AI remains an area of particular interest for B2B marketers. At Renewd’s recent 3-part AI roundtable series for B2B subscription, membership and event professionals, MPG took to the stage for the marketing-focused session to facilitate discussion around the tech’s ongoing development.

Here are some of the key topics we discussed and what the senior marketing and business leaders in attendance told us:

Marketers are still in the experimentation phase with AI

When asked to name the tools their teams have been using, attendees shared a broad range. AI darling ChatGPT was the most mentioned, with transcription tool Otter.ai winning similar favour for its advanced note-taking credentials. GA4 - recently imposed on marketers, willing or not - excites with its AI data crunching capabilities.

Amongst the lesser-mentioned tools, applications varied. Automation from Zapier, image creation from Photoshop and Canva, and copy creation from copy.ai and Oktopost - to name just a few. Marketers remain open to trialling tools and pitting them against one another in various functions.

What’s clear is that marketers are still experimenting with tools - often with overlapping functionality - in a bid to find the ones that will make a real difference to their work.

The question is: will, or can, this experimentation ever end? With almost daily announcements of new AI tools and AI functionality additions and enhancements to already embedded tools such as HubSpot and Canva, we should expect ‘test and learn’ to be a bigger part of every marketer’s life.

Finding tools and understanding their usage remains a key challenge

We asked the roundtable attendees to score their teams on the most relevant skills to AI adoption and usage (graph below). The common weak areas remain those related to finding and properly deploying the AI in the first place. Prompting, a key competency for ensuring tools are working at their best, was the lowest-scored skill.

Marketers will need more time, and in many cases focused training, to get the best out of their new AI companions.

 

… but marketing teams are well-equipped to harness AI once they understand its functionality

When it comes to the skills that will really help marketers long term, things were more positive. Attendees scored their teams higher on strategic thinking and soft skills - both key competencies if marketing is to continue being the champion of AI within businesses.

Understanding how AI fits into broader strategic goals will help marketers remain focused on improving output and results, instead of being distracted by flashy tools that don’t deliver value. 

In a similar vein, attendees were more confident that their teams have sufficient copy editing skills to refine the output of AI tools drafting emails, social and other content for them. Despite the impressive leaps in AI copywriting, a human touch is still essential - for now.

Creative vision will separate the early adopters from the laggards. Marketers who are not afraid to step out of their comfort zone and review existing processes through an AI-lens will find new ways of working, freeing up time for them to focus on more valuable strategic work.

The future is full of opportunities

Prompted on where they see AI going in the context of marketing over the next 6-12 months, attendees once again provided a range of opinions. From improvements in AI video creation options to implications for hiring new marketers - including making AI a competency to check for during the interview process.

However, there was a recurrent prediction of consolidation, with agreement around the fact that through competition and acquisitions - the AI options available will filter down to more elegant and comprehensive solutions that combine functionality that is currently scattered across different tools.

View the full session

You can view the full recording and access the slide deck we shared at the links below.