Ep 28: How does generative AI impact inclusive marketing?
Shownotes
In this episode, Joyann discusses how marketers can use generative AI and why they need to be cautious of the outcomes.
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Transcript
00:00:00:00 - 00:00:30:17
Joyann Boyce
Welcome and welcome back to the marketing made inclusive podcasts. I am your host, Joyann Boyce. Today you're going to have just me solo. Solo minisode. And I just wanted to explore one of the hot topics AI, specific early generative. I said all the things you're seeing around Chat GPT and Dali where people are talking around it creating everything and being used for everything.
00:00:30:20 - 00:01:04:01
Joyann Boyce
They're selling us streams. And I just wanted to kind of explore a little bit about generative. AI's role in inclusive marketing. If there is a role in there. So, I'm making a huge assumption that if you're listening to this podcast that you have engaged with generative AI in some way. And if you haven't, I do highly recommend just messing around with Chat GPT or Bard, which is Google's version, and just asking some generic marketing questions.
00:01:04:05 - 00:01:32:14
Joyann Boyce
I think you can quickly see that it can be useful. Essentially, what those large language models are doing are predicting the next likely word and they're trained on. I'm being very journalistic here, but trained on the Internet. So trained on the content that has been produced by the past. In a marketing case it can be helpful as a starting point from a blank page, can it replace the knowledge of experience and skills?
00:01:32:15 - 00:02:04:25
Joyann Boyce
No. But it can be helpful from, you know, being able to edit. If you have difficulty starting that blank page, giving you something to edit and improve. In the case of inclusive marketing, I don't think generative AI is going to do anything but make non-inclusive marketing ten times faster. There's been some research conducted where they've used prompts for generative AI in terms of imagery and they've asked it to create images to represent individuals.
00:02:04:28 - 00:02:27:13
Joyann Boyce
And a lot of the times it created things that ten xed to biases we have in society. And I think this kind of quickly highlights how negative generative AI could be to inclusive marketing, because dependent on the marketeer and the prompts you're putting in, you're just ten xed any biases you may have your team may have or any biases that already exist.
00:02:27:15 - 00:03:07:06
Joyann Boyce
You may have good intentions to create a campaign that's representative of all types of women, for example. But generative AI is more likely to give you what has been successful in the past and generate an image of a thin blond Barbie as an example, or generates language that is not inclusive. Now, there has been work around making AI in general more ethical, more inclusive, but I do feel that we're a little ways away from it being a huge tool for creating inclusive content.
00:03:07:09 - 00:03:39:27
Joyann Boyce
Now, on the flip side of that, I am exploring using AI to detect bias because I think it's something that is so good at being biased. So why kind of not use it to detect itself? And there's a lot that can be done in that element. If you haven't explored or interacted with the AI in any way, one of the ways you can think of it a really good analogy I use in my work is think of generative AI and things like Chat GPT and Bard as puppies.
00:03:39:29 - 00:04:12:21
Joyann Boyce
Puppies that have been trained to be agreeable, puppies that have been trained to always give an answer. In I would say 95% of the cases, they have been restrictions now where they're pulling back on some of the more controversial content that is producing. And you have to be very specific what you’re asking that well-trained puppy to produce for your content because it can produce something that is potentially harmful for your brand and your audience.
00:04:12:24 - 00:04:28:29
Joyann Boyce
And it may be harmful in an instance that you don't understand how it's harmful because you don't have that lived experience or you're not able to spot the biases or the stereotypes or the troops that are being included in the content that generative AI is creating.
00:04:28:29 - 00:04:37:22
Joyann Boyce
Now, one mini experiment you can do, you can ask it to create a persona based on names.
00:04:37:24 - 00:05:11:02
Joyann Boyce
And there's a lot of biases on the internet around names and the way that it would create a marketing persona for Paul, David John versus Sally, Erica or Bridget, you'll be able to quickly see some of the biases within there. So, my overall opinion is that in the terms of generative AI being able to move or progress inclusive marketing, we're not there yet.
00:05:11:04 - 00:05:39:00
Joyann Boyce
We're not there yet. In terms of generative AI and helpful for marketing in general, I think it's huge. I think there's elements of making things more efficient, but you still need an underlying marketing skill, experience and a level of awareness and knowledge of inclusive content and ways to approach accessible content as well, to really make it impactful for your brand, for your audience.
00:05:39:03 - 00:06:14:09
Joyann Boyce
So, explore the tools, mess around with the tools. Just be cautious that they're not going to produce the most inclusive content. I highly recommend checking out a Netflix documentary by Dr. Joy Paul Pollini while she's in the documentary. It's called The Coded Bias. I highly recommend checking out the article by Bloomberg where they prompted, I believe it was staple staple to Fusion or Dali to create images to represent people in different roles.
00:06:14:10 - 00:06:39:07
Joyann Boyce
And you can see some of the biases there. I will link these below, but these are some examples that as a marketeer you need to be cautious when using generative AI to create content. Top Tips. If you're going to use it, always edit. I know it seems obvious, but there's been so many scenarios of people caught out using it for content and not editing it, not adapting it to that tone of voice.
00:06:39:07 - 00:07:10:23
Joyann Boyce
I have seen posts on LinkedIn myself where I can tell, I can tell what prompts they used because it's the same as four the people's posts before and future wise, A.I. is going to be an ever-growing speedy space. I think it's important for marketers to be involved and be aware of what it is. If you want me to dive deeper into what AI is, or generative AI, or AI in marketing, definitely send me a message on any of the social platforms.
00:07:10:25 - 00:07:33:06
Joyann Boyce
This is a topic that collides very much in my world, is what my research was based on for the past two years in regards to bias and bias in the AI generally. But it is a tool and it can be useful for marketers and it's going to integrate it into every marketing platform that we already use in our day to day.
00:07:33:08 - 00:08:00:02
Joyann Boyce
But there's a lot of caution to be take when you're talking about producing content that's meant to be tailored for your target audience. So that was a quick minisode. Just wanted to share my thoughts on generative AI. Thank you for tuning in to the Marketing Made Inclusive podcast. You can find me on all platforms at Joyann Boyce and tune in next week where we continue to explore how we can make inclusive marketing the industry standard.
