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5 Concerns Marketers Have About AI & How Leadership Can Address Them [New Data + Tips]
Though generative AI is everywhere, the fear around the state of AI is real.
From our survey of 1350+ business professionals in the US, including marketers, we found that 63% of marketers not already using generative AI are not looking to start.
Yet, there are vast amounts of data and use cases to support AI as a productive and efficient tool to support marketing efforts.
In this article, we’re looking at the top fears surrounding AI in marketing and sharing tips from experts to help leadership address them.
The Top Concerns for Using AI
Our survey results identified the top five fears around using AI and the potential rationale. Find out what they are so you can better support your team.
1. Threat to Jobs
AI’s supposed threat to marketers’ jobs is a justified fear. But, our survey suggests that employees are overly concerned about this.
We found that marketers using generative AI believe that it can help create marketing content more efficiently (77%) and improve the quality of their marketing content (79%).
From an employee’s perspective, these stats might sound scary!
However, leadership surveyed said AI/automation tools make employees more productive (30%), and AI/automation tools make employees more effective at their jobs (32%).
Even better, 66% of business leaders have hired new employees specifically to help with leveraging/implementing AI/automation tools.
The threat to jobs can leave marketers worried about their jobs’ future. Understandably, a fear like this could prevent someone from embracing AI to its fullest.
With leaders believing that AI is making teams more productive and effective at their jobs, restructuring the narrative is all it could take to reassure your team that their jobs are not under threat and instead that AI is a tool to empower them.
2. Quality and Relevancy
The second biggest concern revolves around the quality and relevancy of AI outputs. Of those surveyed, 30% of marketers believe that content created using generative AI isn’t as good as content made exclusively by humans.
Also, 28% said the content generative AI produces isn’t always relevant to desired goals.
Evidence suggests that AI is suitable and can return high-quality and relevant content. Our survey found that 44% of marketers agree that AI can write better content than humans.
Perhaps the key is using AI to its fullest potential with strong prompts.
Adam Smith, founder of The Content Machine, explores AI content with in-depth experimentation, strong prompts, and a lot of testing. On LinkedIn, he shares how AI content is working for his websites.
3. Accuracy
AI and accuracy is a well-known fear among marketers. For marketing, accuracy is critical. False information published on a brand’s website can potentially damage brand-consumer relations at best and be catastrophic at worst.
Our survey found that only 23% of marketers are very confident that the information generative AI produces is accurate, and 30% think that generative AI sometimes produces inaccurate information.
Everyone else? Well, they’re under-confident in the accuracy AI provides.
Most AI users have likely come across a questionable statement, and no doubt, fact-checking AI is vital to the AI process.
But does this mean that AI shouldn’t be adopted? We’re not so sure!
Moritz Kremb helps businesses leverage AI for growth. He shares tips and insights on AI. Kremb shares eight strategies to elevate AI and writing in the post below:
Ultimately, AI can only ever be as accurate as its input. If you learn to prompt more effectively, you might find accuracy improves.
4. Usefulness
AI tools are less valuable than some marketers would like them to be. When asked, “How important or unimportant is generative AI to your overall content marketing strategy?” 30% of marketers answered, “neither important nor unimportant” or “unimportant.”
Only 27% of respondents answered “very important.”
The usefulness of AI is relatively subjective because a lot of marketers are finding it very useful and claim that:
Marketers should use generative AI but avoid becoming overly reliant (67%).
Generative AI has had a significant, moderate, or slight change in how they create content in 2023 (83%).
AI/automation tools make them more effective at their job (67%).
The truth is that AI is still young, and it can do a lot. Experts such as Greg Brockman, president and co-founder at Open AI, recognize that AI is still in its early days.
Perhaps the key to using AI in a way that serves you is understanding where it’s helpful so you can join the 67% of marketers who find it makes them more effective at their jobs.
5. Over-Reliance
Conscientious marketers don’t want to become overly reliant on AI tools (43%), a perfectly reasonable response to AI adoption. After all, people want to love what they do, and customers will always need that human interaction.
But should over-reliance stop us from using AI? Probably not! Those most concerned about over-reliance on AI are precisely who should be using it. After all, you will figure out how to balance effectiveness and human touch.
Tips for Addressing AI Fears
Now that you understand the top five fears for marketers, you can find the antidote from marketing leaders who share their top tips below.
[Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vdZCXb5P1E]1. Create empowering processes.
Campbell Tourgis, vice president of sales and marketing at Wainbee, believes the answer is empowering processes.
Tourgis says his team acknowledges concerns that AI may affect content quality. In response, they balance AI utilization with the human touch in sales and marketing campaigns.
