AI; you’re using it wrong!

“Most marketers are using AI wrong.”

That’s what Peter Weinberg and Jon Lombardo state in an opinion piece they’ve written for MarketingWeek.

Now, the former global head of development at LinkedIn’s B2B Institute and LinkedIn’s former global head of research may say this to promote their new venture Evidenza, an AI powered solution that promises to do your segmentation, positioning, and messaging based on the input from synthetic clients.

However, I do think that Weinberg and Lombardo have a point.

They came up with three AI laws:

1. “The amount of leverage that AI creates is proportional to the skill of its player.”
   
   In other words, you first need to become damn good at your job, before trying to automate tasks using AI.
   
2. “The leverage AI creates is proportional to the combined skill of the [player] and the [person programming the AI].”
   
   You shouldn’t focus on what AI can do, but instead debate what it should do.
   
   This means, you’ll need to collaborate. Mix your marketing expertise with someone else’s technical know how to come up with better questions.
   
   Or, as Weinberg and Lombardo put it: “As answers become abundant, the competitive edge will belong to [professionals] who know how to ask smarter questions than their rivals.”
   
3. “The gains from AI are proportional to the difficulty of the task.”
   
   Consider the jobs and tasks that are hard to perform and require the highest investment – in time, effort, and money. Now, consider how AI could help you at these jobs.
   
   Focus on the easy jobs and the efficiency gains will be limited. Focus on the hard ones and the gains will be revolutionary.

I think all of this makes a lot of sense. Also, because it’s not necessarily restricted to AI. I believe it holds true for all innovations.

Now, I’m no AI expert. I’ve clocked way too few hours.

However, I do like to test GenAI and see if I can come up with prompts that make my work easier and its output better.

Here are a couple of consecutive prompt that can help you with your positioning:

1. I’m offering [service offering] to [target audience].
   
   I want you to benchmark my USPs against the competition as to better understand my position in the market. I will provide you with a set of USPs and a list of competitors. I want you to then visit their websites and check for the USPs. Does that make sense?
   
2. USPs are: [list of USPs]
   
   Competitors are:  [list of competitors’ websites]
   
   Please visit the websites, check for similar USPs and provide me with the findings. Put the results in a table format.
   
3. And what about the other competitors? (In case the AI needs a bit of encouragement)

If for some reason you’re uncertain about your own USPs and/or competitors, prompt the AI to help you:

1. Visit [my company website] and uncover my organization’s USPs.
   
2. Based on what you’ve found on our website, who would you consider our competitors?

These prompt probably need fine-tuning. Let me know what you think of the results you got.

Hope this helps!

Thank you for reading MBD Boost #027, sent to marketers and business developers on January 14, 2025.