#BizTrends2025: Bettabets Mathabo Sekhonyana - Dispelling the dazzle: A closer look at AI's real potential

Mathabo Sekhonyana, chief marketing officer at Bettabets dispelling the dazzle of AI as she takes a closer look at its real potential (Image supplied)

As a ContentGrip article notes, AI will manage 85% of all customer interactions this year.

We’re also looking to AI to enhance personalisation, and to help us make quicker decisions.

And, as we rely on AI to take care of more of our tasks, we’ll start using more and more AI-powered tools.

Look forward to a year where included in your arsenal are tools like Salesforce, which generates predictive customer insights, GPT-4, AI-enhanced programmatic advertising solutions as well as technologies that allow us to analyse sentiment more accurately.

This year, we’re also likely to see greater integration of augmented reality and AI, while Dynamic Yield and Persado are making sure that marketing is more personalised than ever before.

(In case you haven’t yet started using them, the tools to invest in are HubSpot for marketing automation, Optmyzr for PPC management, Jasper AI for content generation and Synthesia for AI-driven video creation).

Reality check: What can go wrong?

That all sounds very exciting.

Just think: more time to invest in creative tasks and laser-target campaigns that yield fantastic results.

But every silver lining has a cloud, and AI has several.

Here’s the first: if we’re all relying on the same tools, isn’t there a risk that we lose the essence of what makes our brands unique; that it gets lost in a haze of homogenisation?

Then there’s the issue of oversight – because, as much we are counting on these tools to save us time, the reality is that without human involvement, we stand to lose accuracy.

If you let AI take over all interactions, it’s possible that, in time, the voice of the technology may become increasingly divorced from that of the brand, causing irreparable harm to the brand voice or all together losing it in a sea of genericness.

Creativity and authenticity stand to become victims along the way.

Plus, the newness of generative technologies means that issues around copyright and IP infringements remain blurry, using content created by these tools may result in inadvertent infringement.

Mitigating the risks

It’s not as if we’re going to stop using AI – so how do we stop our brands being affected by these potential downsides?

First things first: Human oversight is a must. Tempting though it may be to relegate all dogsbody tasks to automation, someone must take responsibility for overseeing interactions.

We’re not quite ready to cut out the human element – it’s what will ensure that your brand’s unique voice remains intact.

Some other ‘musts’ for getting the most out of AI: see generative tools as a starting point, rather than entrusting your entire content generation process to technology.

Again, this will ensure that your brand maintains its differentiation. Get inspiration from generative AI, use it for research, but don’t let it replace your input.

AI is a tool, not a replacement

While AI can bring immense benefits to marketing, it’s important to remember that it’s still a tool — not a replacement for human creativity and strategic thinking.

One of the most common misconceptions about AI is that it will replace marketers altogether.

In truth, AI enhances human capabilities by providing insights, automating tasks, and offering more efficient ways to engage with customers.
However, the most successful marketing strategies will continue to rely on human intuition, emotional intelligence, and creativity.

As marketers, we must embrace AI as an extension of our expertise, not fear it will take over our jobs altogether.

It’s about combining the power of technology with the intelligence and artistry of human perception and connection.

By leveraging AI to handle repetitive tasks or analyse large datasets, we can free up time to focus on what truly matters: building meaningful relationships with customers and creating impactful campaigns that resonate with our target audiences.

Authentic growth and value

The promises of AI revolutionising the landscape have been at the forefront of every marketing conversation and certainly, there is no doubt that AI stands to have a profound impact on the industry.

The question, though, is whether that impact will be as significant as predicted – because the truth is that the very real benefits AI can bring us are currently clouded in hype.

It’s up to us, as experts, to separate that hype from the genuine, and very exciting possibilities – and the way to do this is by implementing AI in a manner that drives authentic growth and value.