical purposes.” Elijah Clark, a contributor to Forbes, wrote in March. That could include targeting individuals with personalized marketing messages that exploit their vulnerabilities and desires, he said. As a result, “consumers may be swayed to make purchases that are not in their best interests or even harmful to their health and well-being.”
Even if the AI used is benign, “the fine line between personalized marketing and intrusive surveillance becomes blurrier as AI systems learn more about consumer behaviors and preferences,” Mike Szczesny, owner of EDCO Awards & Specialities, a supplier of employee recognition products, told Forbes in April.
GeistM marketing agency said while “the widespread use of AI in digital marketing might seem amazing now … it may become tricky in the future” as governments introduce new laws to regulate AI access to data and its replies.
Unwanted outcomes
Using AI invariably “makes it much easier to [produce] much higher volumes of … marketing content,” Jeff Marcoux, a marketing professor at Oregon State University, told Forbes in April. “That simply creates more noise rather than delivering value.”
Generative AI also could produce unwanted messages. “In marketing, [the technology could] create content that may be inaccurate or misaligned with a brand’s values, potentially damaging [the company’s] reputation,” Ronak Sheth, chief marketing officer at 360 One, a financial advisory, told Forbes in April.
GeistM said insufficient or biased training data poses a “significant danger” to AI users, as results are “only as reliable as the data [the AI has] been trained on.” Bad results also can be due to “the lack of learning from those using the tool and degradation in the prompts used.”
AI-generated results also can contain negative stereotypes. An October 2023 study from Bloomberg Analysis found “image sets generated for every high-paying job were dominated by subjects with lighter skin tones, while subjects with [darker tones] were more commonly generated by prompts like fast-food workers and social workers.”
Additionally, those biases “exclude substantial portions of the population, … undermining efforts to reach the broadest possible audience,” said GeistM.
Operational risks
Forbes Communications Council warned it is easy to rely too much on AI, as it is “widely used by businesses and continues to be an exceptional marketing tool.”
One risk of over-reliance is that marketers lose “touch with their creative and strategic approach, a crucial skill,” the council said. Over-dependence would “curb team interactions, as marketers increasingly resort to AI-assisted tools … excluding several values such as teamwork, competence and other marketing tactics.”
Additionally, “data and algorithms” may not “understand why people may have interacted with a campaign in a specific way,” Ronin Marketing said.
AI-developed content also will likely rank poorly in search engine results. GeistM said search engine optimization (SEO) algorithms can detect when AI is used to optimize articles for more hits and downgrade them in the search results. “[Google and all] prioritize excellent content written for humans, by humans.”
To avoid downgrades and make content “resonate with [the] target audience,” GeistM stressed that AI-generated content “requires revisions and edits … by content experts.” Their job would be to clarify the key messages, adapt the content’s tone to suit the brand and audience. “Hastily reviewing and publishing AI-generated content can actually do your business more harm than good,” GeistM said. “High-quality content requires thorough planning, research[and] understanding of the topic.”
Man vs. AI
Companies risk a lot if their AI experiment fails. “AI-driven strategies that prioritize efficiency over ethical considerations can erode trust,” Szczesny of EDCO Awards & Specialities stressed. That happens “when consumers feel targeted by overly personalized campaigns or when they become aware of their data being used without explicit consent.”
Elephant in the Boardroom recommends “AI tools [be used] for inspiration … But the chief content creator would be [a human to] keep your brand’s tone and ideology alive and appeal to [customers].” The advertising agency also noted companies need to be transparent with customers when using AI to collect their data.
Ultimately, Ronin Marketing stressed, “using [AI] for what it is good at — data and automation — and allowing people to focus on the rest.” That includes “personalization, interaction, creativity and insight into human behavior.”
Achieving balance between humans and AI “ensures campaigns are targeted and relevant while reaching the right audience with the right message,” Ronin Marketing said. “The synergy between AI and humans presents a promising path forward, where technology complements rather than replaces the creative input of humans.”