AI in marketing statistics: How marketers are using AI in 2024

Artificial intelligence (AI) in marketing has become one of the most talked-about integrations of the last few years. AI presents useful tools to enhance marketing processes and improve data analysis, aligning with the increasing demand for data-first marketing.

According to SurveyMonkey research, increasing the adoption of AI is a top goal for 48% of marketing teams in 2024. With many teams considering AI in their marketing, it’s vital to understand how to leverage and integrate these tools into marketing workflows effectively.

In this article, we'll explore everything you need to know about AI in marketing. Using SurveyMonkey data, we’ll also explain how you can integrate AI into your marketing team.

AI in marketing is the use of artificial intelligence tools to streamline the duties of a marketer. Marketing teams can leverage AI to enhance brainstorming, content writing, and personalization efforts. Equally, AI tools can offer machine learning, which can help improve data analysis and empower data-driven decision-making.

As artificial intelligence tools continue to iterate and improve, we’ll likely see new use cases emerge.

According to SurveyMonkey research, 88% of marketers rely on AI in their current jobs. Of the marketers already using AI:

Across the industry, marketing teams that work for larger enterprises with over 1,000 employees are more likely to use AI. Fifty-seven percent of enterprise marketing teams are willing to use AI in 2024. In contrast, only 40% of teams that work for companies with under 1,000 employees will do the same.

Overall, marketers are positive about AI adoption, with 50% of individuals feeling optimistic and 24% feeling pessimistic about AI. Especially as AI continues to develop, we may see these figures shift in the future.

Artificial intelligence tools have a range of use cases in marketing, with teams leveraging AI technology to enhance and optimize marketing.

Here are the top marketing AI use cases, according to SurveyMonkey research. 

Related reading: International perspectives on AI.

Optimizing content is the leading use case for artificial intelligence tools. This broad topic encompasses everything from adding keywords to copy and balancing on-page SEO to iterating content for different audiences.

Over half (51%) of marketing teams use AI to optimize content. This stems from the fact that several highly-accessible content optimization AI tools are on the market.

The second most popular use of AI in marketing is content creation. When feeding an AI tool a template, marketing teams can rapidly create several versions of similar content. This approach goes hand-in-hand with personalization efforts, allowing businesses to launch granular personalization strategies through AI’s content iteration.

Equally, some marketing teams use AI to produce marketing materials like brochures, website designs, campaign plans, and written content. The extent to which marketers edit generated content varies depending on their trust and faith in AI content.

One of the most useful deployments of artificial intelligence tools in marketing is brainstorming content. By creating a short brief or proposal and including a handful of base ideas, marketing teams can ask generative AI tools to extend their brainstorming session by providing new ideas.

Artificial intelligence tools draw from public data, so they generate fairly basic ideas. However, their rapid generation can be valuable for teams seeking inspiration during brainstorming sessions.

Automation is the fourth most popular use case of AI in marketing. Artificial intelligence tools can train on datasets and use machine learning to replicate these processes.

For monotonous tasks, AI's automation of repetitive actions is a powerful time-saving tool. It allows marketing teams to focus on higher-priority activities and be more productive.

Data analysis is a vital part of marketing, especially in our current era of data-driven decision-making. Artificial intelligence tools can expedite the process of collecting data and identifying patterns in datasets.

Marketing teams can deploy AI to help them analyze data on a larger scale, providing them with the insight they need to develop and launch campaigns effectively. For example, businesses can use AI-powered market research tools to streamline the collection and interaction with market research datasets, providing more rapid insight.

Finally, 40% of marketers use AI tools for conducting research. Especially for research-heavy projects, a chatbot tool can allow an individual to collect sources for further research rapidly.

However, this is still a questionable use because AI is prone to hallucinations and often cites non-existent facts. Unless the topic is common and easy to understand, the information that an AI tool will deliver may not meet the standards of marketing teams.

