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“Artificial intelligence, deep learning, machine learningーwhatever you’re doing, if you don’t understand itーlearn it. Because otherwise, you’re going to be a dinosaur within three years.” Mark Cuban, billionaire entrepreneur
As the evolution of artificial intelligence continues to grow at an exponential rate, us marketers may be wondering, will a machine end up taking my job?
What will a marketing department look like in five years?
How do marketing professionals need to prepare for the jobs of the future?
What will a typical work day look like?
These are all valid questions.
And to an extent, all marketing jobs will change as a result of the integration of AI. But, don’t worry. There is a world in which we can harmoniously exist with AI and use it to become more efficient and agile marketers. Get ready to co-bot!
How is AI going to impact marketing jobs?
There is a lot of disagreement between very smart people on this subject.
In many cases, AI is going to augment your work as a marketer, not take your job.
In fact, most marketers today are stuck doing too much work in inefficient ways. AI is going to free up talented professionals to do more of what they love doing.
In some ways, it is going to make working in marketing more rewarding.
However, there is also a danger that AI negatively impacts marketing jobs.
In about 3 - 5 years, Nancy A. Shenker, CEO, theONswitch® believes some marketing roles will be combined thanks to AI. She anticipates seeing some staff reductions in the next decade because of this.
(Nancy A. Shenker: Embrace The Machine)
So, what will we be doing?
According to Shenker, if you’re a CMO, the next 5 - 10 years of your life will look a little something like this:
- Marketing vision
- Brand integration and highly personalized customer marketing
- Tough decisions regarding team structure, as the evolution to machine is underway
- Spending and competitive strategy based on machine-supplied data
- Brand and customer optimization based on immediate machine-supplied data
- Leadership definition changes as staff size comes down
And if you’re on the marketing team, the next 5 - 10 years of your career will look something like this with machine-assisted functions:
- Content curation
- Analytics and data scientists
- Cross-platform creative (video, print, digital, social ー all machine-assisted)
- Machine-assisted events and PR
- Developers
- Marketing psychologists (brand and customer stewards)
- Content counsel (replaces multiple functions)
- Marketing system engineers
- Voice will rule
- Creative automation strategists
Is marketing a good career for the future?
This begs the question:
If AI could negatively impact marketing jobs, is marketing a good career for the future?
We're biased, but we'd still argue yes.
Today, the marketing industry shows strong demand for talented pros. Industry employment is expected to grow 10% in the next 10 years, according to the Bureau for Labor Statistics.
The potential earnings are quite nice, too. The BLS says the median annual wage for marketing managers is more than $142,000.
Here's what the stats don't tell you...
Demand for marketing was strong pre-pandemic. Post-pandemic, it's gone bananas. Every brand, no matter how traditional, now realizes digital marketing is absolutely essential to doing business. Not all of them realized this before.
That's very good news for anyone in the field or considering it.
There's no question AI will have an impact.
But as AI impacts marketing jobs, marketing jobs will change and evolve, as they always have to adapt to new technology.
The demand for marketers is there. And marketers who understand and use AI will have unfathomable opportunities as businesses look to capture some of the amazing benefits provided by the technology.
You have the opportunity—right now—to be one of them.