We are entering the era of artificial intelligence, which is undoubtedly a transformative period. As I describe in my e-book “AI for Marketers” artificial intelligence represents a technological disruption comparable only to the advent of the Internet due to its transformative power across all areas of our lives: from work to personal relationships and our homes.
Just like the internet (and many other preceding technologies), this change will unfold in different phases, although we can be certain that changes now occur at an increasingly rapid pace. This means that adaptability and resilience will be essential skills for professionals who wish to succeed in the market. Of course, this also applies to companies too.
In this article, we will focus on the marketing professional, with a particular emphasis on digital marketing. However, before delving into this, it is necessary to understand a bit more about the context of the digital marketing professional over the past few years up to the present day. Today, we have a series of concepts such as digital marketing, growth hacking, and growth marketing, which are often used imprecisely and with a lot of hype about what title to put on LinkedIn to be found or hired.
From Digital Marketing to Growth Marketing
Let’s rewind to the 1990s and early 2000s. It is during these years that we can mark the beginning of digital marketing as we know it today. At that time, beyond the creation of websites as a new obligation for companies, new activities also emerged, such as online advertising and organic positioning (SEO) with Yahoo! and Google.
During this period, we can identify the first professionals in the industry in two categories: firstly, those coming from traditional marketing, characterized by having no digital skills, applying analog world notions to digital but understanding this new world as the innovation where they had to be first. Secondly, there were those professionals who, due to their technical capacity, took on roles related to marketing. For example, websites were developed by programmers rather than UI/UX designers as they are today. The same happened with advertising. Everything was very experimental.
Moving forward in time, we can say that from 2000 to 2010 was the era of digital marketing specialists. These professionals differ significantly from their predecessors, primarily because they understand the digital world. For example, they comprehend certain native digital metrics such as CTR, CPC, or CPM. They even understand how users interact with ads and digital assets like a website (here we begin to give importance to metrics like bounce rate or sessions).
Undoubtedly, the first decade of the new millennium marked a great era of specialization. These professionals, who did not entirely come from marketing, also came from other disciplines and began to specialize in various areas of the digital world. For example: Google Ads specialist, SEO specialist, email marketing specialist, etc. In simple terms, these professionals were the muscle of the digital transformation of the world as we know it today.
From the late 2000s to 2020, we can say it was the era of growth marketing, and this is due to several factors. Firstly, as the Internet continued to expand (Facebook was founded in 2004 and YouTube in 2005), other technologies amplified its reach, such as smartphones: Apple introduced the iPhone in 2007.
With this context, a new phase began for companies with opportunities for exponential growth, starting to implement strategies typical of the digital world. Simply put: in the pre-2000s world, it was very difficult to talk about companies that had captured entire markets based on a network effect or a referral program. But this was now possible thanks to the context described in the previous paragraph, and this is how many of today’s largest players were born and expanded: Google, YouTube, Uber, Facebook, Instagram, Airbnb, or WhatsApp.
During this period, there were significant advances that increasingly left technical knowledge behind in terms of the professional’s value: I still remember how difficult it was in 2014 to implement remarketing on the Google Display Network (it was still Google AdWords!) while today, it only takes three clicks.
All of this allowed for the shaping of a new marketer with native digital foundations. Due to technological advancements, they began to shift from a specialized approach to a more holistic one. Here we see how digital marketing professionals, now growth marketers, handle multiple tools ranging from Ads to Email, Analytics, or web design. They understand the online experience as a whole and are knowledgeable in both business and marketing. Moreover, they have a strong approach to experimentation, data, psychology, and design. In other words, today, a growth marketer must have extensive knowledge of technology and business to perform optimally, as illustrated below:
From Growth Marketer to AI Marketer
The need for a high level of knowledge in various subjects, combined with the speed at which the market moves, means that today, more than ever, we need the assistance of artificial intelligence to save us time on operational tasks and allow us to focus on adding value promptly. It is the correct application of artificial intelligence to growth marketing that will give rise to the next evolution of the marketing professional: the AI Marketer.
In recent years, there has been much debate about the approach of generalist professionals (also called “T-shape marketers,” who have knowledge in various areas of digital marketing beyond their specialty in one area) and specialists (who have deep knowledge in only one area). In light of the results, the truth is that to ensure a solid strategy, even if a professional specializes in one area, they must also have broad knowledge of other areas. For example, a Paid Media specialist must understand the nature and functioning of email marketing or social media. Above all, leaders or heads of growth/marketing must have a profound understanding of what is happening in each of the different marketing channels.
Of course, this will be a gradual change, but it is already possible to see it in the day-to-day dynamics. A few months ago, I began implementing artificial intelligence in all my processes as the leader of the growth team at Glitzi (a Y Combinator Company), a home spa and beauty startup. It only took a month to realize that not only was I completing tasks faster, but I was also able to take on a number of tasks that were previously simply not possible. I was also able to train my team, and the results were quick to follow: our sessions have now reached a higher level with a greater and better quality of ideas and resolutions.
This is how artificial intelligence, with assistants like ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini, and with products that are beginning to integrate AI like Hubspot, Adobe, and others, allows us to start evolving to the next level. That is, by AI Marketer, we do not refer only to those who use ChatGPT with some prompts but to professionals who know how to use technology to efficiently integrate the various disciplines mentioned earlier into their growth vision to achieve superior results.
It is with the vision of the AI Marketer that I created AI for Growth Marketer with the goal of discovering and shaping this evolution of the marketing professional, which is undoubtedly beginning and will be the stage where the divisions between digital marketing and traditional marketing professionals are erased—the final convergence in this discipline.
If you found this article interesting, I invite you to read my e-book “AI for Marketers” where I delve deeper into this topic and propose a practical approach with more than 40 ready-to-use prompts for any marketer’s daily tasks. If you have any comments or suggestions based on this article, feel free to contact me on LinkedIn.