AI: Is Efficiency Enough For Media Brands?

By Robert Keenan, President, Keenan Media

Recently, I had the chance to talk to a set of executives about the impact of AI on the media/publishing sector. As we all know, AI is the hot topic on the mind of most media execs. Whether the conversation is positive or negative, AI is now a part of most tech conversations today and likely will be for years to come.

Recently, I was asked to talk to an industry group about AI and the impact it's having on the media space along with the opportunities it provides. You can see the presentation from the meeting by clicking here.

There's no doubt that the advent of Gen AI is having a dramatic impact on SEO traffic. Some publishers are reporting up to a 40% loss in search traffic! But if you move past Gen AI and look at AI as a whole, there are some wins happening in the media space. Here are some that some media companies are adopting today:

1. Using AI to generate versions of emails to speed event marketing.
2. Using AI to help research and generate proposals for sales teams.
3. Using AI to transcribe editorial interviews.

I've even talked to some folks that have leveraged the tools to generate job descriptions. (Admittedly, this is one I did myself when hiring a developer candidate several months ago!).

Like many new technology solutions coming into media, we're all looking for ways for AI to make our lives easier. Right now, the solutions are around speed and efficiency.

But, is that enough?

My argument is the answer is definitely NO to this question. There is no doubt that efficiency is a good way to start. It's an easy way to show the benefit of a tool like AI.

However, if we're going to truly justify an investment in AI and find a true ROI from it, we have to keep pushing the boundaries further.

The question is where can we start pushing. From talking with folks, I think there are a few places where AI can have a true impact on our brands and business. They are:

1. Data insights -- Many of us have data together. But making it easy for all users in the business to run reports is the unlocked potential of data. By using natural language queries, AI can hold the key here.
2. Content Search -- Have you ever met a media team that is happy with the search engines on their sites? I can tell you, I haven't found one! Recently, I saw a demo of an AI-powered chatbot running searches on media brands. If tweaked properly, it really was a slam dunk to solve a problem that has been a thorn in all of our sides.
3. Personalization -- Building personalized interactions with our brands in the digital world has been on every media brand's radars. But, things like complex taxonomies and other technical hurdles have slowed this from happening. Through AI, we may be able to bridge the gap and use the intelligence of the AI engines to better categorize our content and deliver better options for users to determine what they want to see and when.

These are just 3 opportunities out there. As Joel Hughes recently said in an LinkedIn post, it's important for all of us to play with AI tools. But, it's also important to remember that AI is more than using the Gen AI tools. If we're going to be successful with AI, we likely will need to turn to vendors, like a Direqt, to develop AI solutions that are optimized for the needs of media brands.

As I said above, efficiency is a great way to start. However, for AI to have a true impact in the media space, we have to keep pushing the boundaries and look for ways that AI can transform our business and interaction with our audience.