AI Generated Videos a Blessing or Curse for Your Marketing Strategy?

Will AI-generated videos find their way into mainstream media? Well, we’re already there. But what happens next for Artificial Intelligence and the video production industry is the exciting part. So let's dive into more details about the AI generated content ocean.

What is the impact of gen-AI on t he video and marketing industry

In Poland (yep, that’s where we’re at), the first fully AI generated TV advertisement for a major pharma company hit the screens last week and sparked discussions among traditional and digital marketing industry professionals about the impact of generative AI on video production and the marketing industry in general.

Sure, a lot of the conversations revolved around the AI video content quality or the creative concept of the advertisement, but what pretty much everyone thought was: sh*t, this probably was done way cheaper than any traditional ad could be.

And you know what? It was probably true. We covered what makes videos cost the $$$ they do a lot of times - in this blog post for example.

So it made us think.

Is AI a threat or a blessing to digital marketing? Will replacing traditional videos with ones made by AI powered tools become the new normal? Will two opposing trends co-exist, where human creativity will always have to compete with AI technology for the attention of customers? Or is there a secret third option that somehow can combine the best of both worlds - the AI one and human video content creators?

Yep, we think it’s the third one. And here’s why.

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What are the benefits of using Artificial Intelligence in video marketing?

First of all, there are a couple of awesome things about using AI-powered tools to support video development and digital marketing strategy at the same time:

1. Speed - AI can help you save time because it performs tasks faster, including generating video content. Even multiple videos, if you need them for some reason. Buuuut you’ll need an experienced team to make it work.
2. Costs - we've already mentioned AI saves time and time is money. But you can also save on resources such as people, location, and equipment costs. Or you can add special effects and creative elements that would be way too expensive in “real life” just by typing a prompt to an AI tool to create video content in real time.
3. Consistency - AI is good at creating footage that matches colors, style, tone, etc. However, if you want consistency in details, you must bring in various other apps like Photoshop.
4. Accessibility - in theory, anyone capable of learning how to use AI can make a video without any special equipment or years of know-how. Just like theoretically, anyone can make a video with their phone.

Human creativity versus AI-generated content creation

So why not drop all the traditional ways of work and just start using Artificial Intelligence to generate videos and nothing else? Well, there are already some better- and less-known issues associated with AI - starting from general consumer mistrust to it as a new technology, as well as AI generated content itself being too artificial, creepy or weird. But here’s one thing that can’t be ignored. It's the human touch.

Human contribution can bring some benefits into the creative process that AI or machine learning is not yet able to deliver. We’re talking about things like:

1. Plain old creativity. The human creative process is not a straight line going from point A to point B and very often is based on past experiences, emotions (we’ll get to them later), or understanding the context, or cultural references. And the fact is that it cannot be easily replicated. It might in the future, but not yet.
2. Emotions - we’ve talked many times about why emotions are essential, also in B2B marketing - here for example. At this time, AI tools are still failing to create content that effectively conveys emotions or factors them into the decision-making process.
3. Humor. While AI algorithms may be able to decipher the meaning of a joke, they usually fail at producing humorous content the same way we do, mainly because it’s such a subjective issue that people find funny. PS: laughter is an emotion, don’t change our mind.

How AI technology can support human creativity?

So the question(s) we, or other marketing professionals should be asking ourselves is not whether AI-generated videos are a blessing or a curse both for marketers and video marketing professionals. Or if AI videos are better than human-made ones and will they replace them at some point. Or if Artificial Intelligence will ever be able to produce content as good as humans or replace human content creators completely. Or will it at some point generate content without the need of human intervention, removing that human touch once and for all (because who knows how far machine learning, natural language processing and predictive analytics will go in the future?).

It should be: how video content creators can embrace AI tools to optimize and increase the productivity of video content creation process and enhance human creativity to produce even more relevant content to our target audience or support our marketing efforts?

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There are some pretty obvious solutions here, for example using AI to save huge amounts of time by automating all the mundane tasks or repetitive tasks that are associated with video production or content marketing in general. Or to support content marketers such as, let's say, a human writer, by helping generate script ideas or with their research by making AI answer questions. The possibilities are almost endless here - only the future will show how else we can benefit from what AI has to offer.

But why stop here if AI can help us achieve results in video content that only a couple of years ago would still live in the sci-fi realm?

Case Study - Coca-Cola "The Masterpiece" ad

Here's a great example of a 2023 Coca-Cola advertisement called "The Masterpiece" that shows how AI can support video content creation:

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A lot of digital marketing professionals assumed it was mostly AI-developed and called it things like "a great use of generative AI", "finally a good AI ad", or even an "AI masterpiece". However, this great making of video from the team behind the ad shows exactly in which parts AI was used to create the effects and how, but also tons of additional work by a huge team of people with a lot of creative ideas.

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Summary

So, if we had to answer if AI is a blessing or curse for video production, we would have to go with blessing. We think it's a great tool that in the right hands can not only help overcome creative challenges, but bring marketing creativity to new heights. All to provide a whole new level of customer experience and customer satisfaction for your target audience.

We’re pretty excited about what AI will bring into the future of content marketing and production, digital marketing and the business world in general. We hope you are too!

In the meantime let's team up and make videos that will help you engage your customers and stay ahead of your competition together!

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