Courtney Kehl:
Alrighty. Well, here we are! in the era of AI, and I want to thank everybody for joining us. Really excited to be talking about this. I I don’t think there’s any one of us that’s working in this B2B marketing world without AI being a part of the conversation. So with that, I’ve got sort of a rundown on how artificial intelligence is shaping marketing, at least for today. So let me introduce Celeste. She’s an amazing PR. Our coms all the above. Maybe you can give us a little bit of your background?

Celeste Malia:
Thanks Court for having me as a guest today. Great to be here talking about a very timely topic. My name is Celeste, and my background is B2B enterprise software. I’ve been in the industry for over 15 years, and I’ve worked both in house and the agency and also doing and seeing companies from small startups all the way through the Enterprise. And so I look forward to sharing it with you. Some of the insights I’m seeing out there.

Courtney Kehl:
Yeah, no thanks for joining us. We’re excited to, because so less has really sort of a bird’s eye view of all things that are happening across many different companies. So it’s a really great way to kind of get that sort of all encompassing conversation going. So with that, we’re going to go into basically, the business leaders, perspectives on the future of marketing with AI, some of the things that are kind of on the table as a different line of business folks are getting.

Courtney Kehl:
I’m impacted or looking at it down the road, and then some use. Cases are always fun to kind of touch on, and then, of course, discover how companies are currently able to leverage AI while they’re also navigating these risks and challenges that seem to be hitting the table. Great. So how do we get here? Essentially, what’s happening in the world today? And what does it look like tomorrow? So perhaps you can give us that overview.

Celeste Malia:
Yeah, I mean, if I think back, what’s happened in the past decade, we’ve spent a lot of time kind of investing. To get to this point. We’ve, you know, done all the cloud work, and we’ve moved all of our data that was essentially on premise into the clouds.

Celeste Malia:
But here we are facing some very headwinds, you know. Cmo, so many, almost 71% of them in the leaves gardener research so that they don’t have enough budget

Celeste Malia:
many of you know, companies are keeping their budgets close vested to them and and if we think about all the investments that we made in automating our marketing functions, all that we actually throughout our whole business, we spent as we talked about the the cloud coming in and helping us become a lot more efficient. We’re now at a tipping point.

Celeste Malia:
We’re actually seeing a lot of the tools we put into are now not giving us the productivity that it once was started to be. So that is, dipping. And then, on top of that, we’ve got inflation. There’s like the macro trends that are also hitting businesses, and so many of our smaller companies that we work with that haven’t really developed their brand awareness yet and are still kind of climbing that hill.

Celeste Malia:
They’re impacted. And they’re a lot more price sensitive. So subsequently, obviously, that talks about limited budgets. So the 2 kinds go hand in hand. So those things are really moving us forward into the next inflection point of what we’re seeing happening in the market. That’s kind of driving us towards the disruption of AI.

Celeste Malia:
The talk across all the media is really about generative AI. But really there’s 2 types of AI right? There’s a predictive that was, we’ll talk about zoom

Celeste Malia:
And then there’s generating all the past 10 years worth of work that was really focused around automation helping marketers become more efficient, starting off with markets. And then we moved into things like base camp and all those tools that are in your marketing stack that Courtney always talks about And so we’re seeing this disruption start to unfold now into the everyday work of marketers.

Courtney Kehl:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, just to reiterate. We see the budgets getting. We’ve been seeing the budgets get pulled back since Q4 of last year, and folks just really having to do more with less. And it’s the sort of impact that has on just your individual bandwidth as a contributor, and then also for the team as a whole. so yes, without a doubt, we are seeing this sort of motion toward AI as a good sort of way to plug the holes and and really expand the

Courtney Kehl:
the ability to do more with less. So let’s talk about generative versus predictive. What is the difference here?

Celeste Malia:
genre of AI, which is all the rage everyone’s into Chat Gpt. It really took everything by a while, you know a firestorm. Really? it’s a way for us to now generate content images, text videos, right? I think if you haven’t picked up the chat Gpt definitely, try it today. you can ask it anything and it returns you something.

Celeste Malia:
And so it uses algorithms to detect patterns. And then it mimics and it replicates some sort of content that you’re looking for. We’re working with a few companies now that really are on the predictive path. a lot of enterprises have a great source of data. Now, it’s taking that data trying to aggregate it and give you

Courtney Kehl:
if you would call like steroids analytics and steroids that can help you think about the best decisions for your business. So I am. B. I’m bouncing around here. I apologize. I’m trying to push out a poll, so I don’t know. Maybe behind the scenes or admin can help us push the pull out to the team there apologies as I’m becoming disruptive of myself, or just up here as well.

