As ChatGPT is predicted to lead to job growth, marketers reveal how they use the AI tool

Tech recruiter Lorien suggests ChatGPT and other AI tools mean further investment into tech skills is needed in the UK workforce, but it will “create new opportunities for professionals”.

Global technology consultancy Lorien has boldly forecast that AI models such as ChatGPT will benefit the tech sector within business with roles in machine learning, natural language processing and data management increasing.

And as marketing teams adopt this technology, it is clear this need for ‘upskilling’ will affect multiple industries.

Ross Stuart, SEO Manager at Herd, a marketing and development agency in Yorkshire, however, warns against certain sectors being so reliant on this digital revolution.

“ChatGPT clearly offers benefits when it comes to surface-level elements of content creation, the tool has the power to create large volumes of satisfactory content, fast.

“[But] tools like this should certainly be avoided in industries which search engines consider to be Your Money or Your Life (YMYL), such as pharmaceuticals or finance. Misinformation here can have a real impact on readers and taking unsound advice can lead to dire consequences in extreme cases,” he notifies.

Lead Monitor reached out to marketing experts from different industries to get an idea of how they are currently using ChatGPT and similar generative AI.

Download New Statesman Media Group’s latest free report: How ChatGPT will change marketing (for better or worse)

Jeremy Page, global director of creative & executive vice-president at KWT Global: ‘ChatGPT is a boon for PR’

“We’ve been as excited as everyone else by the dawn of suddenly available, commercially accessible, proliferated AI models (necessary to say because, in reality, AI has been around for years). That said, the application of it for day-to-day PR has been an incredible boon.

“From summarised meeting notes to the software tool invented by our very own agency founder Aaron Kwittken, PRophet. The latter uses AI to identify journalists likely to have an interest in your release based on their previous articles and its in-built generative AI will refine pitches.

“ChatGPT and Bard have also featured in creative sessions revealing inspiring insights on trends. The one thing we won’t use it for is to ideate. As capable as it is, the empathy required to identify unique human truths does, at least for the time being, seem beyond its reach.”

Catherine Stagg-Macey, business coach, technology expert and host of podcast Unsaid@Work: ‘Find the time to play with ChatGPT’

“When we don’t know what we don’t know, it’s time to experiment, with the perspective of a small child – being curious, open and willing to fail. This sounds a lot easier than it is. If you are like me, in meetings most days back-to-back, catching up with emails after hours, when do you find time to play?

“A business leader’s greatest gift is their attention and yet we don’t protect it or find time to think about the big things. My suggestion is to find the time to play with ChatGPT and adopt it now so you get to know what’s possible, naturally developing your skills to make the most of it as a tool.”

Abbie Dando, founder of Monday Clicks: ‘We use it for web code, keyword research and idea generation’

“When ChatGPT initially came out our initial thoughts were: Will this replace our copywriting services? However, as time has gone on and we – and other businesses –  have experimented with AI, it’s become very obvious that the bots can’t write as well as humans!

“Despite that, we have incorporated it into our agency; our SEO team use it for writing web code and supporting keyword research, and our copywriters use it to generate ideas and inspiration for articles. It is very early days for AI and we expect its capabilities only to grow. Watch this space.”

Louis Georgiou, founder and director at Code Computerlove: ‘We have used AI to reduce workloads’

“AI is great for driving workload efficiencies, particularly in the world of marketing and SEO. It’s something we’re starting to use more and more, as the technology gets more sophisticated. For example, with data analysis, it would usually take a person hours to review and analyse survey data, but by using AI, we’ve been able to cut this down to just ten minutes. ChatGPT is also great for gaining inspiration for writing. I’ve used it to provide recommendations of what to include in presentations, which has massively reduced my workload.

“I’m excited about the untapped potential, too. In the future, I anticipate AI and ChatGPT to be utilised as a business consultant, gaining competitor insights, analysing audiences and helping to build objectives.”

Johan Perkins, technology director at WAA Chosen: ‘We’ve seen fantastic results in proofing and translation’

“We have been trialling ChatGPT in multiple use cases since the start of 2023, investigating how it can increase productivity across our teams. We’ve seen some fantastic results in areas such as proofing, R&D, translation, and ideation and some weaknesses in longer-form content generation, general accuracy, and its restriction to only be able to reference data up to 2021.

“While we have been building incredible client-facing tools with OpenAI’s other solutions, the most tangible benefits of ChatGPT have been within our team’s daily workflows where it is rapidly becoming a valuable assistant.”

Lauren Mellor, senior content marketing manager at NORTH: ‘It is a starting point for us’

“The main ways we’ve introduced ChatGPT into our work is through ideation. It’s perfect for kickstarting your thought process on campaigns, getting us to think bigger and boost our creativity. The team has really gotten into using the tool to help with headlines, and even with debugging broken code, but it’s mainly a starting point for us right now.”

Dee Overfield, head of digital at Wagada Digital: ‘Integrate ChatGPT into current strategies’

“One thing we are excited about is the use of ChatGPT when integrated with an existing marketing strategy, rather than being used as a standalone tactic. These tools create opportunities to optimise steps in a marketing strategy that might currently be labour-intensive, such as data analysis, or have a risk of inaccuracy, such as attribution.

“By incorporating AI to fill in these ‘blind spots’ we can not only leverage these powerful forward-thinking methods to take marketing to the next level, but also build on the foundation of effective digital marketing methods that we have used in the past.”

Dan Pratt, solutions director at Wolfenden: ‘It allows us to be more productive’

“In our team, one of the key ways AI tools have been useful is taking over some of the day-to-day admin tasks and freeing up our time to be more productive and strategic in our work. From automatic meeting transcriptions to design mock-up tools, we collate ideas and information to give us the platform to increase our output and recommendations.

“When it comes to the more creative aspects of using AI, we’ve also found great successes with using it in ideation sessions and as inspiration for our work.”

Maria Amalia Rojas, chief marketing officer, XWECAN: ‘Focus on improving chatbots’

“AI cannot replace marketers’ creativity and strategic thinking yet, but it can help us  handle repetitive tasks more efficiently; for example by using ChatGPT, you can create higher performing chatbots that can be trained to answer questions just like your brand would and providing customers instant and multi-language support that can serve globally 24/7.”

Charlie Semmence, content manager & copywriter at Underwaterpistol: ‘ChatGPT is a game changer in creativity’

“Content writing for both clients and in-house projects is a key part of my role, and incorporating ChatGPT into my workflow has been a game changer. It allows me to maximise my time by shifting the focus from the composition process towards more impactful research.

“Many sceptics claim that generative AI is killing creativity, however I’ve discovered that this shift actually enables me to be more creative. By utilising ChatGPT, I can save hours that would have been spent on assembling the bare bones of a blog post or thought leadership piece and instead invest that time in ideation, refinement, and enriching copy with thorough research.”