Marketers: GenerativeAI is the most important consumer trend of 2023

Mediaocean conducted an April survey of more than 700 respondents primarily representing brands and agencies, but also media companies, measurement firms, tech platforms, and other marketing industry constituents. In thinking about the most important consumer trends that respondents are watching this year, almost 6 in 10 (59%) cited generative AI (e.g. ChatGPT, DALL-E), slightly ahead of TikTok/social video (57%).

Generative AI was a new option for this edition of the survey that immediately vaulted to the top of the list; beyond it, the rank of most important trends remained mostly consistent with the previous edition. The only difference was that this time, more respondents cited gaming than the metaverse as an important consumer trend to watch, with the latter quickly falling off the radar for marketers amid consumer apathy.

As far as generative AI goes, respondents to the Mediaocean survey tabbed copywriting (59%) and data analysis (53%) as the areas in which they see its biggest potential in marketing, followed by market research (48%), image generation (39%), and customer service (37%). Relatively few (30%) see its potential impact on SEO, with AI-driven search feared to have a significantly detrimental impact on content discovery.

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