In today's rapidly evolving technological landscape, the key to successful business models lies not in predicting the market, but in shaping it. The rise of generative AI, as an undeniable force, is propelling the business stage into unprecedented transformations. A suite of innovative AI technologies, led by generative AI, is maximizing commercial value by shaping markets and setting trends.
More and more companies are pondering how to leverage generative AI as a powerful tool to create more competitive products and precise marketing strategies. The creative thinking within enterprises is driving continuous innovation in AI within the marketing domain.
To address this, Baidu Marketing, in collaboration with the Chinese edition of the "Harvard Business Review," has brought together experts and scholars from the business domain, as well as representatives from various industries and sectors, including Lenovo, Sophia, Sany Group, China Oriental Education, and LigoGraphite, among others. Together, they have co-created the special issue "Shaping the Future of Business," sharing insights into the booming era of generative AI. They discuss AI innovation applications, success stories, and frontier explorations of future development, aiming to deepen industry understanding and grasp of this new future business landscape. Let's shape the future of business together.
Continuous Evolution of New Technologies
How to Implement AI in Enterprise Marketing?
Over the past few years, we've witnessed the journey of AI technology from the laboratory to the market. The emergence of AI technology has transformed marketing from relying solely on human judgment and accumulated experience to utilizing intelligent data analysis and prediction, enabling more precise and efficient marketing strategies.
AI marketing not only helps businesses better understand consumer needs and behavior but also provides personalized products and services, thereby enhancing user experience and increasing brand loyalty.
This is a marketing revolution triggered by AI technology, which not only changes traditional marketing models but also brings new business opportunities and competitive advantages to enterprises.
Professor Jiang Qingyun from Fudan University's School of Management believes that the evolving AI technology holds its greatest value in changing marketing strategies and decisions. Enterprises need to embrace AI and adapt to the trend of AI technology development, taking the lead in shaping the future of business. This is not just about enhancing competitiveness but also ensuring innovation and sustainable development in the ever-changing business environment.
Especially when it comes to the disruptive impact of generative AI on marketing, many interviewed guests note its significant influence on creativity, insights, and media in marketing.
Firstly, generative AI can simulate human creative thinking patterns and, based on historical data and market insights, delve deeper into data to better understand consumer needs and behavior patterns.
From generating attractive and unique content for brands to providing personalized insight solutions and ultimately achieving close interaction and connection with consumers, we find a close relationship between generative AI and brand building.
Wang Chuandong, Vice President of Lenovo Group and Chief Marketing Officer of China, stated that for Lenovo, AI-enabled marketing has become the key to building brand strength and achieving conversion. To bridge the gap from branding to sales, Baidu's Brand Intelligence is Lenovo's preferred choice. Brand Intelligence has changed the way brands communicate with users in the past, making it possible for more refined brand knowledge Q&A and real-time interaction between brands and end-users.
Similarly, Sophia is leveraging Baidu's Merchant Intelligence and other generative AI products to enhance marketing efficiency. According to Qian Ye, General Manager of Sophia's New Retail Center, with the increasing diversity and personalization trend in housing needs in China, Sophia needs to once again focus on "user value" to explore the needs and interests of users of different age groups.
Secondly, generative AI technology also plays an important role in media selection and creative generation. It empowers advertising creativity by producing personalized ad content and intelligently selects the best media channels and communication methods based on different marketing objectives and audience characteristics to maximize marketing effectiveness.
When discussing the education industry, Sha Xu, Executive Vice President of China East Education Group, expressed a similar view. He believes that with Generation Z becoming the main force in vocational education, a single communication mode is no longer effective, prompting China East Education to change its brand marketing approach. Therefore, reaching out to young people with more personalized and creative content via social media is particularly important.
"As compared to other platforms' creative generative AI products, Baidu's Helm understands marketing better, emphasizing the application of marketing scenarios and providing more precise and personalized creative generation services, quickly assisting us in copywriting, images, and video creation," said Sha Xu.
Lastly, generative AI can reshape the advertising delivery process and optimize delivery efficiency.
For example, relying on Baidu's B2B comprehensive industry solution, Love Procurement, based on continuously iterating deep learning models, generative AI is reshaping the traditional advertising delivery process, bringing new growth opportunities for SMEs. With the support of Love Procurement, within just 4 years, the sales of Liugong Graphite have exceeded 100 million CNY.
