Are AI Algorithms Redefining the Scope of Social Media Marketing?

Social media started out as a platform for people to share their thoughts and interact with others. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, TikTok, and Pinterest became familiar names in households and workplaces. When the platforms started adapting advertisement models for monetisation, the game changed. Social media platforms opened up for marketers to advertise their products where their customers were. Social media marketing company helps establish the right digital strategy to grow a business by branding and generating quality leads.

How’s AI Used in Social Media Platforms

Source: Hackernoon.com

AI helps social media companies to obtain, accumulate, integrate, and analyse huge data sets to identify trending topics, hashtags, and iterative patterns. According to Social media experts, this helps in building accurate buyer personas for consumers of different brands and push sponsored ads to the right set of audiences to ensure maximum reach.

Here are a few examples of how the leading social marketing platforms are using AI to offer an enhanced and personalised user experience.

• Facebook offers a personally tailored user experience through engaging content and features like face recognition and tag recommendations.
• Instagram built a highly personal explore feature to offer an enhanced visual experience to its users based on their individual preferences and previous profiles they have interacted with.
• Twitter has a bot detection algorithm to differentiate human users and fake accounts. It highlights the most relevant tweet and ranks them on a priority basis on users’ timelines.  
• Linked uses AI tools to rank the most suitable candidates for a job offer, thus helping recruiters identify the right fit. It takes into account the candidates who are actively on the lookout for opportunities and maps their credentials with the job responsibilities of the new position.
• Pinterest uses a neural network to map the various images to a particular theme. It analyses its user’s personal preferences by browsing history and previous engagement rates on similar content and uses the accumulated data to suggest more relatable content.

How does AI impact Social media marketing?

A digital statistics report published by Hootsuite in partnership with Wearesocial.com reveals that 3.96 billion people (51% of the world population) use social media in 2020 with 99% of the users accessing the platforms through mobile phones. Social media companies use intelligent AI algorithms to analyse the persona of their users, to categorise them better, and offer competitive advertisement packages for marketers who seek a guaranteed reach.

Source: Hootsuite.com

For example, social media suggests a new Keto recipe for someone who’s on a Keto diet or pregnancy products for expecting parents. Users are more likely to purchase a paid product when it’s a personalised suggestion. Such an algorithm gives marketers an incentive to bid competitively for buying Ads on the platforms. 

From chatbots that promote a sense of personal user engagement to recommendations based on integrated cross-platform browsing history, AI has transformed the way brands interact with their customers and depend increasingly on social media marketing companies.

Machine learning is an application of AI to simulate human intelligence and enable machines to make accurate decisions based on available sets of data. Smart AI tools integrate the available data and help make better marketing decisions. Social Media experts say AI can fine-tune the future of Social Media Marketing by assisting various aspects like bidding for Ads, tracking the analytics, automating hashtags suggestions to improve reach, and establishing a content strategy for business.

Social Media Experts Warn About the Perils of AI

The Netflix docu-drama, Social Dilemma, was an eye-opener for the common people that perfectly described the social dysphoria created by AI-based predictive algorithms that helps boost user engagement and reach for sponsored Ads. AI in Social Media Marketing polarised people into idea bubbles that promise a sense of Utopia without any opportunity to interact with contradicting beliefs worldwide.

Social media algorithms stroke our inherent biases and vulnerabilities and uses them to recommend engaging content and personalised advertisement recommendations. As individuals, people need to be more aware of the influence of social media in their thought process and engage with content that will add value to their perspectives and life in general.

For example, if users avoid interacting with content that features speculative conspiracy theories, the lesser they will see such content in their timeline feed in the future. By engaging with content relating to their hobbies and future goals, users can make social media algorithms suggest more content that will be of real use to them and add value to their lifestyle.

Choosing the Right Social Media Marketing Approach

Brands and Social Media Marketing companies have to clearly define their tactic based on ethics and create credible content that proves emotion. Cultivation a cultural change in the way we approach marketing, and more brand accountability is the way to go forward!

Brand affinity is created when people interact with the promoted content, find it relatable enough to create conversations around it. Brands have to practice cultural sensitivity to build an inclusive community that’s a safe space for everybody. Brands can achieve the same by taking into account, a customer’s headspace that’s already influenced by personal insecurities, political turbulence, worldwide pandemic, or natural calamities like bushfires and earthquakes. Social media experts say brands with an intuitive and accountable marketing strategy succeed in striking the right chord with their consumers.

The lack of proper standards to regularise the vast data collected by social media platforms is a challenge right now. When solved, this will further spearhead the adoption of AI-based tools by Social media marketing companies. With brands increasingly depending on Affiliate marketing and users consuming more vlogs and audio content, Predictive AI algorithm that are integrated with voice assistants and enhanced visual analytics will gain more popularity.

A forecast published by www.marketsandmarkets.com states that AI in social media marketing will reach a net worth of 2197 million dollars in 2023. 

Source: Marketandmarkets.com

Social media experts say the advancement of AI will redefine how businesses worldwide approach Social Media Marketing. This the right time for brands and social media marketing companies to invest resources in AI-based social media marketing strategies to have a heads up in the game!