“While we use an AI-powered CRM system and other relevant tools, our editorial team carefully checks the final draft to ensure we publish unique, credible content for our website, marketing materials, and sales scripts,” Tourgis says.
What we like: Tourgis’ team has found a way to bring together the human touch and AI. AI-powered CRMs like HubSpot have integrations like Content Assistant and ChatSpot; both are designed to make your day-to-day tasks easier and faster!
2. Stay in control.
While AI is in its early stages, sharing data can feel scary. Carolyn James, consultant and trainer at Website Insights, has a solution.
“AI is in its early stages, which means it is still largely unregulated. This is why I use data encryption for the sensitive client data I possess. Because we’re dealing with datasets that contain private information, my employees are thoroughly trained to be mindful of these data privacy policies,” she says.
James’ team carefully evaluates all AI platforms before use, ensuring they are secure before integrating client data.
“This is one of many measures we take to protect our clients’ data so it doesn’t get misused or compromised,” James says.
What we like: James is looking out for her clients using encryption methods to protect client data. Additionally, James recommends that marketers use tools that are carefully scrutinized. A great place to start is with an AI tool you can trust.
3. Involve teams in decision-making.
Melissa Popp, content strategy director at RicketyRoo, recognizes that teams not involved in decision-making are less likely to embrace AI.
Popp recommends you “include the team in decisions about AI implementation by organizing brainstorming sessions. Encouraging our team to contribute ideas and shape how AI is integrated across our strategies is also integral to getting buy-in from our team and our clients.”
What we like: With teams involved in decision-making, there are opportunities for everyone involved in the AI implementation to have their say. It’s an opportunity to air concerns and for leadership to reassure and provide solutions.
4. Maintain open lines of communication.
Similarly, Greg Kozera, performance consultant at ELM Learning, recommends establishing and maintaining open lines of communication regarding AI’s many uses. Consider setting up a channel where team members can share the helpful use cases they’ve discovered and their effects on their productivity.
“This ‘learning from others’ scenario can provide proven tips that come directly from those that they trust — their own team members. The additional plus is that there is no limit to this informal education,” Kozera says.
What we like: Group chats or channels can encourage team learning. It’s also a safe place where teams can find support for their apprehensions and receive encouragement from great ideas! From team channels, leadership can see the main issues and plan to resolve them, resulting in a happier workforce.
5. Test tools.
Ken Paskins, CEO of GCE Consulting, recommends testing AI tools. He says, “As with anything else, the best way to quell your fears surrounding a particular tool or technology is to see it in action.”
Paskins recommends slowly implementing AI into simple situations involving basic automation. From there, employees can see firsthand the time they can save with AI.
“[Time saved] can then be spent on more challenging projects that require a human touch,” Paskins says. “Proceed with a ‘learn by doing’ philosophy, and answer questions after your team has the time to experiment with straightforward tasks.”
What we like: Testing tools is a great way to determine what has a purpose within your organization and what doesn’t. If one tool doesn’t work for you, you can look for something that does instead of avoiding AI entirely.
6. Reassure employees.
Shannon Roxborough, chief marketing officer (CMO), ROCKBlue believes that addressing AI fears starts with communication and reassurance.
Roxborough says, “It’s essential that marketing leaders work with senior leadership to reassure employees and address their concerns by establishing internal standards and guidelines for AI transparency, trust, security, and safety.”
Roxborough notes that leaders should work to inform and educate marketing teams about the benefits of AI. That includes how it can help make them more productive and contribute to their well-being.
What we like: AI fears can only improve if leadership and employees work together to develop trust and security. We like that Roxborough is looking to help educate teams and show how AI is a productivity support.
Should AI fears stop you?
The data from our State of AI survey gives reason for the legitimate fears of marketers. Still, the same survey also discovered cases where marketers are thrilled with their AI adoption.
AI fears needn’t stop you from exploring how AI can support you and your business goals. As the experts show us, with good processes, experimentation, communication, and education, AI can be a helpful marketing tool.
Should Marketers Optimize for Bing? [Data + Expert Tips]
When you think about search engine optimization (SEO), one major search engine probably comes to mind: Google. But what about Bing SEO?
With more than a billion monthly users, Bing is the second most popular search engine globally.
Moreover, since Microsoft’s acquisition of OpenAI earlier this year, Bing has begun integrating AI technology into its search engine, and its traffic has increased by more than 15%.
With its growing popularity, Bing SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) should be on the radar for marketers crafting their search engine optimization strategy.
In this comprehensive Bing SEO guide, I’ll help you explore why Bing is still relevant for marketers, offer data-driven, expert-approved Bing SEO tips, and give you the tools you’ll need to optimize your online presence for this increasingly popular search engine.
