AI-Driven marketing strategies beyond content creation

Article highlights:

1. Start using AI to streamline workflows, eliminate repetitive tasks, and organize data.
2. AI-powered lead scoring is the new feature in town that works by analyzing thousands of data points across historical conversion data to make predictions about what predicates conversions.
3. Running ads with AI is changing how and where companies spend money by making ads more effective than ever before.
4. Organizations should build out a process for adopting new tools, set a strict budget for the marketing tech stack, and align AI marketing tools with overall business objectives. 

AI-Driven marketing strategies beyond content creation

Between the excessive use of the em dash and sentences that start with, “…in today’s rapidly evolving [insert industry] landscape,” a lot of business content is starting to sound the same. As we all start to develop generative AI for marketing fatigue, it’s a great time to look beyond AI in marketing for content creation and start using AI to streamline workflows, eliminate repetitive tasks, and organize data. We believe in using it more like an assistant, rather than a content factory. We’ve got some great ideas on how to use AI in marketing! 

AI for market intelligence 

One of the best places to start this year with AI is market research. AI tools can help complete competitive analyses across platforms, including social media and search. SEMrush recently added a feature on AI visibility, giving your brand insight into how often it appears in AI searches and what to do to improve your rankings. Additionally, instead of spending countless hours putting together trend data and competitor comparison charts, start with an AI tool! This can be a great way to get further insight into how customers or patients are feeling, which companies are launching new products, and where your organization stands in comparison. Previously, this kind of information would be collected during trade shows, via networking, and when receiving print or digital ads. Now, AI gives you insider access with tools like SpyFu, SEMrush Market Explorer, and Crayon. 

Predictive analytics and lead scoring

As you get set up for 2026, predictive analytics can help organizations move from guessing to data-driven forecasting. Organizations can now identify high-risk churn customers or hot leads as early as possible to improve interventions and conversions! If you need more information on serious buyers, AI-powered lead scoring works by analyzing thousands of data points across historical conversions to make predictions about what predicates conversions. Tools include Hubspot’s Predictive Lead Scoring, Salesforce Einstein, and 6sense. These tools give businesses with long lead cycles more power in understanding where they should be spending money and which leads are much more likely to convert so they can narrow the focus on the right targets. In the case of preventing churn, many of those same tools will allow you to set up automated retention campaigns that are triggered when customers or patients stop responding or exhibit churn tendencies as identified by historical data. 

Personalization at scale and AI-driven marketing automation! 

We’ve talked ad nauseum about the enduring power of personalization in most advertising and marketing campaigns. AI now allows you to make content and campaigns feel personal, but on a larger scale. Personalization is no longer just a “NAME” slot in a newsletter, it’s a campaign tailored exclusively to users or leads that meet certain criteria all triggered by specific actions or data. A variety of different AI marketing automations are available to allow teams to focus on problem solving and strategy, rather than getting bogged down in the details. Examples of personalization that are easy to implement with AI tools include:

• Dynamic content and website personalization, including landing pages
• Smart segmentation and hyper-local targeting for ad campaigns 
• Email campaign personalization beyond the name field

Ad optimization and better budget allocation

Artificial intelligence and AI go hand in hand. Running ads with AI is changing how, and where, companies spend money by making ads more effective than ever before. Google’s Performance Max campaigns put together ads based on brand assets uploaded to the site. The top performing ads get selected for more impressions and views, and are constantly evolving based on user responses. It’s smart advertising that your team doesn’t have to manually manage. There are similar tools available for social campaigns, including Meta’s Advantage+ which is the same concept of Google Performance Max, you provide the assets and copy, the algorithm does the rest. If that sounds like losing too much control to the algorithm, there are tools available that let users define the criteria and guidelines for running the ads, giving you more say over how and when ads are displayed. Unfortunately, some of these new tools may be restricted for healthcare organizations as there are regulations on healthcare advertising, making it vital to do your research before investing in one channel. 

Improved customer service

AI can be very helpful in terms of improving the user experience, however, more and more people are getting frustrated when confronted with AI bots. So, it’s important to understand what your audience needs in terms of customer service and what they respond well to. Perhaps implementing an AI scheduler is a better idea than an AI chatbot that answers simple questions and may cause annoyance when people just want to speak to a human. That being said, platforms like Drift Health, Tidio, and Intercom provide chatbot builders with healthcare-specific features including HIPAA compliance options, medical information disclaimers, and graceful handoffs to human staff. It’s worth testing if your staff is busy and needs an extra filter before connecting with patients. One of the most helpful tools at this stage for healthcare organizations could be an email inbox prioritization tool or a patient communication workflow. Both of these processes help to eliminate busy work from your team’s responsibilities and prioritize important patient touch points. When it comes down to it, patients want to know that they are a priority and team members need more hands and hours in the day to get to every email and call. Adding an AI marketing automation tool to these workflows helps address both needs without making anyone feel like they are losing a personal touch in the name of efficiency. 

 Quick metrics to measure the effectiveness and benefits of AI in marketing:

• Time saved on routine tasks (quantify hours per week)
• Speed of campaign optimization (hours vs. days vs. weeks)
• Content production efficiency (pieces per week, cost per piece)
• Team satisfaction and retention (AI as positive vs. negative influence)
• Scalability (marketing outcomes vs. team size growth)

No matter where you start, it’s important to recognize that AI tools are only becoming more powerful and accessible. So, while it can be tempting to try and adopt every shiny new tool that comes onto the market in hopes that that tool will be the one, that won’t get you very far as marketing techniques. Organizations will do themselves a huge favor if they build out a process for adopting new tools, set a strict budget for the marketing tech stack, and align AI marketing tools with overall business objectives. AI tools are meant to support and assist, not replace teams and workflows, so implement responsibly.