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UK Watchdog Blocks Microsoft's Acquisition Of Activision Blizzard https://ift.tt/F53EXCj Due to concerns over stifled competition in the cloud-computing gaming market, British regulators have blocked Microsoft's purchase of leading video-game maker Activision Blizzard. The deal, which would have cost $69 billion, was set to be the biggest tech deal in history. The deal had already been scrutinized by regulators in the U.S. and Europe, as well as Sony. All were concerned that Microsoft would hold an unfair advantage in the developing cloud gaming market with control over popular franchises such as "Call of Duty," "World of Warcraft" and "Candy Crush." “The only effective remedy is to prohibit the Merger,” stated the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in its final report. On Thursday, Microsoft issued a statement, calling it “probably the darkest day in our four decades in Britain.” Microsoft says the wrong message is being sent to the global tech industry about the UK. “If the government of the United Kingdom wants to bring in investment, if it wants to create jobs (...) it needs to look hard at the role of the CMA, the regulatory structure in the United Kingdom, this transaction, and the message that the United Kingdom has just said to the world,” Microsoft president Brad Smith told BBC radio. advertisement advertisement Smith also said that he doesn't believe the CMA has a relevant sense of how cloud technology works or how it affects markets -- adding that Microsoft will appeal and remains fully committed to the acquisition. Activision is equally committed to reversing the decision. The chair of the CMA's independent expert panel, Martin Colman, said that cloud gaming has the chance to alter the industry by offering gamers more choice over how and where they play, potentially hurting console gaming as a whole. “This means that it is vital that we protect competition in this emerging and exciting market,” Colman added. Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/TgZ8DAb April 27, 2023 at 04:07PM
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A Home-Run for Humanizing B2B Content: Why Generative AI Can Only Get Your Business to First Base4/27/2023
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A Home-Run for Humanizing B2B Content: Why Generative AI Can Only Get Your Business to First Base https://ift.tt/LvM03Oj With the Major League Baseball season now underway, one of the sport’s great ongoing debates has once again found traction: to stick with human umpires, or embrace the electronic strike zone? It’s just another example of how rapid advancements in technology are fundamentally impacting everything in our society, from the classic American pastime to the ancient art of writing. Those of us in the content marketing space are having our own debates about the true value of robots and automation, and how they fit going forward. The consensus at this moment? Artificial intelligence is going to be a game-changer in many ways, but its limitations will continue to make the human element essential when it comes to driving content marketing outcomes. Let’s explore some of the ways generative AI solutions can help get your business on base and set up opportunities, and why the human touch is critical to ultimately putting runs on the board. [bctt tweet="“AI is going to be a game-changer in many ways, but its limitations will continue to make the human element essential when it comes to driving content marketing outcomes.” — Nick Nelson @NickNelsonMN" username="toprank"] Advantages of Generative AI Content for MarketingWhile the urge is understandable, content creators who are actively avoiding generative AI tools out of apprehension are doing themselves a disservice. There are a lot of great benefits that can fundamentally enhance the way we work and the outputs we produce as marketers. Here are some of the most helpful advantages technologies like ChatGPT can bring to B2B content marketing. Expansive and comprehensive research, made efficient. This is one of the benefits I’m most excited about, and have been most impressed by. Researching, if you want to do it right, can be one of the most time-consuming aspects of content creation – there’s so much information out there to seek out and sift through. With the right prompts, content creators can leverage AI to answer questions and receive targeted info at lightning speed. I’m not going to be leaning on these tools as my sole source, because they are susceptible to inaccurate, outdated, and incomplete information, but I’ve already discovered plenty of shortcuts through the technology and look forward to exploring more. Streamlined content development and production. I would argue that (for various reasons we will soon cover) you generally don’t want to put AI in control of creating content. However, that’s not to say these tools can’t be immensely helpful in the process of content creation, especially the early stages of ideation and outlining. If you’re a writer, then you probably know that the hardest part of creating a new piece can be getting started: sourcing your talking points, organizing your thoughts, ensuring your content will thoroughly cover the topic it addresses. When provided with suitable direction, a generative AI tool can present ideas, information, and outlines in an instant. For example, you might prompt, “I want you to create a table of contents for a report about [X],” and boom, you’ve got your jumping off point to start building valuable content. By layering in more prompting specificity in terms of context and constraints, you can get more focused and useful outputs to guide your process. Scalable experimentation for faster innovation. The ability of generative AI to rapidly retrieve information, build concepts, and answer prompts paves the way for content marketers to constantly test different approaches, messaging styles, and techniques capable of improving their workflow efficiency as well as the quality of their final output. For an example of how this might take shape, I simply went ahead and… asked ChatGPT to share how it might help facilitate a content experiment. Here’s what it suggested:
