The notion of artificial intelligence (AI) has played out in fiction, on the silver screen and on the small screen for decades. Instead of having sentient cyborgs that enslave humanity, people are using AI for our benefit. Today, we take a look at the AI of 2018, and how your business can leverage it for your benefit.
What is Artificial Intelligence?
Today’s world is filled with data. All the experiences and thoughts humans have produced over centuries have provided somewhat of a record of what is expected from AI. After all, if humans are going to replace workers with machines, ensuring they can do the jobs as efficiently is going to be important. For now, however, AI is being utilized in conjunction with people—trying to make our world better by making the applications and services we depend on more intuitive and efficient.
At one time, there were the American titans of industry. Today, we have titans of technology, and not one of them isn’t completely fascinated by the practical applications that artificial intelligence can have for humanity. The thing standing in the way from all this glorious AI-fueled innovation, of course, is humanity. It seems every so often there is a report that is written suggesting that millions of workers can now be replaced with machines, and in the interest of shareholder profits, any business that has been able to leverage AI and increase its profitability has gone ahead and done so, often against public sentiment.
One study predicted that 47 percent of all jobs could be automated by 2033. If you’re looking for some current statistics, in 2016, another report found that up to nine percent of all workers are now unnecessary. Another suggested that more than 800 of the largest businesses in the world will cut between four and seven percent of their workforce and replace them with more efficient and less costly artificially intelligent machines.
How Your Business Could Use AI
You use AI every day without even thinking about it—every time you use Google, Uber or Lyft, and every time your email sends an incoming email to spam. Even as people all look forward to an inevitable permanent vacation as a result of AI, it can be extraordinarily useful for the smaller business. Here are three ways even the smallest of businesses can take advantage of the growing AI market.
Operations
For small manufacturers or service providers, many of the often-redundant parts of the job can now be automated. Since an AI-fueled ERP or CRM platform adjusts to the data you enter into it, it increases the level of automation you can use to make your business more efficient.
Marketing
Small businesses rely on very targeted marketing campaigns, and by utilizing AI-driven marketing platforms, companies can reduce their marketing costs and target the audience most likely to purchase their products and services.
Customer service
Customer service representatives have a tendency to flame out fairly quickly and actually deteriorate a company’s relationships with its customers. By using AI to automate a big portion of the customer service load, customers will get better support and will tend to become repeat customers.