Welcome to the Sunday update. Allowing you to skim through and get a feel for some of the latest uses of technology and AI in Marketing.

In this week’s update:

• Is AI killing creativity? (Probably not)

• e-Commerce + Roblox

• Man interviews himself (sort of)

• A word from Zuck

• Last time on the Smart CMO

Let’s kick it off with a big question I see all the time.

Is AI killing creativity?

Short answer is no.

Here’s a great example of how AI is being used to create it’s own category and artform.

AI artist, James Gerde, has taken a performance from dancer, Brigita Krašovec, and created something visually unique. (Andrew Au)

Every time I go to my newsfeed, there’s another great example of how people are using AI and tech to create something new.

So I am always amazed when someone says that AI is killing creativity.

And it doesn’t need to be a revolution in the create process. It can be a dab of inspiration and an evolution of the process.

Here’s a great example of ad creative that easily demonstrates the step-change process to including AI in your workflow.

(1) The artist is able to quickly get to work generating images in Midjourney (left) before selecting a direction (right).

(2) The ad creative is quickly evolved (left), but that’s not the end. Using generative fill the artisit adds to the original image.

(3) Soon enough they’ve created a unique ad (left) and paired it with a clean piece of copy.

This is such a great example of how creatives can bring in new tools to enhance / extend / evolve / [insert your own elaborate synonym here] their creativity.

And at no point has AI curbed the creativity of the artist.

(Source: Jesse Perez)

e-Commerce + Roblox

If your first question is “What the **** is Roblox?” - then it’s safe to say you’re not a 10 year old child.

So let’s get you up to speed:

• Roblox is a online video game platform

• Roblox has 300 million monthly active users (May 2023)

• 60% of Roblox users are under 16

• There are 3 million developers on the Roblox platform.

• Community developers have made over $701 million on Roblox in the first 9 months of 2023 alone.

And just to be clear here is the breakdown of users by age group:

Now onto what I actually want to share with you.

Wallmart is coming to Roblox

This is an initial test where Roblox will not be earning any revenue from Walmart sales.

How does it work?

1. Players visit the Walmart Discovered experience on Roblox.

2. They navigate to a shopable area within the experience, where they can select from 3 different products.

3. After hitting the "buy" button, a webpage opens up within Roblox to input payment and shipping info to complete the sale.

4. Upon completing their purchase, buyers receive a free digital twin of their physical item, which their avatar can wear across Roblox.
   
   (Source)

Why should this matter to you?

Here are my thoughts on why this matters:

• Captive audience

• New demographic which brands may not have engaged through existing channels

• Gamified environment

• Additional value to customer (e.g.: Digital twins)

• Low operational cost

Man interviews himself (sort of)

Linkedin founder Reid Hoffman published an interview with himself… Well, his AI-self.

Creativly titled “Me, myself, and (A)I” Reid Hoffman has created an AI-generated version of himself to conduct his own Q&A.

This interview brings together experimetnation, implementing new tools, and working outside of your comfort zone. The most important criteria for innovation - in my opinion.

I’ve often throught about how businesses can use AI generated versions of people. My first thought fell on key personnel.

What if you could create a virtual spokesperson for your brand?

Speaking from experience, getting time in the diary of key personnel is a nightmare. Unless your Communications and PR team are dealing with a crisis, it’s unlikely they are going to be co-operative with dedicating time to Marketing and Comms related activities.

It’s rare that your CFO, COO or CPO are comfortable in front of a camera.

What better way than to capture their likeness once, and leverage AI to explain the latest product updates or industry financials - on a weekly basis!

Note: There are of course many other areas where this can be appiled (i.e.: internal comms, customer service, onboarding, product updates, sales etc).

If you want to see how far along we are with this kind of tech, this is probably the best experiment yet:

A word from Zuck

Mark Zuckerberg has given us an update on what’s coming from Meta.

Meta is releasing an operating system to power their VR headset (see Quest). What’s most interesting is their approach to the software, it’s going to be open source.

Which means everyone and anyone can have a go at developing software for their tech.

According to Zuck you can expect to see headsets coming from the likes of Lenovo, Microsoft, and ASUS - with more to come.

Hear from the Zuck for your self:

zuck

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📌 Last time on Smart CMO newsletter

Previously on the Smart CMO: Check out my last summary of McKinsey's report 'The state of AI in 2023: Generative AI’s breakout year'.

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