Key Limitations of AI for B2B Marketing ContentAs powerful as it is, smart and strategic marketers can rest assured that generative AI is not equipped to replace them. There are several limiting factors that prevent this technology from making the human aspects of marketing irrelevant. In fact, as these tools become more widely adopted, the skill and experience of a talented marketing professional will arguably grow more vital and differentiating than ever. What are the shortcomings of generative AI for marketing content? Let’s start with the most straightforward: AI isn’t designed to be factual or accurate. And it’s often biased. This is one of the most fundamentally important things for anyone to understand about AI. Because the algorithms are so sophisticated, it’s easy to assume they have built-in mechanisms to ensure information they serve is correct. But, they really don’t. “They're simply generating text that sounds plausible based on the data they've seen,” explains Joe Amditis. “This means that they can ‘hallucinate’ information or even ‘lie’ in some cases, and their outputs should therefore always be checked by humans for accuracy.” This same dynamic makes AI-generated content ripe for biases. “ChatGPT is only as good as the data it is trained on, and if the training data is biased or inaccurate, it can lead to biased or inaccurate content generation.” Amditis recently published a guide called Beginner’s prompt handbook: ChatGPT for local news publishers, from which the above insights are drawn. Geared toward journalists who are interested in utilizing the technology while responsibly navigating its downsides, I found the guide incredibly insightful and valuable. One of the primary, highlighted takeaways from the handbook? “The key is to employ strict and redundant human oversight whenever and however you decide to use ChatGPT, but especially in high-stakes situations where the information it spits back to you is meant to be used in any public, professional, or non-trivial way.” [bctt tweet="“The key is to employ strict and redundant human oversight whenever and however you decide to use ChatGPT.” — Joe Amditis @JoeAmditis" username="toprank"] AI lacks originality and human resonance. Or Shani, who founded the digital advertising AI tool Albert, is quick to acknowledge where the technology falls short. “Where we see AI as having limitations are in the obvious areas: emotions, feelings, subjective thinking,” he told the Marketing AI Institute. “Humans are unique in their ability to feel in a very complex way and translate those feelings into emotional connections.” That’s a crucial consideration at a time where the B2B sector at large is recognizing and celebrating the essential value of breakthrough creative and emotional impact in their marketing. AI lacks judgment and expertise. Artificial intelligence is able to draw informed conclusions based on the data available to it. But that data is inherently limited and far less valuable than the personal experience of marketers, executives, and other talent involved with a business. Even small decisions pertaining to content strategy can have massive ripple effects on a company’s success, and this is where the intervention of skilled, experienced humans is most indispensable. As Shani added: “Limitations in artificial intelligence will also stem from the degree of precision with which technologists are able to replicate human ‘intelligence’ and decision-making.” Or, as Joe McKendrick and Andy Thurai wrote at Harvard Business Review: “Artificial intelligence is designed to assist with decision-making when the data, parameters, and variables involved are beyond human comprehension. For the most part, AI systems make the right decisions given the constraints. However, AI notoriously fails in capturing or responding to intangible human factors that go into real-life decision-making — the ethical, moral, and other human considerations that guide the course of business, life, and society at large.” In B2B marketing, those “intangible human factors” are hard earned through experience, collaboration, and professional growth. [bctt tweet="“In B2B marketing, “intangible human factors” are hard earned through experience, collaboration, and professional growth.” — Nick Nelson @NickNelsonMN" username="toprank"] Circling back to our original scenario of robots replacing human umpires in baseball, that notion loses its practicality when you think about the broader responsibilities that the role entails, beyond calling balls and strikes. Human umpires are crucial to the game of baseball as they bring experience, intuition, tradition, and authority to the game. While technology can aid in making calls, human umpires are an essential part of the game's fabric, and their presence adds to the authenticity and atmosphere of the sport. Don’t take my word for it – the last paragraph was lifted verbatim from ChatGPT. In business, needless to say, the stakes tend to be a bit higher than a baseball game. Generative AI is a hit for B2B content strategies, but it’s not a home run. Want to learn more about creating content that breaks through and delivers brand impact in the age of AI? Check out our guide, Marketing with Intent: The Future of SEO and Qualified B2B Search Traffic.The post A Home-Run for Humanizing B2B Content: Why Generative AI Can Only Get Your Business to First Base appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®. Mobile Marketing,SEO via Hubspot https://ift.tt/qkwSMEf April 27, 2023 at 06:46AM
