By Marti Willet, President, Digital Marketing Recruiters
If there’s anything to be learned from the past year, it’s that AI is an incredible asset in the corporate and marketing worlds. With AI-fueled tools, you and your team can create efficiencies and predictable outcomes like never before. Yet, despite the many advantages of AI adoption, you have to be careful about how you’re positioning your business’s AI usage if you want your marketing department to thrive.
Right now, marketers worldwide are more concerned about their job longevity and security than ever before due to the proliferation of AI. With 87% of marketers worried about technology replacing their jobs, nowhere is the AI impact on digital marketing more apparent than in the recruitment industry.
It’s fair to say that all job seekers are showing heightened anxiety, of course. According to a recent ADP study, just one-fifth of employees said they felt a sense of job security. However, digital marketing professionals are feeling especially nervous with the advent and popularity of generative AI solutions like ChatGPT. Perhaps they should. A small but concerning study from ResumeBuilder.com last year showed that 48% of firms had replaced human workers with ChatGPT. With statistics like that, it’s not hard to see why marketing employees and applicants would be on edge.
From within the industry, digital marketing recruiters are hearing the same worries again and again. Candidates believe their roles will no longer be needed as AI advances and more employers try to “run lean” amidst an unstable economy. Again, their fretting is not unfounded. Nevertheless, it’s also not always accurate. Plenty of wise employers recognize that, although it’s advantageous, AI has its limits. Without honest-to-goodness human marketers, machines will just be advertising to other machines.
The point is that employers can and should use AI to simplify and speed up current and future marketing employees’ jobs. That way, the employees can focus on high-level tasks designed to make the most impact on their organization and its clientele. Ultimately, the best “use case” for AI is in an assistive capacity rather than as a full-fledged replacement for an actual knowledge worker.
But this solution begs an important question: If you’re a company seeking marketing talent, how will you overcome the perception that AI is erasing any hope of job longevity for applicants? What strategies can you use to help great candidates see that it’s worth their time to submit their resumes in response to your organization’s job postings?
Fortunately, you can begin by applying the following four best practices. Each one aims to provide a high degree of reassurance that you value human creativity as much as you value the newest AI advancements.
Invest in training employees on AI best practices.
Education plays an enormous part in helping employees and job seekers feel less daunted by AI. When marketers feel more comfortable and confident with AI, they’re more willing to use it. They’re also able to see it as a way for them to better collaborate with their colleagues and peers.
Demystifying AI for your employees and new hires can also provide a necessary service for your business. The AI world is evolving very quickly. By keeping your team members on the leading edge of AI products and developments, you’ll be investing in both their skill sets and your business’s ability to properly leverage AI to your benefit.
Ultimately, there’s no downside to putting funds aside to show your people how to get more done in their days. Plus, it’s great to have a team of AI “experts” in marketing to serve as mentors for other departments ready to dabble in AI experimentation.
Promote and practice transparent communication around AI.
You can take the power away from “AI’s taking away our jobs” rumors by being transparent with your employees. Instead of letting everyone make assumptions about the effects of automation on job security, explain your intentions around current and future AI adoption. How do you see it empowering your marketing team members? What can it do for your organization’s bottom line? Being willing to talk about AI as a leader removes its power to incite fear.
Your transparency will pay off by improving your brand reputation as a company with a strong, people-based mission. Remember that job candidates are very aware of employers’ brand reputations. As stats culled by Apollo Technical reveal, three-quarters of job candidates look at an organization’s brand reputation before applying. The more positive your brand, the more exceptional the marketing talent you’ll attract.
Avoid AI-related layoffs whenever possible.
Have you discovered one of your marketers’ positions is unnecessary due to the AI tools you’ve implemented? Before letting the marketer go, see if you can shift your employee to a different role. This move will highlight that your employees matter. It will also prevent possible unwanted consequences, like turnover brought about by job longevity and security concerns.
It will cost much less to retrain a marketer who has been on your team for a while than to lose the legacy knowledge of a trusted worker. Therefore, do your best to make adjustments and work with the employee. It’ll show your good faith, and you can share the story with job candidates in the future to highlight your people-first approach.
Candidates, recruiters, and employers worldwide are feeling the impact of AI on recruitment in the marketing realm. To ensure its waves won’t rock your marketing department’s rhythm, put measures in place to show that you’re both AI-friendly and human-centric.
About the Author
Marti Willett is the President of Digital Marketing Recruiters, a specialized firm dedicated to matching talented digital marketing professionals with growth-focused businesses. With a rich background in digital marketing, Marti has spent over a decade refining her expertise in talent acquisition, business process architecture, and leadership development. Her approach is characterized by a passion for connecting exceptional individuals with the right job opportunities, leveraging her team’s collective 30 years of digital marketing experience to offer a truly personalized service.
