What is AI in marketing?

Generative AI can analyse data such as customer feedback, reviews, social media posts, audience behaviours and market trends to provide actionable insights. It can also be used to generate marketing copy tailored to your target audience’s needs and preferences. In addition, it can automate key processes such as customer segmentation, social media scheduling and content creation.

As outlined in our guide to AI in business, ChatGPT generates text by processing large volumes of language data from online sources, such as blogs, articles and news sites, and presenting it as readable, structured content. This makes it particularly useful for producing marketing copy or step-by-step strategy guides.

Best practices for AI in marketing

To get the most out of AI in marketing, you can first familiarise yourself with some best practices for using it. The following examples help guide your use of generative AI and improve the quality and relevance of your results.

Use ‘clean’, quality data

Using clean, high-quality data can significantly improve your generative AI results. As Matt Burney explains in Indeed’s guide to the future of AI for employers, quality inputs lead to more relevant and accurate outputs. This generally means that it should have the following five characteristics:

• Accurate
• Reliable
• Complete
• Timely
• Relevant

Identify specific use cases

Focus on targeted use cases rather than creating overly general prompts. Identify small areas for improvement first, for example, by using AI to explore audience segmentation opportunities or assess which product features your audience is most engaged with. If you overhaul your entire marketing strategy using AI, this could lead to errors or unintended outcomes.

Be vigilant of AI bias and factual errors

AI tools can replicate bias from the data they are trained on – or from the data you feed into them. As noted in our article on AI in diversity and inclusion, biased datasets may unintentionally exclude certain demographics in your marketing analysis. Consider conducting AI audits to ensure that your tools do not contain biases which could exclude certain demographics in your marketing analyses. To help reduce this risk:

• Consider conducting AI audits for fairness and inclusivity
• Screen AI-generated copy for insensitive or non-inclusive language
• Double-check all facts, statistics and external references against reputable sources
• Use a plagiarism checker to ensure originality, particularly for public-facing content

Sometimes AI can be factually inaccurate, especially when providing links, data or other similar resources. Make sure to check the information it provides thoroughly against reputable sources. You may also consider using a plagiarism checker to make sure that the AI hasn’t copied the text verbatim from another source.

Use feedback loops to ‘teach’ AI

Use continuous feedback to ‘teach’ AI tools by reinforcing the responses or outputs that deliver useful results. Over time, this helps the model refine its approach and improve the quality of its outputs. For example, you might follow up a response by asking ChatGPT to expand the text, make it more concise or focus on a specific topic. This kind of iterative prompting can help tailor results more closely to your marketing needs.

Remain compliant with data protection laws and be transparent about usage

Before using any customer data with ChatGPT, ensure your approach complies with UK data protection regulations, including GDPR and the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025. As outlined in our guide to GDPR, creating a clear compliance plan can help you stay on track. Consider extending this plan to include how you use customer or business data with AI tools, and be transparent with users about how their data is being handled.

How to use AI to create personalised marketing

One of the most powerful applications of AI in marketing is its ability to quickly tailor strategies to evolving customer needs. As preferences shift over time, ChatGPT can suggest new approaches that help your business stay competitive. For example, it can offer tips for researching customer sentiment or exploring consumer culture within your industry. Other ways to use AI for personalisation include:

• Suggestions for audience segmentation
• New product features
• Marketing funnel strategy tips
• Support with search engine optimisation (SEO)
• Ad targeting tips for your customer base

When not to use AI in marketing

While AI can be helpful, there are situations where it may be less effective. For example, using ChatGPT to rewrite your entire marketing campaign or draft a complete newsletter may not deliver the best results. This is partly because the AI-generated ‘voice’ can be recognisable – especially as audiences become more familiar with the technology.

As seen in our guide to AI and human experience (HX), many aspects of marketing are shaped by human reactions, emotions and perceptions – experiences AI cannot fully replicate. If AI-generated copy feels impersonal or awkward, it may weaken the customer’s connection to your brand.

Injecting a highly personal brand voice can help customers feel more connected with your brand and its product. For example, your newsletter might have a light, humorous tone that engages the reader in a dialogue and is addressed to them by a member of the marketing team. Additionally, showcasing your brand voice through human storytelling can be a great part of your employer branding strategy, encouraging candidates to apply for roles in your business.