Substantial User Base
Less Competition
AI-Powered Search
Risk Diversification
Bing vs. Google: Similarities and Differences
Building the Right Foundation for Bing SEO
Leverage HubSpot’s SEO Marketing Tools
Sign Up for Bing’s Webmaster Tools
Claim Your Business on Bing Places
Tips to Improve Your Bing Ranking
1. Prioritize Exact Keyword Matches
2. Don’t Forget About Meta-Tags
3. Invest in Quality Backlinks
4. Build Strong Domain Authority
6. Cultivate a Social Media Following
7. Incorporate Images — But Don’t Overdo It
Maximize Your Online Visibility with Bing
Should you optimize for Bing?
Is it worth optimizing for Bing? That’s only a question that your team can answer. I’d encourage you to look at it this way: If you’re just starting out on your SEO journey, focusing on Google may make sense.
Plus, you may not have the resources to allocate to both search engines. But as you grow, it’s definitely worth optimizing your online content for Bing, too.
While Bing still has a smaller market share than Google, it remains an important piece of the search engine pie, and it can serve as an important channel for your marketing efforts.
To capitalize on this potential, invest in Bing SEO. That means understanding why Bing SEO matters, the ways in which Bing and Google differ, and what it takes to build a solid foundation for Bing SEO and boost your rankings on this platform.
Why Bing SEO Matters
So, why does Bing SEO matter? That’s a great question. Before diving into the specific strategies that drive success on Bing, it’s helpful to explore why Bing SEO matters for today’s marketers.
There are four key factors underlying Bing’s ongoing relevance:
Substantial User Base
Bing might not have the same search volume as Google, but it still boasts a substantial user base. With over a billion monthly users, Bing captures a noteworthy share of the search market.
If you ignore this audience, you risk missing out on potential customers who are actively seeking information, products, or services related to your business.
Investing in Bing SEO will help you tap into a diverse pool of users and increase your online visibility.
Less Competition
Because most SEO efforts are primarily focused on Google, competition for rankings on its results pages can be fierce. Bing, on the other hand, offers a less crowded landscape.
With fewer websites optimizing for Bing, there’s a greater opportunity to achieve higher rankings and gain visibility in search results. This can be particularly advantageous for businesses operating in highly competitive niches.
AI-Powered Search
Thanks to its acquisition of OpenAI, Microsoft has been able to infuse advanced AI technology into Bing’s search engine.
This has enabled Bing to develop enhanced functionalities, smarter recommendations, and an improved user experience, all of which have been contributing to an increase in user engagement and site visits.
In light of these trends, optimizing your online presence for Bing means aligning your strategy with cutting-edge, rapidly growing technology, ultimately setting your organization up for success in the long term.
Risk Diversification
Finally, relying on Google alone for all of your organic search traffic can be risky.
Unexpected changes to the algorithm or shifts in user behavior can suddenly impact your website’s visibility, leaving you with little recourse to recoup the losses.
Diversifying your SEO efforts by including Bing in your strategy can provide a safety net, helping to mitigate this risk and reduce the potential impact of fluctuations in search engine performance.
Bing vs. Google: Similarities and Differences
Good news! If you’ve already optimized your website content for Google, you’re off to a solid start for Bing as well.
Many SEO techniques are effective on both platforms, as both search engines reward content that’s relevant, trustworthy, and high-quality.
However, there are also several important differences that marketers should keep in mind when optimizing for Bing. First, Bing is generally more open about its search algorithms than Google is.
This means that marketers can, in many cases, make more informed decisions about exactly how to craft Bing-optimized content.
Another key difference: Google explicitly ignores meta keyword tags, but Bing still uses these tags in its search algorithm. Therefore, with Bing, it’s worth continuing to make sure your web pages have useful, accurate keyword tags.
In general, Google looks more for higher-level topic relevance, while on Bing, specific keywords that exactly match the search terms you’re targeting are more likely to be effective in improving your SERP rankings.
Another important difference is the relative weight of social. Google has stated that social media engagement is not a factor in its search rankings, but on Bing, social plays an important role in determining what content will rank.
As such, driving high-quality social media engagement should be part of your Bing SEO strategy.
Below, I’ll dive into how you can leverage these key differences to build an SEO strategy that considers Bing alongside Google.
Building the Right Foundation for Bing SEO
Any Bing SEO guide would be incomplete without an overview of how teams can build a strong foundation for Bing SEO. There are several important steps to consider, and I’ll walk you through them now.
