For longer than you are probably aware of AI has been a part of your life. It surged up to the surface of the news in 2023 as many new AI apps followed ChatGPT’s release in November of 2022. However, even before these new forms of AI surfaced, virtual assistants were a part of our lives – whether it was Siri, Cortana or Google we got very accustomed to AI without even being too aware of it. Other technologies like AutoCorrect are designed to use Machine Learning to adapt to your habits over time. It learns your speech patterns and offers helpful suggestions and corrections across everything from email to word processors and text messages.
So what’s new in this wave of AI?
Generative AI is now smart enough to take your input and develop a creative output in the form of both text and images. This opens up a whole new world of possibilities that can increase our productivity and assist in creativity. As the popular saying goes, “with great power comes great responsibility.” It’s important to understand the potential bias of AI as well as the need for human touch (such as proofreading and fact checking) as it only has a set amount of information to work with. So, while many are worried they will be replaced by AI, we like to think of AI as a tool that will help you take steps that may have previously taken much longer, such as data organization. AI lacks contextual understanding, common sense, ethics, and imagination. While AI can assist humans in various fields, it cannot replace them entirely.
Helping You Work Smarter Not Harder
As we mentioned AI is getting better and better at generating text and images, but how can this technology assist you directly?
- Automation: This helps save you from repetitive and time-consuming tasks that, while valuable, eat up big chunks of your day. AI is capable of helping you perform data entry, timely responses to customer service needs and creating content ideas for your social media feeds. This frees you up to focus on more strategic tasks that require human creativity and problem-solving skills.
- Personalization: AI can help business owners provide personalized experiences for their customers by analyzing data such as customer behavior, preferences, and purchase history. This can help businesses tailor things like their email outreach to be more effective at communicating with their target audience.
- Fraud and Scam Detection: The most susceptible part of any business even with the top of the line security is the human element. AI can help business owners detect suspicious patterns and behavior and flag early. This can help businesses protect themselves and their customers from what would otherwise be devastating financial losses, before they happen.
- Predictive Analytics: AI trained in data modeling can use predictive analytics to forecast future trends and behaviors. This can help business owners anticipate changes in the market, identify emerging opportunities, and make informed decisions.
By leveraging AI, you are able to get the most out of your day-to-day operations by cutting out the time consuming repetitive tasks and focusing on what will set you apart. Reclaim time to boost your productivity and stay competitive in today’s fast paced business environment.
So which tools are worth it?
There are so many AI tools out there now that, depending on your industry, are more useful than others.
Chat GPT
When referring to AI, ChatGPT usually comes up. ChatGPT is a free app that can assist you with your writing needs. In order for it to work most efficiently and effectively, you need to provide it with very specific instructions. Therefore, it may take some time for you to find the best method of creating the best prompts to get the results you want and need. Google even released a direct competitor to ChatGPT, Bard, to make its stance in the AI world.
With the introduction of a search browser function and plugin, ChatGPT has become an even more versatile tool. This plugin functionality allows ChatGPT to access the internet and provide users with up-to-date information.
Otter.AI
Otter.ai is a useful tool for meetings or interviews, as it can automatically summarize what you spoke about and split it into different topics that were covered as well. It maps out who is speaking at what time making it easy to go back and revisit pieces of the conversation in detail.
DALL-E 2
Dall-e 2 is a great tool for creating highly realistic images in just a few minutes. It contains a broad range of artistic styles and produces high quality images. This can be used for creating illustrations, designing products and generating new business ideas.
AI is now able to interpret human prompts and generate multimedia. Ask it to show you an orange on a tree stump in the middle of the rainforest and you’ll be surprised at the results! You can even go so far as to specify the artistic style and it will update the output to match.
Adobe Firefly AI
Adobe Firefly AI is a popular text and design software used by creatives and software developers. It analyzes massive quantities of data and makes predictions using cutting edge algorithms. In essence, this platform helps users make better-educated decisions by providing them with insights and suggestions based on real time data. It does require an adobe cloud subscription to sign up!
Notion AI
Notion AI is a great way to help you automate your tasks. This platform has capabilities to assist you summarize your notes, recap your meetings, brainstorm ideas, write rough drafts and more. It can even expand upon what you already have written.
AI Integration Updates
In addition to the creation of new AI apps, we see a lot of established companies creating or incorporating other AI add-ons to their products. Some highlights of these include:
Canva
Canva, the graphic design platform, has incorporated AI in various capacities into their system. From integrations that are similar features to Dall-e 2 to Beat Sync which allows you to easily create your Reels and TikTok videos, Canva has upped its AI game by incorporating several areas to make work more efficient than ever before.
Adobe Photoshop
A must use platform in the design industry, has incorporated its own Generative Fill AI into their apps. This AI can add in whatever you describe via text to the selected area of a photo. It is able to add and fill sections of the photo with appropriate shadows, reflections, lighting, and perspective to give you amazing results with less editing.
Airtable
Airtable created their own AI feature. This will let everyone on the team use the power of AI to create product specs, predictively categorize user feedback, create creative briefs, generate job descriptions and so much more. Airtable AI will be able to be added to any workflow and will have features available to help a variety of departments.
Who’s using AI?
According to IBM’s Global AI Adaptation Index of 2022, more than a third of companies report the use of AI in their businesses. The use of AI varies between businesses, some use it for fraud detection, others for automation of business processes etc. Finding how AI best fits into your business is entirely up to you but it is important to note that the use of AI and its prevalence in our world is increasing, despite how you plan to use it going forward.
How AI is being used by big brands:
Coca-Cola’s Real Magic Campaign invited digital artists to participate to create “Real Magic” using a first-of-its-kind AI platform to generate original artwork with iconic creative assets from the Coca‑Cola archives. The platform was built exclusively for Coca‑Cola by OpenAI and Bain & Company, “Create Real Magic” is the first platform to combine the capabilities of GPT-4, which produces human-like text from search engine queries, and DALL-E, which produces images based on off text input. This collaboration showcases the fusion of human creativity and AI technology, resulting in visually stunning and emotionally compelling ads that resonate with consumers in a whole new way.
AI is a tool but not a crutch.
We should be clear that while AI may be the future, it’s far from the answer to all of your problems. There are still plenty of things that humans do better and AI lacks that creative spark that is unique within each and every one of us. AI can’t replicate the nuance of the human condition that allows us to innovate and stand out from the crowd by thinking critically.
We recommend that you at least start getting familiar with AI as a tool, but be wary of heavily becoming over dependent on it. Like every major innovation that has reshaped the modern world, from the automobile to the internet, the sooner you get on board the more advantages you’ll have over those who choose to ignore it. You’ll put yourself in a position to catch the wave rather than missing it altogether.