How AI can support your marketing process

Tools like ChatGPT can act as a ‘co-pilot’, offering fresh suggestions, helping with repetitive tasks and freeing up your team to focus on high-impact work. The same principle applies across other areas of business. For example, AI project management is proving to be a game-changer in streamlining workflows and improving decision-making. Some of the benefits of using generative AI in this way include:

• Automating time-consuming tasks
• Generating new ideas quickly
• Providing your marketing team with quick solutions so that they can focus on longer writing tasks, reaching out to clients or building effective campaigns

Best ChatGPT prompts for marketing

ChatGPT prompts can be a powerful way to generate ideas and strategies for your marketing campaigns. When using ChatGPT, it’s worth experimenting with different prompts until you achieve the results you are looking for. You can also refine the output by following up with more specific requests. For example, after generating ideas for a giveaway campaign, you might follow up with ‘Suggest a way to present this in a meeting or pitch deck.’

Below are some example prompts and ideas for integrating them into your marketing strategy. While these may be some of the best ChatGPT prompts for marketing overall, we will explain how you can further integrate these into your own marketing strategy.

Marketing strategy tips

You can use ChatGPT for your business to support your marketing strategy by staying up to date with social media trends, audience behaviour and campaign ideas. You could even ask it to build a customer marketing funnel based on your existing research. Use the ChatGPT prompt template below to gain social media insights:

‘Provide [x number of] tips on how I can use social media to increase awareness of my brand in the [x] industry.’

ChatGPT may respond with suggestions on:

• Effective content types
• How to use short-form video
• Strategies for audience engagement

To plan a giveaway strategy, try a prompt like:

‘Create a step-by-step approach to running a giveaway for [brand product] on [social media platform] for [target audience] in order to generate customer leads.’

ChatGPT might then suggest ways to:

• Define your goal
• Choose prizes based on your company’s product
• Set entry criteria
• Make your giveaway content engaging
• Announce the winner
• Track your results using metrics and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Creating marketing copy

ChatGPT can help you create personalised marketing copy for a range of contexts, which you can use to generate feedback responses, social media posts, video or podcast scripts and ideas for email headers and subject lines. If you need to respond to customer feedback or a negative review, try a prompt such as:

‘Create a feedback response for a negative review of [company product], acknowledging the customer’s disappointment first before explaining how the company plans to address their concerns. Include company contact details [insert details] and customer support team member [insert name].’

For best results, provide ChatGPT with the actual review so it can tailor the response accordingly. Addressing a customer’s specific concerns can help rebuild trust and strengthen your brand’s reputation.

You can also use ChatGPT to create email subject lines and headers. For example:

‘Suggest [x] email headers and [x] subject lines based on the attached email newsletter, making them funny, upbeat and focused on [theme, e.g. sale, holiday season, product news].’ 

ChatGPT will generate a range of options for you to choose from, helping you produce engaging messaging with minimal time investment.

Customer analysis

ChatGPT can also support customer analysis by helping you identify audience segments and assess sentiment. For example, use sentiment analysis to identify common pain points in customer feedback or to categorise reviews as positive, neutral or negative. Here are a few examples of how you can achieve this with ChatGPT:

‘Provide an overall sentiment analysis of [product name] customer reviews on [x] site, highlighting pain points and product development opportunities.’

This kind of insight can give you an in-depth analysis of customer satisfaction, including ways to build on consumer trust, improve your product or service and strengthen your competitive positioning in the market.

You can also assess customer loyalty using a prompt like:

‘Provide a customer loyalty rating out of 10 for [x] product based on [x] site reviews and online community feedback.’

ChatGPT may respond with a score, supporting reasoning and potential loyalty detractors, along with suggestions for improving customer acquisition, customer experience and retention.

Generative AI can be a valuable guide throughout the marketing strategy development process. It can be especially useful for idea generation, customer analysis and short-form copy creation. This helps free up time for your marketing team to focus on high-impact work, such as campaign execution or long-form content. As always, be mindful of best practices, particularly regarding bias and the responsible use of customer data, to ensure an effective and ethical approach.