Cut through the AI noise with the “3 As”

Jim Lecinski is clinical professor of marketing at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management and author of The AI Marketing Canvas. He’s previously written for Think with Google about how to give your annual marketing plan a makeover and how marketers can become more agile. Here, Jim offers his advice on how marketers can cut through the AI hype and get to the heart of implementation in a practical, tangible, and beneficial way.

The views expressed are those of the authors and may not necessarily reflect the views of Google.

The marketing world is abuzz over the enormous potential of AI, and rightly so. However, given the noise of AI hype, buzzwords, and jargon, marketing leaders like you tell me how challenging it is to find the true signal — the marketing uses of AI that can make a real difference right now for your business, your team, and your customers.

Over the past few years, I’ve counselled dozens of marketing leaders on how to harness the power of AI effectively. The advice I consistently give is to focus on what I call the “3 As”: automate, augment, and analyse. This simple yet powerful framework cuts through the noise and helps marketers zero in on the practical applications of AI that will make a real impact for businesses right now.

Let’s explore these 3 As and see how you can use them to improve your marketing efforts with AI.

Let’s face it: Marketers spend countless hours on tedious, repetitive tasks. But imagine a world where AI automation takes care of the mundane and frees up marketers to focus on strategic, high-impact work.

Say, for instance, a fashion brand were to use AI for automation to enhance efficiency. AI-powered chatbots on its website and mobile app could manage a wide range of routine customer requests around the clock — from providing personalised product recommendations to scheduling in-store appointments. This approach would significantly reduce customer wait times and allow the brand’s human customer service agents to concentrate on more complex and meaningful interactions. Given all the hours spent on these tasks today, using AI to automate them could have a substantial impact.

CMOs looking to unlock similar gains should start by identifying tasks that are ripe for automation. What repetitive processes consume your team’s time? Which customer interactions could be easily handled by AI? Marketers who apply AI solutions in these areas — think chatbots for customer service, AI-powered email marketing platforms, Google’s Performance Max for Search campaigns, or automated social media scheduling — can reclaim valuable time, boost productivity, and, ultimately, grow revenues.

Forget the fearmongering headlines. AI isn’t here to replace marketers; it’s here to empower and enhance what you do. AI augments human creativity and unlocks a world of one-on-one customer interactions that humans alone can’t manage. Think of AI tools as creative partners and personalisation engines that help you deliver new customised brand experiences and impact.

If, for example, a global fitness brand were to use AI, it could enhance — rather than replace — the role of human marketers. Imagine a popular fitness app that uses AI to turn a standard workout platform into a personalised brand experience engine. The AI could tailor workouts, nutrition plans, and even motivational content to each individual user, crafting a brand experience that feels more personal and engaging than typical one-size-fits-all marketing communications. This approach could help foster a stronger relationship between the brand and its users, transforming passive consumers into active participants in their own fitness journeys. In essence, AI would empower the brand’s marketers to build deeper, more meaningful one-to-one connections with customers.

Look for opportunities where AI can enhance your customer journey, from pre-purchase to product usage. Could AI make personalised recommendations? Enable virtual try-ons? Power custom training programmes? Augment these touchpoints with AI and you create more relevant and compelling experiences that resonate deeply with your audience. The result? Higher engagement, more satisfaction, and, ultimately, stronger brand loyalty and revenue growth.

Marketers tell me they’re drowning in data. AI can help us all swim. It can analyse vast amounts of information to uncover the hidden patterns and insights that would take human analysts months (or years!) to find. This leads marketers to smarter decisions, better strategies, and a deeper understanding of customers than ever before.

Imagine if a music streaming brand were to harness the power of AI for insight analysis. The brand’s AI algorithms could analyse billions of data points on listening habits, preferences, and behaviours to curate highly personalised playlists and recommendations. Features like customised weekly playlists or daily mixes could use predictive analytics to suggest songs that users are likely to enjoy. This data-driven strategy would keep users engaged, boost retention, and potentially drive the brand’s growth to new heights.

The lesson for CMOs is clear: AI for analysis can unlock all the potential of all your data. Your AI-powered tools can understand customer behaviour, predict future trends, and segment your audience with laser precision. This data-driven approach is no longer optional; it’s the key to crafting highly effective campaigns, optimising your marketing spend, and staying ahead of the competition.

Coca-Cola uses the 3 A’s

Coca-Cola is well known as one of the brands that has added AI across its marketing operations with great success. To understand how they’ve done it, I talked with Samir Bhutada, global vice president, StudioX Digital Transformation at The Coca-Cola Company. He noted that “the 3 As is exactly how we are thinking about implementing AI here in marketing at Coca-Cola”.

He further explained: “For automation, we focus on low-empathy tasks that should be automated to free up human time, such as capacity planning and building automated systems for tracking and recommending the best team members for projects. This leads to better work, better career development, and higher performing teams.

“For augmentation, we believe high-empathy tasks benefit from the human touch, so we augment humans in these tasks with AI-enabled interfaces, both improving and speeding up creative generation. The Coca-Cola Masterpiece is a great example. This enables speed, efficiencies, and effectiveness.”

Read more about how Coca-Cola is using AI for augmentation in partnership with WPP and Nvidia.

“For analysis,” Bhutada continued, “we use AI to answer critical questions, like identifying which 50% of our marketing communications are working. As we capture trends and spot patterns with generative AI, we feed those learnings to inform and improve our creative development.”

Bhutada also shared some important advice about scaling these three applications of AI in marketing. “The biggest challenge we see is to go beyond pilots and scale AI solutions to drive transformation. A big part of this challenge is change management to enable new ways of working across different units of the organisation. Hence, it’s critical to design pilots in a way that they can be easily scaled, supported by consistent communications that deliver proof points of tangible benefits.”

Start small and scale up. Begin with pilot projects to test AI applications and gather insights. Expand what works and integrate AI more broadly across your marketing operations. Invest in training so your team can use AI tools effectively. Encourage a culture of continuous learning and experimentation.

Here are the key actions you can take when implementing the 3 As.

• Start: Explore AI use cases, tools, and partners that can help automate routine tasks and augment your marketing efforts, freeing up time for strategic initiatives.
• Stop: Don’t let the hype and jargon distract you from the practical applications that can transform your marketing efforts today.
• Keep: Keep the focus on customer experience and personalisation, adding AI to enhance these areas through automation and advanced analytics.

With the 3 As as your signal, look for opportunities to use AI to automate, augment, and analyse your marketing activities. Put AI to work for you to drive efficiency, creativity, and data-driven decision-making. The era of AI-driven marketing is upon us. Embrace it, cut through the noise, and lead the way.

About the author

Jim Lecinski is a clinical professor of marketing at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, where he was named 2022 Professor of the Year. A recognised marketing expert with over 30 years of experience, Jim teaches popular MBA courses on marketing strategy, omnichannel marketing, and AI for marketing. His seminal book, “Winning the Zero Moment of Truth” (ZMOT), has been read by over 300,000 marketers worldwide. His latest book is “The AI Marketing Canvas,” published by Stanford University Press.

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