Constant Contact Wants to Help SMBs Monetize Content Via AI

Why it matters:

• 70% percent of executives in a recent Gartner poll said that their organization is in investigation and exploration mode with generative AI, which produces original content from just a key phrase or brief description.
• Many of those generative AI investments are directed at customer experience and retention, according to 38% of Gartner poll respondents.
• 26% of Gartner poll respondents said their investments in generative AI were meant to drive revenues.

As artificial intelligence (AI) has evolved, so have the tools that Constant Contact provides for its business partners to communicate with their customers.

The marketing technology company, which helps businesses execute and manage their email, SMS (text messaging), and social media communications with their customers, is putting more capabilities into the hands of small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) when it comes to building relationships across multiple channels. That includes creating and sending messages with the right content at the right time for specific customer segments.

“Most people know us for email, and they’re getting to know us for SMS text,” Russ Morton, Chief Product Officer, Constant Contact, told CO—. “As you think about a true marketing automation strategy, you're going to need to leverage both of those, along with social, of course.”

Constant Contact recently launched what it described as the first AI-powered email and SMS marketing content generator for small businesses and nonprofits. The AI Content Generator allows Constant Contact customers to automate the content-drafting process for email, text, and social media marketing campaigns.

New automated language programs, such as ChatGPT and others that can generate content based on just a few prompt words, have opened the door for new opportunities for SMBs and others to automate their messaging, Morton explained.

“We see our role as staying abreast of all of this dynamism that’s going on in the world and bringing that to small businesses,” he said. “Previously, we’ve used AI to suggest when you should send [an email], or to suggest a subject line that’s going to get people to click on your emails. Now the big breakthrough is that the AI, with a [prompt] text, can actually generate an entire email for you.”

[Read: How Artificial Intelligence (AI) Is Changing How Marketers Sell Everything From Food to Fashion]

AI tools that turn businesses’ proprietary info into content that hooks customers

Constant Contact’s AI Content Generator was built using the ChatGPT application programming interface (API), but the company is continuing to monitor developments in AI-driven language solutions, or “generative AI,” an area that is expected to evolve rapidly in the near term, Morton said.

The new tool uses proprietary data and algorithms to recognize the types of content that small business customers are most likely to engage with, then taps ChatGPT to automatically create content that can be leveraged across multiple marketing channels.

“Most businesses, by just spending less than 30 seconds … can type out what they’re thinking in a stream of consciousness kind of way, and use our tool to get started,” Morton said. “The tool trains you to be a great marketer without you having to get an MBA or hire five different people.”

Constant Contact’s launch comes as businesses across a range of industries have been investing heavily in generative AI. According to Gartner research, 70% of executives in a recent poll said their organization is in investigation and exploration mode with generative AI, and 19% are in pilot or production mode.

“The generative AI frenzy shows no signs of abating,” said Frances Karamouzis, Distinguished Vice President Analyst at Gartner.

The most common use that executives in the Gartner poll cited for generative AI investments was customer experience and retention, at 38%, followed by revenue growth at 26%.

“Generative AI has vast potential to support solutions that augment humans or machines and autonomously execute business and IT processes,” the report concluded.

[Read: 3 Big Picture Trends Set to Drive Business in 2023]

Combining AI with historical data: ‘We've got 25 years of customer emails, and we know which ones are more effective’

In addition to its new AI-driven language tool, Constant Contact also enhanced its automation capabilities with a new Automation Path Builder, which helps marketers tailor their strategies to specific customers based on recent actions and preferences. It includes a library of prebuilt templates that can be used to quickly produce campaigns for customers based on their specific actions, such as subscribing to a list or making a purchase.

At the same time, Constant Contact has also made its user interface more intuitive, Morton said. This helps marketers more easily create and send appropriate messages for each communication channel, so businesses can guide customers through a journey ultimately aimed at driving more sales. Constant Contact also offers best practice guides to help businesses manage their communications efforts.

The extensive experience that Constant Contact has had in messaging consumers has given the company a wealth of data that fuels a cycle of continuous learning and refinement, said Morton.

“We've got 25 years of customer emails, and we know which ones are more effective,” he said.

This, combined with the new, language-generating capabilities of AI, enables Constant Contact to produce “extremely well-crafted marketing content that's going to engage the audience,” Morton said.

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