Leverage HubSpot’s SEO Marketing Tools
Whether you’re just getting started with SEO or looking to take your optimization strategy to the next level, you can’t go wrong with HubSpot’s SEO marketing tools.
These tools are an excellent way to build a strong foundation for your SEO efforts.
The HubSpot platform can help you plan out your SEO strategy, optimize your content for search, and measure ROI, ensuring your Bing SEO strategy is data-driven and aligned with your broader marketing goals.
Sign Up for Bing’s Webmaster Tools
Next, if you’re looking to optimize for Bing specifically, it’s definitely worth signing up for access to Bing’s webmaster tools.
This suite of tools can help you identify the keywords you already rank for on Bing, gain visibility into the backlinks that Bing has indexed for your website, and subscribe to alerts to make sure you stay on top of any changes.
Creating an account with Bing also gives you access to a comprehensive dashboard with key metrics related to site activity and click rates.
You can even run your website through a range of diagnostic tools, including Bing’s SEO Site Analyzer, keyword research tools, and mobile friendliness audit.
Submit a Sitemap to Bing
In addition, once you’ve signed up for an account with Bing’s webmaster tools, you can submit a sitemap for your website directly to Bing.
Submitting a sitemap will help boost your Bing SEO by improving how the search engine crawls, indexes, and ranks your website.
Before Bing accepts the sitemap, you’ll be asked to verify your website by placing an XML file on your web server, copying a short meta tag into your website, or adding a CNAME record to your DNS.
Once you’ve verified your website, Bing can use your sitemap to better understand the information and content on your website, ultimately enabling the search engine to provide better, more useful results to users.
Invest in Schema Markup
Schema markup is another important way you can help Bing understand your content and thus improve the quality of the results it provides.
In a nutshell, effective schema markup enables search engines to parse website information and interpret what it means.
This ensures that when your business comes up in Bing’s search results, key data points like your company’s location, a blog post’s author, or an event’s time and date, are clearly and prominently displayed.
Claim Your Business on Bing Places
Finally, if your company has a physical location, claiming your business on Bing Places is critical to ensure users are seeing accurate, up-to-date information about your organization.
Remember: Even if you don’t use Bing yourself or haven’t yet proactively invested in Bing SEO, Bing already lists publicly-available information businesses like hours, location, and more.
However, this information isn’t always accurate, so claiming your business on Bing Places helps ensure everything is up-to-date.
Plus, unclaimed businesses are generally listed below those that have been claimed and verified, so if you needed one more reason to take the extra step, that’s it.
As such, both to boost your rankings and to confirm that the information shown to customers is consistent and correct, it’s worth taking a few minutes to claim your listing.
To do so, simply find your business on Bing and click “Claim Business.”
You’ll be asked to verify that you’re a business owner or authorized representative.
Once verification is complete, you’ll be able to add photos and videos of your products and services, updated hours of operation, services offered, contact methods, and more.
It’s simple.
Tips to Improve Your Bing Ranking
Once you’ve set up a solid foundation for Bing SEO, it’s time to get into the nitty-gritty details. Below, I’ve listed eight tips to help you improve your Bing rankings.
1. Prioritize exact keyword matches
This is one of the main differences between Google and Bing SEO strategy. While Google’s algorithm has grown fairly complex, Bing’s still relies heavily on exact matches between search terms and on-page content.
Rather than considering factors like word usage, context, and semantics, Bing is seeking exact keyword matches.
That means that it’s beneficial to include exact keyword matches in the content on your site.
For example, if you want to rank highly for the phrase “marketing automation software” on Bing, don’t just write content about software tools that can help automate marketing.
Instead, make sure to include the exact phrase “marketing automation software” in the H1 or H2 headings in your content.
2. Don’t forget about meta tags
SEO isn’t just about the content that users see — it’s also about behind-the-scenes content that helps search engines understand what your website is all about.
While both Google and Bing consider the content in your meta tags, Bing is particularly interested in exact matches between keywords and meta descriptions.
As such, make sure that your target keywords are reflected not only on the page, but also in the meta tags that Bing will be looking at.
3. Invest in quality backlinks
Another critical factor in Bing’s ranking algorithm is the quality of your backlinks: That is, the websites across the internet that link back to your site. Importantly, this is an area in which quality is much more important than quantity.
Bing is looking to see whether reputable, relevant, well-established websites are linking to your website, as this can serve as an indication that your website is also trustworthy.
In particular, Bing tends to prioritize links from websites with .edu, .org, or .gov domains, since these sites tend to be associated with official, verified institutions.
Bing also tends to give considerable weight to domain age, with backlinks from older websites having a stronger positive effect on website rankings.
Finally, if spammy, low-quality websites are linking to your site, that can substantially harm your rankings.