It’s always a good idea to validate data you receive from an AI tool to ensure false or non-existent data do not sway you.

Related webinar: AI in Marketing: How to cut through the hype and harness AI’s potential.

Artificial intelligence tools have several use cases in marketing, and each stems from one of the benefits they can offer marketers. 

Here are some of the most important advantages of AI in marketing:

These advantages can represent major time and cost savings to marketing teams, helping them improve the bottom line and produce campaigns faster.

Although AI in marketing has several advantages that can make it a useful tool, there are also disadvantages to be aware of.

Businesses should understand and take steps to adapt to the following disadvantages of AI in marketing:

When businesses mitigate the impacts of these disadvantages, they can reap the benefits without reducing the efficacy of AI tools.

There are numerous artificial intelligence tools that your marketing team can embed into your systems and begin to utilize. For example, SurveyMonkey Genius allows teams to rapidly create and deploy high-quality surveys and transform responses into actionable insights with ease.

Let’s discuss how to best use AI in your marketing strategy.

The first step toward successful AI integration into a marketing team is to understand why you want to use these tools in the first place. A core goal or actionable plan that calls for AI will provide you with a roadmap to successful integration.

Before you select tools or start testing out AI platforms, you should first list goals or tasks that you’d like to use AI on. By starting with the result you’d like to gain, you can make a clear strategy that will get you from A to B.

As a core part of defining your goals, you’ll also have to look toward your current capabilities and where you may need a helping hand. For example, if your marketing team is highly effective at content marketing, then a content AI developer may not be that effective. But, if you lack the resources to scale your personalization efforts, this would be a perfect place to integrate AI.

Your business can better understand where AI can generate the most value by assessing your current capabilities. It is good to send feedback surveys to your employees, asking them where they’d most like to see AI in the workforce.

Leverage employee surveys to rapidly collect, collate, and draw insight from data.

Once your marketing team has established what use cases you want to focus on, it’s time to look for AI tools.

Currently, you can choose from a whole host of available AI platforms. To find the one that’s best for your team, consider:

Based on your response to these questions, you may be able to rule out certain tools. A platform may be too expensive, too complex, or simply incompatible with your current data architecture. 

One of the disadvantages of artificial intelligence in marketing is that AI data is prone to bias and hallucinations. Instead of allowing these factors to hinder progress, you can regularly collect, test, and analyze AI data to pinpoint these biases. By exploring training data, you can find and remove the origins of bias in your datasets.

Businesses may also want to spend time reviewing any AI-generated outputs. While this step will slow down your marketing team, it ensures copy, marketing materials, and content writing meet your brand standards.

Related reading: Turn feedback into actionable insights with survey analysis.

Your AI marketing strategy will naturally evolve. As with all new projects, it’s important to set benchmarks, measure progress, and look for areas for optimization.

When it comes to AI in marketing, your staff will be the primary people who will have contact with the tools. To get the most from AI in marketing, you can turn to these people to request feedback, discuss training, and identify problems.

While AI is a useful tool, your marketing team is the factor that will convert it into an effective ROI for your business. Where possible, ask for feedback by sending out surveys to your team. You can do this periodically to trace how the uses of AI in your business evolve.

According to research by SurveyMonkey, 88% of marketers use AI in their day-to-day roles.

Artificial intelligence tools, especially as regulations develop, will form a useful tool that can speed up manual processes, help support creative endeavors like brainstorming, and automate repetitive tasks.

Marketing teams already use AI in several use cases, from content generation to data analysis. As we progress further into this AI-enabled age, we’ll likely see even more use cases materialize.

AI in marketing is a powerful option for teams looking to hone their marketing teams, improve processes, and generate more ROI from marketing campaigns. By effectively integrating AI into your marketing team, you can leverage AI to support your marketers with the best possible tools.

Discover how you can use SurveyMonkey Genius to enhance your marketing strategy. Sign up for free today to get started with AI in marketing.