Brands have long evolved from a world where their identities are shaped by how they ‘look and feel,’ to one defined by how they ‘behave and respond’. In an AI-centric world, where brands can now learn from past behaviors to inform future reasoning, they can also more fully ‘realize’ the very attributes and traits that have long infused their DNA.

​

We’ve always spoken about brands in very humanistic terms   - their personality traits, attitude, tone and voice.  Now we can infuse them with the self-knowledge that guides them to act in accordance with those same standards. And allow them to show up for the communities they serve in brand new, brand-aligned ways.

 

Rather than the operational role we’ve relegated to AI in Marketing — that, for example, Amazon uses to dynamically shift pricing, or Starbucks uses to further personalize messaging — what if we were to use AI to reflect on the ways your communities are hurting and the role it can play in healing the hurt? What if we were to entirely rethink the role that AI could play in service to a brand? Rather than AI to personalize or AI to optimize,  it could be deployed to guide, to heal, to connect or to lead.

 

Let’s imagine a couple of ways this could manifest. In partnership with Joe Kleinschmidt, a brilliant mind in the AI Human Experience space, we ideated a couple paths to express potential activations in this space. Imagine you’re a brand that sells widgets to HR leaders. A community-centric path would be to listen and learn about the ways the HR Leader community is struggling, especially as they navigate the challenges of these unprecedented times.  An AI-activated community experience enhanced with deep listening could collect shared stories and learnings, and offer up a community-informed playbook for the HR community on how to successfully navigate the trials of future pandemics. Not something we want to envision, but a likely reality. Or, if you’re a real estate brand selling homes nationally, how about tapping into the needs of neighbors and neighborhoods looking to complete local projects.  Or offer up AI solutions to better leverage local or unemployed resources in service of the community. We prototyped just that with Bluejay, by way of example.

 

To activate, brand marketers must ask:

 

1. What are the ways our people are hurting?  What are they missing in their lives?

2. What role can our brand play in helping?

3. What experiences will provide value and meaning, and how does it align to our brand promise?

4. How can we leverage AI to make these communities smarter/better/healthier over time?

 

CMOs are in a unique position to lend their creative firepower toward AI Brand activations that serve their constituents in meaningful and impactful ways. The operational way AI is being used in marketing is fast becoming table stakes, and now is the time to differentiate. Tapping into community needs, using AI to power community solutions, and in so doing positioning your commitment to your category builds a win-win for all. And most of all, a whole lot of brand love.