So if you’re aware of any of these harmful backlinks, consider either reaching out to the webmaster of the website in question and requesting that they remove the link or using Bing’s webmaster tools to formally disavow the backlink.
4. Build strong domain authority
Of course, domain authority doesn’t just apply to your backlinks — Bing also considers several factors related to the authority of your own URL.
Some of these factors may be outside your control, but it’s still important to keep your domain authority in mind when making key SEO decisions.
The main levers you can pull when it comes to Bing’s assessment of your website’s domain authority are age and keywords.
Bing rewards websites that have been around for a long time, so think carefully before creating a brand new website if you already have one.
In addition, Bing’s focus on exact keyword matches applies not just to on-page content and meta tags but to URLs as well. For instance, Bing is more likely to rank pages highly if the URL includes an exact match to the search terms.
5. Ensure mobile friendliness
As Marketing Consultant Anna Crowe explains, “Even though Bing has said there are no plans to introduce mobile-first indexing on its platform, you still want to make sure your site is mobile friendly.”
When determining mobile friendliness, Bing considers factors such as:
If the content on your pages fits within the narrower screen width of a mobile device
Whether or not the text is still readable on mobile
If your links and buttons are still easy to use on a mobile interface.
If you’re not sure whether your webpage is sufficiently mobile responsive, you can use Bing’s mobile friendliness test tool to quickly gain insight into your site’s current status. Then, improve any areas that don’t earn high marks as necessary.
6. Cultivate a social media following
While Google has largely removed social media engagement from its search algorithm, Bing still places substantial weight on the social following associated with a website’s domain.
To be sure, that does not mean that you should start paying for followers. Shady tactics that help you rapidly gain a large number of fake followers will be easily detected, and Bing penalizes such behavior.
However, making a genuine investment into building a real, loyal social media following can pay off when it comes to your rankings on Bing.
If Bing sees that your web pages are being shared widely on social media, it’s likely to take that as a good sign about the authority and relevance of your content, and improve your SERP rankings accordingly.
7. Incorporate images — but don’t overdo it
Well-placed images with clear, concise alt text can go a long way to boosting your Bing SEO.
Indeed, while Google is known for largely prioritizing text and html, Bing’s algorithm may reward content with more multimedia components, such as images and video clips.
That said, when it comes to media elements, it’s equally important to avoid overdoing it. Drowning your website in a sea of imagery can often backfire, especially if images or videos make it harder to see the key information on your site.
In addition, excessively intrusive advertisements that block your actual content or interfere with the user experience are also likely to harm your search rankings. For example, here’s a web page layout in which the imagery is intrusive, not helpful:
8. Craft quality content
There are countless tips and tricks that can help boost your position on Bing’s SERPs. But at the end of the day, just as with SEO on any other platform, your success on Bing comes down to your ability to craft quality content.
That means developing web pages that are relevant, informative, and credible, and free of spammy or misleading content.
A focus on quality is especially important as generative AI creates new possibilities for machine-generated content.
Indeed, in a recent survey of more than 400 marketers, we found that more than half were already incorporating generative AI into their SEO and content development workflows.
Clearly, AI tools can add a lot of value — but it’s important to avoid publishing content that reads like it was written by a robot.
After all, if Bing’s algorithm detects content that appears to be solely designed to boost SERP rankings (rather than to add real value to the user), it’s likely to classify that content as malicious and penalize rankings accordingly.
At the same time, as AI tools are increasingly incorporated into search engines, marketers may benefit from rethinking their approach to content.
In the same survey, marketers predicted that if generative AI is integrated into search engines, “How to” and “Question/Answer” type content will perform the best, perhaps because this format is most likely to correspond to the questions users may ask of an AI-assisted search engine.
As AI evolves, so will the type of content Bing deems as high-quality. But as long as marketers ensure that the intent behind their web content remains to help their users (not to trick the algorithms), they’re likely to be rewarded.
Maximize Your Online Visibility with Bing
While there’s no doubt that Google remains the industry leader for search, factoring in Bing is an increasingly important part of an effective SEO strategy in today’s market.
In particular, Bing’s growing user base, reduced competition, and ongoing investment into cutting-edge AI technologies make the platform an important way to diversify your strategy and maximize your online visibility.
Of course, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution to SEO.
Especially as new technologies continue to emerge and disrupt industry standards, it’s critical to take a dynamic, agile approach to crafting (and re-crafting) your marketing strategy.
But if you build a strong foundation and follow the Bing SEO tips listed above, you’ll set yourself up for success and maximize your chances of capitalizing on the unique advantages Bing has to offer.