Courtney Kehl:
So it looks like, yeah, we’d love to just kind of know of those folks that are joining us. If you, how many of you are actually using AI today? You know, any way, shape or form is just a pretty straightforward question, because some of us are a little bit more fearful of leaning into it. Some of us are waiting to kinda see where it goes and how best to use it from others. And then, you know, really, other folks are driving head first into it so kind of around that

Courtney Kehl:
great, So good moving forward. Sorry. So let me. There we go. Learn business leaders, perspectives. So you know, different folks are, you know, encouraging the AI use other folks that don’t want it to be a distraction from the what they’ve been currently what they’ve been doing sort of, you know, if it’s not broken, don’t don’t fix it, but at the same time sort of where we’re taking things into the future as So as has been mentioning here.

Celeste Malia:
yes, definitely, I think it’s impacted all of us at a very personal level. But also, maybe even the work functions that we do. We’ve kinda looked at how some of how it’s starting to impact the way we think about doing our jobs today. And I know Court. You’ve helped kind of pull together some ideas here.

Courtney Kehl:
Yeah, we’ve been doing messaging as well for companies that are in the AI space. So you know there’s a cost cutting that we’re in an era of everything about, you know, cost savings. So the AI piece there, without a doubt, is hitting the table.

Courtney Kehl:
But also, of course, the concerns around, you know, how does that impact the individuals jobs, etc., And then at Chris, developing just really personalized spots on messages for those of us that are doing sort of the more the Ab. Approach. And then you know, streamlining the marketing efforts as a whole, as we kind of, we touched on. And then the ability to forecast actually is really an interesting one. coming, coming down the

Courtney Kehl:
So really taking just even staggered information and being able to kind of fill in those gaps and get a better understanding of your buyers today.

Celeste Malia:
Yeah, it’s interesting to see. Like, you know, when we first started doing messaging, it was all done in house. You’ve got a team of people who are sitting behind tables, getting together being what’s important to get out to the market, and then you would take it to an analyst or a third party to validate that. Now, what’s interesting is you can also use tools out there to start testing it as you go.

Celeste Malia:
So it’s not a streamline process. It’s just honestly just taking in information and iterating it as you kind of go. So it’s quite fascinating how we’re kind of quickly, how we’re moving the work that we do today.

Courtney Kehl:
Yeah, absolutely. All right. So let’s dive into some of those examples. they, we’ve got a few of them out there. I’m sure there’s many more, but we just wanted to grab some kind of interesting one. So kind of flip on over to bear with me it’ll pop open. And while you’re doing that I would say that you know we’re seeing a lot of work in the B to C space right now, especially companies like Go fund me. And here’s a little video of some other work. Interesting work.

Celeste Malia:
This is a campaign they launched to showcase how human kindness can really help each other. And what you’re looking at is a video all pulled together by machine learning, actually. And this is all content that’s generated by pre-source data. What’s fascinating to me is that it just looks like another animated video. But as you’ll see through the end. It’s actually a merle. So you take a mirror and you and you can pull together these stories and generate very fascinating work.

Courtney Kehl:
very fascinating. Yeah, the ability for this, the machine learning piece of it to fill in the gaps yet again, and really kind of bring together a broader story around each of these components that you see here. and then tie it together and string it together into the larger, more cohesive. And that’s the mural here that they kind of ran it across each of these areas and thread it together into a whole story. So yeah, it’s absolutely

Courtney Kehl:
Let me see if I can pop on out.

Celeste Malia:
So a lot of marketers are out there, you know, using the tools being experimented to see what we can do. It’s quite fascinating. And in the B2B space it’s a little bit different. we’re still figuring it out. But what are you seeing here at court?

Courtney Kehl:
Yeah, it was absolutely so. B2C is probably the most likely in front of The adoption of AI is certainly on the marketing side internally, though with B2B again impacting the actual team players on your own marketing department. There are many opportunities. It’s just the external the AI application for a B2B

Courtney Kehl:
promotion is still yet to be a little bit. We haven’t seen as many adopters out there regardless. You see, we’ve grabbed a few of them here. We’ll make sure we send this out to So you can kind of click on the various links and our sources.

Courtney Kehl:
But just everything, from social media to SEO to, you know, outbound mailings and campaigns, and just many different applications of this. so which kind of brings us to, you know again, those of us that are adopting it versus those of us that are a little more reserved, and maybe we can touch on that

Courtney Kehl:
So navigating those risks and the and the challenges, and just those wanting to lean in, or perhaps waiting to kind of follow along with the folks that have figured it out along the way in front of us.

