As AI becomes ever more prevalent in our everyday lives, we thought we’d take a look at how it’s had an impact on paid social media advertising, and the pros and cons of using the tool for your business.
Let’s dive right in…
Pros of Using AI In Paid Social Media Ads
Ease of Use – If you’ve taken a look at Facebook advertising recently, you will notice that the automated settings are now the default, making it even easier to use. The AI version will suggest copy, headlines and imagery for the ad campaign, taking a lot of the leg work out of setting the ad up - freeing up your time to get on with your daily workload.
Targeting and Personalisation – AI can quickly and easily analyse user data and create specific audience segments to target your ads to. This means that you could target different audience segments with different campaigns for maximum impact.
Improved Efficiency - Once you’ve set the ads up, AI can automate a lot of the repetitive tasks that you may not have time to do, like adjusting bidding, campaign optimisation and testing your ads on different audiences. All of which allow you to focus on your strategy, rather than getting bogged down with the minutiae of the campaign itself.
Real Time Optimisation – AI algorithms will make instant adjustments to campaigns based on performance. The algorithm ensures that more budget is allocated to the best-performing ads or audience segments.
Predictive Analytics – The algorithm is also capable of predicting trends, user behaviours and the likelihood of users converting to customers. All of which can help you refine strategies.
Cost Effective – The fact that it targets only relevant users should mean that your ad spend is fully utilised and not wasted on the wrong audience. Added to which, it will identify underperforming ads quickly and reallocate the budget to reduce any wasted ad spend.
Scalability - The tool is adept at handling large-scale campaigns across multiple platforms. This enables consistency in performance monitoring and reporting.
Advanced Insights – AI can analyse certain creative elements of the ad, such as imagery and headlines etc to determine which combinations drive the best engagement. It will then provide recommendations for improving creative content.
From this quick list, this sounds pretty perfect – ads that take minutes to set up, fine tune themselves and make recommendations for future campaigns. For balance, let’s take a look at some of the cons…
Cons of Using AI in Paid Social Media Ads
Dependent on Data Quality – AI's effectiveness relies heavily on the quality and quantity of data you have about your social media page or account. If you’re just starting out for example, the data won’t be available, and you will still have to manually select your target audience.
In addition, some data may be incomplete, which can lead to poor targeting, which will reduce the performance of your campaign.
Limited Creativity – There is no substitute for human creativity, and whilst AI can make suggestions, you know what tone of voice resonates with your customers better than anyone else. Over-reliance on AI may also result in ads that lack originality or emotional resonance.
Lack of Transparency – On occasion, AI algorithms can behave like a "black box," making it difficult to understand why certain decisions were made about your campaign. This can cause issues with trying to diagnose any campaign issues.
Over Automation – Using too much automation can lead to a loss of control over certain campaign details that require human judgement, meaning potential opportunities can be missed.
Privacy and Ethical Concerns – Given that AI targeting relies on heavily on user data, you need to be careful with privacy and ethical issues. Poor handling of data or excessive personalisation may lead to disgruntled users.
To Summarise
AI in paid social media ads is a powerful tool for optimising campaigns and improving efficiency. However, it is essential to balance automation with human oversight to ensure the quality of the data, authentic tone of voice and to be mindful of how user data is handled to minimise any risks.
If you are looking to grow your marketing activities this year and need some support navigating the increasingly competitive digital landscape, do get in touch to speak to a member of our team.