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Guess Which Device Has Supplanted Computers As The Go-To For Email? https://ift.tt/cdlqH6n One of the most surprising consequences of shifting consumer media behavior patterns coming out of the pandemic is what platform they use to receive in-bound marketing email messages. Given that this is a "Mobile Insider" column, you've probably already figured out what device has been most ascendant. But the real surprise is by how much. According to research released this week by the Data & Marketing Association (DMA), the smartphone has leapfrogged desktop or laptop computers as the dominant way consumers new receive email marketing messages -- and by a wide margin, too. The study, which is based on research conducted among 2,000 consumers in the U.K., finds smartphones are the go-to device for email among 79% of consumers, up from 62% in a similar survey in 2021. Conversely, desktop/laptop computers fell from the most cited device (64% in 2021) to a distant second (37%) this year. advertisement advertisement Tablets also declined by three percentage points, but remain the third favorite device for receiving email marketing messages, while both smartwatches and smartspeakers also gained a point. Devices aside, I think the net finding here is that email has evolved into much more of a mobile consumer experience from what used to be a relatively stationary one. I'm not 100% sure what the implications of the shift are for most brands, but another finding in the study is something all marketers should think about: The worlds of B2B and B2C are increasingly converging, at least in terms of email. "The rise of hybrid and remote working seems here to stay, and they appear to have accelerated the use of professional email accounts to receive brand communications," the DMA study concludes, noting, "In 2021, 50% of consumers revealed they did not have a work email address – that figure now stands at just 23% in 2023." “Mobile is more prominent than ever in this year's statistics," explains Pauline Bull, marketing director at Deployteq, which conducted the research for the DMA. "We see trends even more in favor of mobile as internet data becomes more accessible and the need for immediate gratification rises; it's easier to check emails on a phone than on a laptop! Therefore, it's now more important than ever to have a user-friendly platform that spans across multiple channels such as WhatsApp, mobile app, SMS, and email to help tailor your communications directly to customer preferences in a few clicks." Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/TgZ8DAb April 27, 2023 at 06:43AM
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Actor Angus Cloud Takes Rockstar Energy Into The PUBG Mobile Gaming Universe https://ift.tt/gBoEwIA
Rockstar energy drink front man Angus Cloud has “skin” in the wildly popular gaming platform PUBG Mobile—and he’s willing to share it with others. Cloud joined Rockstar’s talent roster last fall to appeal to consumers who share his passion for motorsports, fashion, art, skateboarding and video gaming. Since then, the actor who appeared in the HBO series “Euphoria” has done public activations with race driver Fredric Aasbo, luxury streetwear brand Billionaire Boys Club and an art/skateboard exhibition in Miami that coincided with the Art Basel international art fair. All were components of the “Fuel What’s Next” Rockstar campaign. “We’re taking ‘Fuel What’s Next’ into the gaming world, where truly anything is possible,” Sean Bonthuys, senior director of brand marketing for the energy portfolio at PepsiCo, tells Marketing Daily. advertisement advertisement “It’s about showing people what’s possible if you focus your energy and pursue your passions.” An early entrant into the nascent but now oversaturated energy drinks space in 2001, Rockstar positioned itself as a lifestyle brand targeting younger miillennial and Gen Z consumers who represent the “new generation of doers, achievers and superstars." “We’re not just about fitness or performance. We’re about the lifestyle that surrounds those passion points of those consumers," says Bonthuys. When people log into the app for PUBG Mobile—which has more than 1 billion global players—they can download and compete in a Rockstar in-game challenge for the next four weeks. As far as having skin in the challenge, players can download the likeness of Angus to their own profile “and compete with other people in the game as Angus Cloud” as seen in this video. The first player to beat the challenge will win the grand prize of a Polaris Slingshot high-powered, three-wheel motorcycle valued at $38,000. To kick things off, Rockstar is hosting a live stream on Twitch tomorrow night in conjunction with NRG Sports with a performance by rapper Don Toliver. Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/TgZ8DAb April 26, 2023 at 05:02PM
