AI as the Face of Your Brand

A useful informed survey.   We attempted to use AI as brand equity.  When does it work?  Particularly in the case of assistants, we often anthropomorphize.  Why or why not?

When AI Becomes the New Face of Your Brand
H. James Wilson,Paul Daugherty, Nicola Morini Bianzino  in the HBR

In the world of marketing, brand anthropomorphism can be a powerful mechanism for connecting with consumers. It’s the tactic of giving brand symbols people-like characteristics: Think of Tony the Tiger and the Michelin Man. Today some companies are taking brand anthropomorphism to a whole new level with sophisticated AI technologies.

Consider advanced chatbots, like Apple’s Siri, Amazon’s Alexa, and Microsoft’s Cortana. Thanks to the simplicity of their conversational interfaces, it’s quite possible that customers will spend increasingly more time engaged with a company’s AI than with any other interface, including the firm’s own employees. And over time Siri, Alexa, and Cortana, and their individual “personalities,” could become even more famous than their parent companies.

The implications are numerous. As chatbots and other AI technologies increasingly become the face of many brands, those companies will need to employ people with new types of expertise to ensure that the brands continue to reflect the firm’s desired qualities and values. Executives should also be wary of how AI increases the dangers of brand disintermediation. As brands assume more and more AI functionality, businesses must proactively manage any potential ethical and legal concerns.

To study those issues and others, we surveyed how AI is being implemented at more than 1,000 global companies. We found that many of those firms are already using (or have been experimenting with) AI to orchestrate the brand experience across a number of business processes. These include customer service (39% of companies), marketing and sales (35%), and even the managing of noncustomer external relationships (28%) where brand power is key, such as in attracting top talent into the organization’s recruiting pipeline. Studying those deployments led to several insights around three new types of decisions executives face at the intersection of technology, personality, and strategy. .... " 

Using Anthropologic Thinking

In the HBR:  Using anthropology to get more our of social media.    We used anthropologists in the enterprise.  This article promotes more quantitative thinking than we typically saw from anthropology.  Something that may seem new:  'social listening' is something we had done for a long time.  Good introduction to the possibility of paying micro attention to conversations:

" ... There is something marketing managers seem to forget about the internet: it was made for people, not for companies and brands. As such, it offers managers a source of insight they never had — social listening.

Eavesdropping on consumers’ social-media chatter allows marketers to economically and regularly peer inside people’s lives as they are being lived, without introducing biases through direct interaction. Armed with traces of revealed opinions and behaviors, managers can at long last discover the manifestations and ripple effects of their actions on consumer behavior. Clear indications from marketing science underline how chatter affects sales, brand health, and even stock performance. Social listening competency will be critical to competitive advantage in the digital age. . .. "

Business Anthropology

In Innovation Excellence:  As I recall we had one corporate anthropologist.  Don't know if that still the case.  What is that and what is it meant to produce?  An overview.

Need for Practical Anthropology

While I was at the enterprise we had precisely, and rather informally, one anthropologist.  Was always fascinated by the role.  Understanding human behavior is important, but is retail behavior in their realm?  So do we need more practical anthropologists?  Experienta points to a further discussion.

An Anthropologist at Intel Labs

How and why do companies use anthropologists?    Here a conversation with one at Intel Corp.    Last I know our enterprise had one, though that was not the title used.    Answering questions like "What is the future of technology?"  That's what I did too.

Consumer Thinking from One Observation

In The HBR: Think like an anthropologist to understand consumer data.    " ... It was hardly what you’d call an “adequate sample size” for market research, but the results were nevertheless eye-opening for the maker of a pain-relief ointment: A single consumer posted an online photo showing how he placed foil over the ointment to prevent it from staining his pants. Despite years of consumer research, the pharmaceutical firm hadn’t known about the staining problem. That photo prompted the company to change the product and its communications about the ointment, creating significant value for the firm .... " .  

Hmmm, this kind of reasoning leads to:  If the results you get from one observation turn out to be correct, it will be selectively lauded, else it will be forgotten?

Procter Anthropologist Finds Worldwide Traits

An article in the Cincinnati Enquirer on the work of Andrew Manning, P&G anthropologist. P&G finds worldwide consumers share traits. ' ... His anthropological learnings are used by P&G scientists, designers and marketers to make and sell products that consumers will buy. Manning recently summed up his job to a luncheon of the American Marketing Association's Cincinnati chapter: "I listen to consumers, and I use what they say to help create products." ... '