Celeste Malia:
Yeah, I think there’s this narrative in the market that AI is gonna take over. And for some of the people, you know, depending on your personality fit. You want to kind of dive in, and they’re seeing. Where is it eating my job, or how could I use it to do my job better? And so they’re definitely what we’re seeing is a variety of variations of where people are with it. But I think through the work that we’re doing with a lot of our clients. What we’re hearing in the market is that AI still needs that human to actually run it right? They, we’re working with a client that actually has a may, you know.

Celeste Malia:
positions, the human to automate the tasks into, to oversee what the work is being done and and that’s where you see the keep. The men in the middle. where you know algorithms, you can have good data, and you can have bad data and it can have inaccurate information. And so you still need somebody who is smarter than the machine to kind of

Celeste Malia:
understand what it’s doing and where its pitfalls are happening. So it’s not like AI is going to come and take your job today. But I think understanding how it can be useful, because it’s not going to completely replace humans at all.

Celeste Malia:
Yeah, there’s a lot of job opportunities as well for those folks that are kind of embracing it more so. so you kind of look at it on both sides. That’s actually a great point. The skill sets, you know, for marketers. It’s what skill sets do I need to do my job for tomorrow. Start kind of honing in on what those are, and how it can help propel you for the next wave. And how can I stay ahead? Because really, this is a a great opportunity to just

Celeste Malia:
play with it, experiment with it. understand? What are the skills that are gonna help you even do your job better?

Courtney Kehl:
Right? Right? Be a part of the conversation step one, and really, again, be be more comfortable it, just having having the ability to navigate the conversations and what’s happening currently and where where it’s going is definitely gonna give you sort of that edge

Celeste Malia:
in the communications field you know I have used. I’ve tried out chat, Gpt, you know, if you’re stuck or you’re writing. And here’s some used cases or some ideas for you to start using AI in your everyday work. If you’re stuck and you need to write an article or by line use chat, gpt, ask it a question, you know. Get some sources, use it to help stimulate some inspiration. If you’re in PR.

Celeste Malia:
check your work. you know definitely it won’t give you the answer. It will spit out your top 10 media for, say, in areas like security. But definitely, you know, you’re still smarter than that. Then the list that it provides so you can use it to check your work and make sure that you’re not leaving someone behind. If you want to conduct media monitoring, I think Chat GPT is a good place to do that.

Celeste Malia:
And of course, if you’re just writing those long emails to pick it up, you know, ask it to do something quick for you. It’ll give you a great start.

Celeste Malia:
Social media post that, too, if anything. What it does is it is used as a shortcut to help stimulate, get you moving forward, because sometimes it takes us as we go through our day, the transitions and being able to just pick up something and move forward. And perhaps that’s where things like Chat GPT, could be useful.

Courtney Kehl:
Yeah, absolutely without a doubt. So that kind of brings us to sort of the quick and quick and fast version of you know AI today, and where we see it going. And just really, you know, opportunities for us as marketers. so kind of wanted to wrap it all up see if there’s any questions, or the Q. A. Chat box there. By all means pop something in there. otherwise you can also, of course, reach out to us directly.

Courtney Kehl:
we’re using our own team as a good example of learning AI as we go. And I’m sure we’ll have a lot more to talk about in just a month’s time, because it’s moving so fast that’s where we’re at.

Celeste Malia:
Yeah, thank you for taking me to Court. The world is really moving quickly. Every new day there’s a new tool, a new solution to doing something. it’s kind of hard to kind of cut through what is what is what really and many and many of us are still trying to figure it out ourselves. So there’s there’s many moving parts. And I think we’re happy to help many clients that we’re working with. Go through that right now, whether you’re on the journey of never having AI,

Celeste Malia:
and now are trying to make that move in there or if you’re a startup and you’re in the AI space. How do we get you out there to cut through the noise?

Courtney Kehl:
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I know for me as a marketing manager and just overseeing different areas and branches of marketing. I’m looking forward to seeing the individual individual specialists lean in and kind of come back with some best practices, tips and and and things learned along the way, so it’ll be again. More interesting as we go.

Courtney Kehl:
Great. Well, thanks everyone for joining us. We kept this really straight to the point, and, you know, wanted to just dive in on some of the higher level stuff, but happy to get a little deeper with some of the more specific instances and areas that you might be touching today.

Courtney Kehl:
Great thanks, so much, Celeste.