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Montana Governor Seeks Ban On All Apps That Share Data With Foreign Adversaries https://ift.tt/X3oAUwG Montana Governor Greg Gianforte reportedly is urging state lawmakers to ban all social media apps that share certain data with foreign adversaries. Gianforte's request came in response to Senate Bill 419, passed earlier this month, which would prohibit app stores from offering TikTok to users in Montana, and prohibit from people from using TikTok in the state (with some exceptions, such as for law enforcement). An earlier version of the bill also would have prohibited internet service providers from offering TikTok to Montana users, but that provision was deleted from the final version. The measure doesn't penalize users, but provides for sanctions of $10,000 per day against TikTok and mobile app stores. Gianforte's request was first reported by The Wall Street Journal. advertisement advertisement The governor also reportedly wants lawmakers to remove provisions that would subject app marketplaces to sanctions. The Montana bill, like other recent efforts to curb the use of TikTok, was largely driven that data collected by the company about U.S. users is being shared with China. TikTok is owned by the Chinese-based company ByteDance. Numerous states (including Montana) have banned the use of TikTok on government owned devices, but Montana is the first to attempt to prohibit people from accessing the app on private devices. Civil rights groups including the American Civil Liberties Union, Center for Democracy and Technology and Electronic Frontier Foundation oppose the measure, arguing it violates the First Amendment. “SB 419 is censorship,” the groups said in a letter sent to lawmakers earlier this month. “It would unjustly cut Montanans off from a platform where they speak out and exchange ideas everyday, and it would set an alarming precedent for excessive government control over how Montanans use the internet.” Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/TgZ8DAb April 26, 2023 at 05:02PM
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Turning B2B to Being-2-Being: 5 Top Insights B2B Marketers Need To Know About Google’s AI Search Future https://ift.tt/efKI05Y What will Google’s generative artificial intelligence (AI) search future look like, and will the search giant be able to make good on its goals of aligning its systems to principled human values? Google recently set forth plans to expand its generative AI search technology offerings, laying out an initiative code-named Project Magi, which could have a limited roll-out as early as May 2023, while its all-new generative AI-powered search experience has been slated to arrive sometime after. “Working on AI at Google literally feels like you’re living in the future. It’s one of the most exciting things I’ve done in my career,” Marvin Chow, vice president of global marketing at Google, recently noted. “History shows that we will under-estimate the long term possibilities but over-estimate the short term impact. Regardless, all of our lives are about to go through a rapid evolution of change that will make things easier, make us smile but also make us question our responsibility to society and our community,” Chow observed. [bctt tweet="“Working on AI at Google literally feels like you’re living in the future. It’s one of the most exciting things I’ve done in my career.” — Marvin Chow @theREALmarvin" username="toprank"] Google’s long-standing dominance in search has undergone a certain amount of foundation-shaking turbulence with Bing’s public launch of its AI-infused search offerings, and with several of Google’s lucrative search partnership contracts including Apple and Samsung up for renewal in 2023, this will likely go down as the year the search giant faced the most disruption since it rose to the top of the search mountain. Search Is Most-Desired AI FeatureIt should come as no surprise that the AI-driven product a leading 49 percent of U.S. adults were most interested in came in the form of AI-powered online search, according to recently-published survey data. In in the B2B sector — with its longer buying cycles and greater number of touch-points than in the B2C world, a better search experience thanks to generative AI could be especially welcome, as B2B buyers seek to find information about generally more complex products and services. Marketers have traditionally made search a component of brand promotion strategies, in both non-paid organic and paid search advertising, with Google long holding the undisputed dominant role in search. 