Unleash the Power of AI in Marketing: 7 Essential Tools for SMEs
Are you looking to boost your marketing efforts with the power of AI? In this article, we'll explore some incredible AI-powered tools and with the latest wave of low-priced and easy-to-use AI technology, even companies with limited budgets and time can get in on the action. So, let's dive in and explore the power of AI-driven marketing.
These days, even small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) can easily reap the benefits of artificial intelligence (AI). These cloud-based, digital marketing AI tools are truly game-changing.
While many SMEs may feel overwhelmed by the thought of adopting new systems, AI-based marketing tools can actually make it easier for them to compete with larger businesses.
With the right technology, SMEs can automate repetitive tasks, gain valuable insights into their customers and create more targeted marketing campaigns.
This new breed of generative AI that uses Large Language Models (LLM) and natural language processing capabilities is spreading like wildfire and covers multiple verticals and use cases.
In this article, we'll explore AI-powered tools that SMEs, entrepreneurs and solopreneurs can use to unleash the power of AI-driven marketing automation.
The topics we’ll cover here are:
- The Power of Words
- Insights Hidden in Documents
- Build Your Dream Website
- Bring Visuals to Life
- Dominate Social Media
- Streamline Your Workflow
- Wow Your Audience
So, let's dive in!
But before we do, here is a little Tl; Dr section.
The tools I would suggest experimenting with at the moment are:
- Hypotenuse AI
- Browse AI
- 10web
- AILabTools
- Ocoya
- Zapier
- Decktopus
This is by no means an extensive list. They are the best AI tools that I have found.
But, in this fast-moving industry, it may all be out of date in a few months' time…
What are the Benefits of AI in Marketing
While AI may have been working behind the scenes to create targeted campaigns for several years now in enterprise businesses, generative AI is revolutionising the way SMEs reach and engage their customers.
And here's the best part: thanks to the latest wave of low-priced, easy-to-use AI technology, even companies with limited budgets and time can get in on the action and start competing for attention and awareness.
So if you're looking to take your marketing efforts to the next level, AI may well have the answer for you!
Here’s some AI-related stats:
A survey by Influencer Marketing Hub found that over 60% of marketers have used AI in their marketing operations.
The same survey also found that over 70% believe that AI can outperform humans at their jobs.
73 per cent of respondents said that they believed that AI and ML had potential to impact customer experience.
A study by PWC believes that AI will have a potential global contribution of $15.7tr by 2030.
Finally, a report by Cisco featured in a Forbes article mentions that 83% of executives are making AI a top priority in their businesses.
However, AI is complex and with many tools available, literally 1000s, it can be difficult for anyone to get started.
To help take advantage of AI, here are 7 areas of marketing where AI can maximise your productivity.
1. Unleash the Power of Words: AI-Powered Copywriting Tools
Copywriting is a tricky business.
For someone who is not an expert copywriter, the benefits of using AI content marketing tools are numerous. With AI, you can quickly generate headlines, subject lines and descriptions that are more likely to grab your audience's attention and drive conversions.
Plus, with AI checking spelling and grammar, you can be sure that your content is error-free and polished before hitting publish.
They are a fantastic time and money saver, giving anyone the ability to produce quality content in a matter of minutes.
I researched and tested about 20 AI content creation tools and have found these three to be the best for low budgets and small teams.
ChatGPT: Whichever way you look at it, this has been a game-changer.
If you haven’t heard about ChatGPT, it's a pretty cool chatbot that’s been developed by OpenAI.
It's based on the GPT (Generative Pretrained Transformer) language model, and the coolest part is that you can chat with this bot in a conversational way, just like you would with a real person.
You know what's even more impressive about ChatGPT? It can be incredibly useful for a wide range of use cases.
Sure, the prompts can be a bit long-winded, and it might not be the quickest tool out there. And yeah, it’s not the most up-to-date (the dataset hasn’t been updated since 2021).
Another important note is that from my testing, it actually had the lowest score in AI detection (high is good, low is bad), but more about that later.
Despite all that, ChatGPT still manages to provide some truly great responses. And get this - it's completely free!
It’s growing faster in users than Instagram or TikTok and this is just a taste of its potential.
As far as I’m concerned, everyone that does any type of content creation should have this tool in their tech stack.
