FFrom Serena Williams playing against incarnations of her younger self to millions of personalized messages from a Bollywood superstar supporting small businesses in India, artificial intelligence and machine learning are driving a revolution in the global advertising industry.
Mark Read, chief executive of WPP, the world’s largest marketing services company, which is listed on the London stock exchange, said AI-powered advertising practices were helping win over customers eager to harness the potential of a new technology.
“It’s critical to WPP’s business going forward,” said Read, adding that he had tested the Microsoft-backed AI-based search tool ChatGPT. “I would say it has helped us win new business. We have been investing in it for several years.”
WPP paid an estimated £75m to buy Satalia, a London-based AI technology company, two years ago as it sought to infuse the burgeoning technology into its creative and media buying practices.
Recent applications include creating an ad campaign for Nike’s 50th anniversary, called Never Stop Evolving, which features Williams taking on versions of herself throughout her career.
In India, machine learning was used to create a campaign for Mondelēz-owned Cadbury, featuring Shah Rukh Khan, which enabled the development of “millions” of personalized ads using the Bollywood star’s voice to help promote the local businesses that struggled during the Covid pandemic. .
Read said the company had also embraced generative AI, which creates new content rather than simply analyzing existing data, much as ChatGPT had done in the chatbot industry.
However, Read is careful to point out that while AI and machine learning can take over tasks handled by employees and present the potential for significant cost savings down the road, he doesn’t see their use resulting in much number of layoffs among its more than 100,000. global employees.
“We see it as a tool in a vendor’s kit, used to make workflows more efficient, rather than a way to remove humans from the process,” he said. “In fact, we think it shows how valuable true creative thinking really is.”
While innovative advertising is the most visual application of AI’s potential uses, WPP is also increasingly applying it to its media business, which spends around $60 billion worldwide each year buying media. advertising spaces for customers.
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Examples include using AI to better target geographies and demographics for a charity event for Cancer Research UK. And build a system for Sainsbury’s to optimize online grocery delivery routes based on the weight of customer orders, which can make a significant difference to profitability.
Read recognized that it was in media buying, the profit engine for global marketing services groups, where AI could prove most valuable in driving WPP’s long-term profits.
“We are using it a lot in the media business,” he said. “It’s helping us improve the efficiency of our media operations and the efficiency of our creative production businesses by automating tasks that were previously done by people.”