76 percent of U.S. advertising buyers noted that ads placed alongside Google search had the highest return on investment (ROI), according to Cowen survey data, and recent WARC survey data has shown that 53 percent of marketers expect to boost spending with Google in 2023 — a figure that is down from the 59 percent seen in 2022 — with some 11 percent planning to increase spending with Bing. An increase of 27 percent during 2023 over 2022 global spending on AI has been predicted, with 2023 spending set to climb to $154 billion — an increase of more than $30 billion year-over-year — while overall AI spending is expected to eventually top the $300 billion mark by 2026, according to newly-published IDC forecast data, as we recently covered in our weekly Elevate B2B Marketing News. 52 percent of search industry practitioners have said that AI will be extremely important when it comes to delivering relevant search results in the future, according to newly-published survey data.Despite Challenges AI Content Labeling Is ExpectedAdding AI to its search offerings sees Google facing many of the same challenges and considerations that Microsoft and other firms also face. Recent Gartner data has shown that while consumers presently expected a certain level of misinformation to appear within AI-generated content, there was an expectation for organizations using AI-built content to clearly label it as such. “All these businesses have a big task ahead of them to make sure that what they’re doing in generative AI is very plainly disclosed to the consumers that are interacting with them,” Debra Aho Williamson, principal analyst at Insider Intelligence recently observed. [bctt tweet="“All these businesses have a big task ahead of them to make sure that what they’re doing in generative AI is very plainly disclosed to the consumers that are interacting with them.” — Debra Aho Williamson @DebraWilliamson" username="toprank"] Garner’s data also showed that 85 percent of consumers had only “some trust” or “no trust” in AI-generation search results. There are also growing concerns among marketers at having content plagiarized under the guise of AI training. Social news aggregator and discussion platform Reddit recently became one of the first organizations to implement restrictions on the open use of its content archive for training AI services, through the use of an application programming interface (API) that will charge firms using the platform for AI training, as Kevin Purdy, technology reporter and product specialist at Ars Technica recently explored in “Reddit will start charging AI models learning from its extremely human archives.” With both Google Bard and ChatGPT having named Reddit as a source of existing AI training, it’s unclear how or if AI training sources will have a legal mechanism to retroactively charge for that previous training, or to request that its data be removed. Recent AI add-ons have been included in product updates from Mailchimp, GoDaddy, among many other technology organizations. A recent joint study from Sprout Social and Cint found that 71 percent of social media marketers have started using AI and machine augmented learning (MAL) tools, with 82 percent of that group reporting positive results including increased productivity, higher accuracy, and swifter content curation, with 14 percent having noted that it was too early to say. “We view generative AI as one of the most meaningful technology innovations in our career,” Baird Equity Research analysts noted, according to a recent piece by Laurie Sullivan, senior writer and editor at MediaPost, exploring the large impact that AI is having on technology, in “Generative AI Most Transformative Technology On Par With The Internet.” It is in this light that I asked five top industry leaders involved in B2B marketing and search to share their thoughts on what they expect Google’s AI search future will look like, and whether they believe the search giant will be able to make good on its goal of aligning its systems to beneficial human values. Let’s jump right in and see what marketing and search innovators are expecting from Google throughout 2023 and beyond.1 — A False Fabric of Truth in the MachineDixon Jones CEO, inLinks I believe that Google will not miss the boat around generative AI, in spite of the early lead from ChatGPT and Bing. I do, however, see that keeping bias and errors out of the output is extremely hard to do consistently. The technologies are based largely on what humans have said about the world that they live in. Humans make fundamental mistakes, for one thing. We used to think the universe revolved around the earth. How absurd is that notion now? So what mistakes are we currently making in our view of the world? These mistakes then become part of a false fabric of truth in the machine. The second issue is that the underlying data (web content) is written by people trying to push an agenda, not by people trying to balance truth and uncover facts. My third concern is one of power. Some topics and groups in society generate much more data than others, which in turn will abnormally increase their “presence” in the outputs from the machines. The USA will get more exposure than (say) South Africa. Why should this be, in a “fair” representation of the world? [bctt tweet="“I believe that Google will not miss the boat around generative AI, in spite of the early lead from ChatGPT and Bing.” — Dixon Jones @Dixon_Jones" username="toprank"]2 — Google AI Changes Will Arrive in StagesBarry Schwartz CEO, RustyBrick Founder, Search Engine Roundtable I don’t think Google even knows how AI will change how search looks and feels in the future. We see a lot of experimentation, mostly from Bing right now, and then a lot of PR buzz from Google executives on the topic. One thing is for sure, there will be change and it will happen in stages. First we will see elements of AI chat features across Google Search and Bing Search, while also bridging it back from the chat feature directly into search. Then we may see chat based answers, maybe in place of featured snippets. We know ads will be baked into both experiences. Times are changing and it is super exciting to be watching the changes happen in real