Artificial intelligence and machine learning have the potential to revolutionise the way that we live our lives, whether we’re talking about the way that we drive and how our cities are organised or whether we’re talking about the way that we analyse and understand data.

This has a huge knock on effect for marketers, of course. But first, it’s important to understand the way that the internet of things, big data, artificial intelligence and machine learning are all intrinsically interlinked.

The internet of things is the term that we use to refer to interconnected devices that are able to upload data, whether we’re talking about smartwatches or connected traffic lights. This data becomes big data when it’s analysed on mass, which allows us to draw conclusions that might otherwise have remained undetected. Artificial intelligence is often used to automate this process, because no human could ever analyse the amount of data that we’re talking about. Machine learning allows artificial intelligence to draw its own conclusions, instead of being limited to looking for exactly what it was originally programmed to look for.

How Machine Learning Helps Marketers

Now, you might be thinking to yourself, “This is great – but how does it affect me as a marketer?” Well, the fact is that marketers are creatures of data. We analyse numbers to determine whether our campaigns are a success, and we use complicated tests to improve those numbers over time.

That’s where machine learning comes in. It allows marketers to process huge amounts of data about their campaigns and customers and to unlock latent information that’s right there in the data but which has so far gone unnoticed. It can even help our lead generation process by allowing us to more accurately target people with personalised content and the perfect messaging to get them to convert.

We’re actually already using machine learning technology, both in our everyday lives and when we step into the office. Netflix uses it to make recommendations to users, and social networking sites are starting to experiment with machine learning technology as a key ranking factor in their news feeds. Machine learning could also revolutionise the way we run our advertisements, particularly when it comes to programmatic advertising and other high volume campaigns.

The Future of Machine Learning

Of course, we’re still at the beginning of the machine learning revolution, and so it’s hard to say with any certainty what the end result will look like. It’s possible that many marketing roles, such as search engine optimisation and ad management, will eventually be taken over by algorithms, especially because machine learning techniques can start to teach themselves over time.

There are two main ways to get more leads from your online lead generation campaigns. The first is to refine your calls-to-action, your internal signposting and your data capture pages so that you’re converting more leads from your existing traffic. The second is to accept your existing conversion rate and to focus instead on driving more traffic to the site.

Regardless of how you feel about machine learning’s potential for lead generation, most notably by getting to know prospects and drawing conclusions that no human could ever identify, it’s still going to affect our lives as consumers.

When it comes to business, all we can do for now is to keep an eye out for the latest research and best practices. As more and more people find new ways to use machine learning technology, we’ll start to see more and more of its potential. What a time to be alive.