The beginning of digital marketing — Kelford Labs Daily
Marketing for and by machines.
Sometimes I wonder if “digital marketing” is just beginning.
What we called “digital marketing” until now was really just organic, human-made marketing distributed through digital channels.
But now we’ve got marketing made by machines, to be consumed by machines. Whether that’s generative search engines or AI agents working on a user’s behalf: Marketing is now being made by bots to attract bots.
Is AI the first, true version of “digital marketing”?
Like, “digital cinema” didn’t begin with distribution formats. We didn’t put a movie shot on film on a DVD and call it “digital filmmaking.”
It wasn’t really until films started getting shot on digital cameras that “digital filmmaking” really took off as a concept.
It’s inarguable that digital filmmaking opened the doors for new filmmakers to have opportunities that didn’t exist before. They suddenly had more options, more abilities.
And marketers now have new, easier digital tools like ChatGPT that allow them to do things they never could before.
But just like digital filmmaking, most of what emerges first will be absolute crap. We’ll need more and more sophisticated sorting and recommending algorithms to help us find the stuff we actually like and want.
I think we’ve all noticed, for instance, that Netflix and YouTube’s recommendation algorithms have not improved at the same pace that digital media has devolved. There’s more content now than ever, but it’s harder and harder to find anything good.
The same is and will be true of marketing. More and more of it, created by AI, will mean more and more distraction, more and more interruption, more and more noise.
So it will take more and more effort to stand out, even as the tools make it easier and easier to join the cacophony.
All of this is to say, though, that I don’t want to be like the filmmakers who refuse to use digital cameras, who think all cinema must be organic, must be shot on film.
I want to be the type that knows it doesn’t matter what technology is used, the important thing is the image.
The tools don’t matter, the choices we make do.
And we need to know how the tools work, whether that’s a digital camera or ChatGPT, so we can get the best results.
Ones that are ours because we made choices, so we’re doing digital marketing, not just adding to the digital noise.
Reply to this email to tell me what you think, or ask any questions!
Kelford Inc. shows experts the way to always knowing what to say.