time. [bctt tweet="“I don’t think Google even knows how AI will change how search looks and feels in the future. One thing is for sure, there will be change and it will happen in stages.” — Barry Schwartz @rustybrick" username="toprank"]3 — A Fluid Future With Opportunity & Ethics ConcernsNeil Marshall Administrator, WebmasterWorld Co-Founder, Marshall Jennings PR As of today, it’s clear that Bard is lagging behind OpenAI’s offering in some respects: Bard has a more recent data set but seems less creative, and that’s why the search leader is putting in a great deal of effort to catch up with Bing’s lead. The future looks a little fluid right now because this technology can do some things very well and others not so good. For sure, Google’s team will be working hard on monetization opportunities. This is disruptive technology, and there’s a great deal more to come, along with pressure from the ethics lobby and eventually legislators getting involved. [bctt tweet="“Bard is lagging behind OpenAI’s offering in some respects: Bard has a more recent data set but seems less creative, and that’s why Google is putting in a great deal of effort to catch up with Bing’s lead.” — Neil Marshall @engine" username="toprank"]4 — Taking Greater Chances & A Star Trek Computer ParadigmRoger Montti Independent, Search Engine Journal Owner, Martinibuster.com In a way we're already living in Google's iteration of AI in search. It's in products like Google Maps and Google Lens. AI also plays a role in search at the back-end indexing phase and on the front-end where the algorithm creates the search results, all invisibly in the form of Google's SpamBrain AI system. Google's approach to AI has consistently been in an invisible form within the traditional user workflow: Ask a question, get an answer. But that's the old paradigm. What will the new paradigm look like is what we want to know, right? Given that a fully conversational search has long been the goal of Google's founders, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, I would answer that this is where Google is heading. The future of search, ironically, is going to look like the fictional future from the past. Google's inspiration for over ten years has been the Star Trek computer where users invoke a wake-up prompt, "Computer..." and then ask a question. The Star Trek computer is a natural form of interaction, much like speaking to a human. The Star Trek computer is an information assistant, which is what Google aspires to be. Initial attempts to do this on mobile devices have been limited to asking your phone a question and Google answers by speaking passages from websites that answer those questions. That wasn't AI — it was a kind of fake-out simulation of the Star Trek Computer (a computer with a lower-case "c"). That old fake-out version will in the future, in my opinion, be enhanced by AI. This goes beyond reading what's on web pages and fully crafting spoken responses, summaries, in natural language. This question is about what to expect for search, but I would expand that question into other domains like shopping. In that kind of scenario structured data "might" gain more importance at first in order to help teach the AI that its assumptions are correct, like training wheels. But at some point it may not need the structured data training wheels. Maybe it doesn't already need structured data. Lastly, Google is generally portrayed as scrambling to catch up to Bing but that's not, in my opinion, an accurate portrayal of the reality of what's happening. Google already has the technology, since at least the spring of 2022, to achieve fully conversational AI search. And it's not just proof-of-concept technology either. Google researchers have already created state of the art level technology. The bottleneck was a lack of leadership and vision. In my opinion Google lost ground when Alphabet selected the current CEO who is a technology person and not a business-oriented visionary planning moves ten steps ahead. This was evident in the recent all-hands meeting where the questions by employees indicated that they had no idea what Bard was going to be. That's the result of a lack of vision and leadership. Google used to lead but that is obviously no longer the case. So maybe this is a wake up call for Google to take this technology it already has and move forward with that Star Trek computer paradigm and start taking chances. [bctt tweet="“Google already has the technology to achieve fully conversational AI search. And it's not just proof-of-concept technology either. Google researchers have already created state of the art level technology.” — Roger Montii @martinibuster" username="toprank"]5 — Better User Experiences Co-Existing With Human ValuesDarwin Santos Senior Technical SEO Specialist, Amsive Digital Google stands to enhance the effectiveness of search results significantly by further integrating AI technologies into its search engine. We've already observed how search platforms like Bing provide a more satisfying user experience for some kinds of informational queries. However, it is important to note that not every search can be addressed just as effectively through chat-like interactions; some situations still call for traditional search results. As the dominant player, commanding over 93 percent of the market share, Google must exercise prudence. AI systems' inherent nature — with their potential to generate hallucinations and difficulty in controlling outputs — necessitates