Why You Aren’t Getting More from Your Marketing AI

Ascarza, E, Ross, M and Hardie, B G S (2021) Why You Aren’t Getting More from Your Marketing AI. Harvard Business Review, 99 (4). pp. 48-54. ISSN 0017-8012

Abstract

Fewer than 40% of companies that invest in AI see gains from it, usually because of one or more of these errors: (1) They don’t ask the right question, and end up directing AI to solve the wrong problem. (2) They don’t recognize the differences between the value of being right and the costs of being wrong, and assume all prediction mistakes are equivalent. (3) They don’t leverage AI’s ability to make far more frequent and granular decisions, and keep following their old practices. If marketers and data science teams communicate better and take steps to avoid these pitfalls, they’ll get much higher returns on their AI efforts.