- Jessica Jensen, CMO at Indeed, said artificial intelligence is a powerful marketing tool.
- Marketers who experiment with AI and connect to social value will be the most successful.
- This article is part of the CXO AI guide series.
The development of generative artificial intelligence has made workers in many industries question their future. Marketers are no exception.
As Indeed’s Chief Marketing Officer, I oversee a marketing team of over 400 people, each of whom is committed to helping people find jobs and helping employers hire. Every day we explore how we can use artificial intelligence to do better and how all marketing jobs are changing.
On the one hand, it’s exciting to ride this new wave of innovation. On the other hand, we need to make sure that people keep their hands firmly on the wheel. If we overestimate the power of technology, we run a very real risk of harming our audiences and our businesses.
How AI is changing marketing
It is often said that content is king, and today artificial intelligence supercharges content. We recently adopted OpenAI GPT-4 APIs to dramatically accelerate the creation of new content for Indeed job seekers.
Using artificial intelligence, we are creating content for job seekers 75% faster than before and saving over $10 million thanks to these tools.
But let’s also remember that artificial intelligence has drawbacks. While we can use AI to create content faster and more efficiently than ever before, we must remember not to inadvertently perpetuate bias.
For example, during one test, we asked the tool to write a few sentences about gender bias in the workplace. This tool focused exclusively on men and women, leaving out other underrepresented groups.
To prevent this, we have designed and tested a process that includes rigorous fact-checking and bias identification, because we know that LLM models can sometimes include outdated professional and gender roles. We ensure that our content experts always oversee final reviews for brand identity and inclusivity.
Jessica Jensen is the Chief Marketing Officer at Indeed
Courtesy of Indeed
As marketers, we also realize that a strong image can convey more than words alone. This year we used Midjourney, an artificial intelligence program, to create design options for various campaign graphics.
Our creative team used this technology to quickly select and make final decisions. We compressed the long graphical exploration process from weeks to days. While the speed of AI is impressive, we give priority to human input throughout the process to ensure quality and minimize bias.
Why? Because we recently asked the GenAI tool to show us a “group of disabled people” and the images we received only showed people in wheelchairs. Artificial intelligence has not shown us people who represent this group in an inclusive way. A lack of diversity and the right mix of representation would be disastrous for our brand and what we strive to achieve as a company.
How AI is changing the role of marketers
Our role as marketers will also change. The Indeed Hiring Lab, our in-house team of global labor economists, recently explored how Artificial intelligence may impact jobs and the skills needed to perform them. They analyzed 55 million job postings and over 2,600 skills and determined that GenAI will impact almost all jobs.
The study shows that marketing-related professions are among the occupational groups with the highest exposure to GenAI. Our economists also found that GenAI can perform well at 85% of the skills listed in marketing job postings, such as copywriting, image creation, video compilation, and more (interestingly, childcare and construction work are less at risk from AI).
Is it time for marketers to panic? No, but it’s time to pay attention and experiment.
More importantly, as the world accelerates, we as marketers must come together and recognize the impact our work has on society. We must ensure that humans control and edit AI output to fully represent and empower all people in society.
The marketers who will succeed in the future are those who combine business value with social value. At Indeed, we’re committed to creating opportunity for all, so our work as marketers must be inclusive.
Jessica Jensen is CMO at Indeed and a CMO Insider columnist.