caution. By anchoring its responses in well-grounded facts, Google has the opportunity to develop a superior product that genuinely aligns with human values and needs. [bctt tweet="“By anchoring its responses in well-grounded facts, Google has the opportunity to develop a superior product that genuinely aligns with human values and needs.” — Darwin Santos" username="toprank"]Can Google’s AI Search Future Help Turn B2B to Being-2-Being?With all of the industry murmurations surrounding Google's forthcoming generative AI search offerings, a sense of something foundational is in the air among B2B marketers. Next year will be 40 years since I started working in online communications operating a 300-baud computer bulletin board system (BBS), and 2023 is most definitely an extremely exciting time in the evolution of not only search but technology's overall impact on humanity. I hope this look at Google's AI search future will help inform your own B2B marketing efforts, as more marketers learn to both harness the power of AI and to place newfound value of our uniquely human qualities. It's long been said that B2B could more aptly be referred to as human-to-human interactions, and as AI has proliferated I tend to see B2B also taking on more being-to-being characteristics, and search from Google and other firms will continue to play a key role in connecting us all. To learn more about B2B search marketing and AI, be sure to also check out these additional articles we've recently published on the topics:
The post Turning B2B to Being-2-Being: 5 Top Insights B2B Marketers Need To Know About Google’s AI Search Future appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®. Mobile Marketing,SEO via Hubspot https://ift.tt/ey1kqov April 26, 2023 at 06:23AM
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Sitecore Enhances Cloud Components, Including Email Design https://ift.tt/yJdUAwM Digital experience platform Sitecore has added several new capabilities to its XM Cloud Components. As part of this, the email tool Sitecore Send has received several enhancements, including:
XM Cloud Components, which is now integrated with XM Cloud Pages, allows content authors, UX designers, and marketers to work in parallel to quickly create on-brand experiences for their customers, the company says. Also, it provides an AI-powered audience discovery tool to find customers based on their interests, buying intent and their status in the sales funnel. The new SaaS-based offering provides opportunities for brands to “plug and play new technologies such as ChatGPT, introducing a new level of flexibility to adapt and respond to technology innovations and the ever-changing customer needs," says Dave O'Flanagan, chief product officer of Sitecore. advertisement advertisement One Sitecore user is Wolters Kluwer, an information service company based in Europe. “Since beginning our partnership, we built 30,000 pages, and now we publish about 100 pages a day, all thanks to the drag-and-drop components capability," says Amy Kolzow, vice president of global digital marketing at Wolters Kluwer. A survey conducted by Advanis for Sitecore showed that 85% of U.S. marketers expect to move at least some of their marketing tech stack to composable software solutions. The top reasons are flexibility to integrate with existing martech stack (47%), faster time to value (46%) and freedom to integrate technologies that enhance the customer experience (46%).
Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/Ze5ap8l April 25, 2023 at 04:26PM
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UK Shoppers Prefer Email For Messages - On Mobile, Study Finds https://ift.tt/ApaSbL5 Consumers in the U.K. have warmed up to email: 32% now say they find email messages useful, versus 15% in 2021, according to the Consumer Email Tracker 2023 Report from the Data & Marketing Association (DMA UK), with support by Deployteq. In addition, 64% of consumers rank email first as a preferred channel for receiving brand messages about discounts, offers and sales. Another 53% prefer email for new products/services and advice, and 44% for reviews. Mobile is now the most widely used platform for accessing email, with 79% saying they use it -- up from 62% in 2021. In contrast, desktop/laptop use for checking emails has fallen from 64% in 2021 to 37%. “Mobile is more prominent than ever in this year's statistics, says Pauline Bull, marketing director at Deployteq, “We see trends even more in favor of mobile as internet data becomes more accessible and the need for immediate gratification rises; it's easier to check emails on a phone than on a laptop!” advertisement advertisement Meanwhile,hybrid and remote working are having an impact, with 23% of consumers now saying they do not have a work email address, compared to 50% in 2021. Also, 37% of consumers now keep separate inboxes for personal and marketing emails, up from 23% in 2021. There has been a general improvement in email clicks, with the report noting these year-on-year increases for consumers’ clicks:
One cautionary note is that (34%) of consumers often wonder about their email addresses' source. “Email remains a key part of a consumer’s omni-channel journey,” says Ian Gibbs, Insight Director of the DMA UK. “Depending on how you view it, the cost-of-living crisis has either presented a crisis in marketing effectiveness, or it has created an environment of profound opportunity for marketers.” The DMA UK and Deployteq surveyed over 2,000 consumers.
Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/Ze5ap8l April 25, 2023 at 04:26PM
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OKRP Wins Metro By T-Mobile Creative Account https://ift.tt/zITryVU Pre-paid wireless brand Metro by T-Mobile has named Chicago-based independent agency OKRP as its agency of record following a formal review. The incumbent was Saatchi & Saatchi, part of Publicis Groupe. OKRP will develop campaigns promoting new and existing services, plans and other offerings from Metro. It will include work created specifically for Hispanic and multi-racial audiences. advertisement advertisement “We knew we had to do our homework to really understand Metro and its customer, and owe a lot to the team at Metro for being partners before they were clients,” said Nick Paul, President of OKRP. “We’re proud of our collective result and can’t wait to get it out in the world.” The first work from the agency is expected to break in a few months. OKRP made headlines last year when it reeled the Burger King creative account. Other clients include P&G, AliExpress, Ace Hardware, Cars.com, Illinois Office of Tourism and others. The review was managed by ID Comms. Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/Ze5ap8l April 25, 2023 at 04:26PM
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What QSRs Should Be Prioritizing Now https://ift.tt/qcKw3JX In the QSR industry, technology was adopted at an unprecedented pace during the pandemic. Long procurement processes and careful vendor selection were replaced by survival of the quickest—as restaurants pivoted “overnight” toward offering digital ordering, curbside collection and home delivery services. This led to the kind of shift that strategists constantly advocate: Sense demand, and change your rhythms to suit. Many leading QSR brands (whom we won’t name here) set sales records in 2020, then broke them the next month, and then the month after that. Business was beyond “good.” Now that we've (largely) emerged from that period of disruption, some of those gains have failed to maintain pace. In terms of digital capability, the playing field has leveled such that it’s now a straight shoot-out between QSR competitors on more subtle aspects of the customer experience. As we know, CX is everything today. With that in mind, and in order to outgrow the competition and continue the growth trajectory that was hinted at in 2020 and 2021, QSRs must consider three key principles: advertisement advertisement First off, aim for intensity coupled with action. One of the hallmarks of companies that outperform their competition is a restlessness and ambition to adapt to everything. If you made big changes in 2020 and then remained stationary or rolled back to before, you’re behind. Dissatisfaction with the status quo should be a lifelong mantra and be systematically managed. Are you keeping track of the steps you're making as you progress upward on the digital maturity curve? Are you critically assessing each system to ensure it's not holding back your business? Do you have a way to pilot new technologies and platforms? Next, create distinction, but remain consistent. You're probably on Uber Eats and Grub Hub, and so is your competition. This isn't a bad thing, as your customers love having options, but they erode margin and chip away at the core elements of your brand. Only existing on a third-party platform is like only existing as a popup restaurant; you get access to customers, but you trade off creating a truly distinctive experience. For customers to choose your app, you must offer something extra like loyalty programs that focus on meaningful, personal rewards, coupled with experiences that help digital guests get what they want out of their interactions with your restaurants—namely speed, value and personalization. This necessitates taking responsibility for all aspects of your digital CX, owning your mobile application and website and tailoring both to the needs of your customers, your restaurants and your food. Your app will likely be the most frequent touchpoint, so it's an investment worth making. Lastly, make your data accessible and actionable. One without the other just won’t cut it. Everyone in your business needs access to real-time, accurate, actionable customer data, which means empowering different parts of your business to mine what’s buried in the data. If you're locked into closed platforms—some of which don't give you access to customer data—then you're preventing your marketing, operations and restaurant teams from delivering what customers want: to feel like you understand and are fulfilling their needs. Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/Ze5ap8l April 25, 2023 at 04:26PM |
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April 2023
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