Bridging the Gap Between AI and Strategy. The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning.
Year: 2023
Type: dissertation
Abstract: Artificial intelligence (AI) is omnipresent.The literature demonstrates that AI quickly becomes prevalent in everyday and professional life.These rapid advancements in AI have significantly impacted many industries, including marketing.Numerous organisations have already implemented AI to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of their marketing processes.This led to AI-based technologies becoming facilitators and innovators in most companies and industries.However, with the current AI's significant impact on marketing, there is still limited research on its impact on STP (Stone et al., 2020).This research aims to bridge the gap between AI and strategic marketing by exploring the impact of this technology on Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning (STP).In doing so, the implications for the discipline, best practices and considerations are assessed.To achieve this objective, the research question of this study is as follows: "What is the impact of AI-based technologies on STP?".Nine semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with a heterogeneous group of marketing and AI experts to answer this research question.The content of these interviews, based on the manual coding of 81 transcribed pages, is analysed in this dissertation's findings and discussions section, which attempts to answer the stated research question.Several measures were taken to ensure the findings' reliability, accurate display, and internal validity. FindingsThe interviewed expert verified and expressed the significant impact of AI on daily life, but more importantly, marketing and the STP process.This study demonstrated that AI significantly affects STP's very nature, increasing the efficiency and accuracy of marketing efforts.Additionally, this profound AI-induced transformation will seriously alter the roles and responsibilities of marketing professionals.However, it is essential to recognise and address related challenges and limitations to effectively leverage AI's full potential ethically and lawfully.AI's impact on the STP can be divided into different categories.First, this research demonstrates that AI significantly impacts the very nature of STP.The key impact here is dynamic marketing, where AI continuously collects and analyses vast amounts of behavioural and profile data to consider the STP a continuous process.This evolution means the STP process becomes self-learning and connects to real-time customer behaviour.This approach eliminates the gap between analytics and customer behaviour and allows for better understanding, segmentation, and targeting.This shift to a dynamic and automated approach to STP completely transforms its well-known traditional approach.The impact of AI on STP can also be discussed in terms of increased efficiency and effectiveness.AI impacts STP and other marketing processes by increasing efficiency and effectiveness.As previously mentioned, AI-induced real-time dynamic marketing is able to increase efficiency and accuracy.This modern approach to STP enables marketing professionals to adapt their STP strategy continuously and create an enhanced customer-centricity.
Author: Smit, Thibeau
Language: English
Topic: AI in Service Interactions
Subfield: Marketing
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7055009132