Xu Jinliang, General Manager of Henan Liugong Graphite Co., Ltd., believes that compared to the time cost of acquiring customers offline, the cost of acquiring customers online is very low. With just online store opening, operation, and advertising, nationwide customers can be reached. With the support of Baidu's generative AI, user profiles have become more refined.
Similarly, Wang Lichao, Vice General Manager and Director of Marketing Headquarters of Sany Group, believes that digital transformation is a key lever for the construction machinery industry to break through the cycle. In the current environment where incremental growth is difficult to find, generative AI is bound to change the business model and marketing strategy in the field of construction machinery.
Building "Intelligent Business" Together
Making AI Accessible to Everyone
Through the sharing of these interviewed guests, we can see that the introduction of advanced AI technology not only provides enterprises with smarter and more efficient tools but also redefines our understanding of business, with generative AI driving a more intelligent, innovative, and sustainable future for business.
Based on this trend, more brands will undoubtedly start to lay out AI marketing in the future, using generative AI tools. But the question that follows is, can everyone use AI tools well? In an ideal state, how far are we from the era when everyone will use AI?
As shared in the special issue "Creating a New Future for Business," in the process of reconstructing Baidu's marketing with generative AI, Baidu Marketing has launched a series of innovative platforms and applications, such as Brand Intelligence, Merchant Intelligence, Light Boat, Helm, and Love Procurement. In addition, Baidu Marketing has launched a new brand value proposition - Creating a New Future for Business. "Generation" implies that Baidu will fully embrace the era of generative AI and make full use of generative AI technology. As for the development direction of "Creating a New Future for Business," Baidu's answer is "Intelligent Business."
At the Baidu World Conference last year in 2023, Baidu released the 4.0 version of the Wenshin large model, which is the most powerful Wenshin large model to date, with significant improvements in understanding, generation, logic, and memory. Baidu Marketing believes that people have been trying to create an entity that can autonomously achieve preset goals, namely intelligent agents. The emergence of large models has brought the ideal state of intelligent agents closer to us, perhaps this is the code to make AI accessible to everyone. Specifically, based on the Wenxin Large Model 4.0, "Intelligent Agent Commerce" is sketching out the blueprint for the future of business. On one hand, each customer can have their own exclusive avatar intelligent agent on Baidu. These agents can autonomously engage with users in the best possible manner, stimulate demand, provide exceptional service, and meet customer needs. On the other hand, Baidu Marketing will utilize Light Raft as the unified platform for interacting with customers, deeply understanding and satisfying their needs.
In the ecosystem section of the "Creating the Future of Business" special issue, we are fortunate to have invited a series of industry experts and leaders, including Elvis Xu, Managing Director of Search and Programmatic Platform Services at Qunyi Group; Xiaozhen Chen, Vice President of Shenguang Group; Yingzhou He, Chairman of Shaanxi Bode Network Media Co., Ltd.; Xiaomin Li, CEO of New Light Ring Unparalleled; Na Wang, CEO of Brand Innovation; Ling He, President of Hebei Pangu Network Technology Co., Ltd.; Zhongbing Li, Chairman of First Screen Group; Hai Guo, President of Leio Digital Media Agency Group & Senior Vice President of Jusheng Wanhe; Jiaju Chen, Vice President of Data and Media Product Solutions at Dentsu China; Di Wu, CEO of Jingmei Advertising; Wei Liu, CEO of Zhiwei Technology; and Bo Yang, Chairman of Chengdu Baidu. They have delved into the profound impact of AI technology on marketing.
The guests unanimously believe that the continuous development and application of AI technology are fundamentally changing the landscape of the marketing field. They also affirm the importance of "Intelligent Agent Commerce" and emphasize its critical role in enhancing marketing efficiency, creating personalized user experiences, and fostering interaction between brands and users. They unanimously agree that "Intelligent Agent Commerce" is not only a trend in future marketing but also a key path for enterprises to achieve innovation and sustainable development.
From the perspective of Baidu Marketing, any enterprise, regardless of field or scale, can harness the powerful capabilities of generative AI through Baidu Marketing's intelligent agent commerce, thereby facilitating breakthroughs in management and marketing and creating a prosperous future of business. This requires Baidu and its partners to explore together to create more value for society.