Hypotenuse AI: This AI platform can automatically create content, including art and images, article writing, product descriptions and advertising copy.
The user interface is clean and intuitive with a simple form to outline your topic description, keywords and style of writing. You can give it your own title if you wish and include information about your audience and brand, product or service.
They offer a 7-day free trial and the prices are $24/month for the Start package and $49/month for the Growth package.
Within about 10 minutes I had created a really nice 1500-word article, straight out of the box, that gave the highest score in AI detection and what’s nice about it is that you can add as much or as little guidance as you like and if you have a WordPress website, there’s even a plug-in.
There are templates for blog posts, social media, website content, product descriptions and emails, you can even do bulk generations.
They have an AI art generator… but there's certainly better out there for that.
Writesonic: This is a content creation tool that enables users to produce high-quality articles quickly and easily. It has a built-in AI-powered editor that helps you improve your content quality, identify errors and optimise your SEO.
The user interface is again very easy to navigate, the content creation form has drop-down fields and there is some fairly decent keyword research included.
It can create articles, ads, social media posts and website copy from start to finish and is great at all of these, but it did feel like I had less control over the creation, it kind of wanted to do the whole thing for me.
Writesonic has a free trial with 2,500 words per month and the starting package gives 19,000 words for $13/month, so it’s really good value.
This tool is probably not ideal for copywriters, but would be great for time-pressed marketers or small business owners that want to prioritise quantity. Saying that, it did give a very high AI detection score.
These AI copywriting tools are invaluable for small businesses and entrepreneurs looking to streamline their content creation process. With AI copywriting tools, you can easily produce engaging content that will help you reach your business goals.
But, all is not rosy in the AI garden. There are two issues with using AI for content creation and one is: AI detection tools.
I know what you’re thinking… is this going to be an issue?
At the moment, Google says no, they won’t be punishing websites for using AI-generated content as long as it’s helpful, reliable, people-first content.
But this could change, so make sure to use these tools, like the one I’ve linked above and get the peace of mind that your content passes the test.
So, considering ChatGPT could give you a low AI-Detection score, I would suggest investing in either:
Writesonic to smash out some quick long-form articles, or
ChatGPT for titles and outlines and then Hypotenuse to create each section.
The other issue is that AI can get some facts wrong, so best practice is to read through it, check that it all adds up and include some of your own flair and experience.
2. Unleash Insights From Docs and Sites: AI-Powered Data Extraction Tools
Next up is data extraction tools.
Analysing and extracting insights for research can be a daunting task, especially for SMEs with limited resources.
With these platforms, you can quickly and easily gather data from various sources, including website information or PDFs.
The benefits of using AI-powered data extraction tools are clear. By automating the process of data analysis, you can save time and resources, while gaining insights that can inform your marketing decisions.
So if you're looking for a way to stay one step ahead of your competition, automated data extraction is definitely one tool that should be on your AI marketing toolkit list!
The two that I would suggest taking a look at are:
Browse AI: Their homepage says it all. “The easiest way to extract and monitor data from any website.”
You can extract information and automatically fill a spreadsheet, monitor changes, collect data on target markets and stay on top of trends and insights.
They even have some pre-built robots for Linkedin, Product Hunt, Reddit, Google, Amazon and others.
And what’s more, you can set-up an API on your own website or software.
You get 100 free credits per month for free and the starter package is $39/month.
ChatPDF.com: With this totally free AI, you can talk to your PDF files as if they were a human with perfect understanding of the content.
Why not try it out by going to our repository of whitepapers. Download one that looks interesting. Upload it to ChatPDF and start questioning the bot to quickly and easily discover insights without having to read the whole document. Isn’t that cool?
By utilising AI-powered data extraction tools, small businesses and entrepreneurs can gain insights and leverage web data to quickly understand trends and make data-driven decisions that will drive success.
3. Unleash Your Dream Website with Ease: AI-Powered Website Builders
Having an attractive website is essential for any business.
However, many SMEs don’t have the resources to create a custom website from scratch.
From creating stunning visuals to optimising content for search engines, these tools provide small businesses and entrepreneurs with the perfect solution for creating professional-looking websites and landing pages quickly and efficiently.
For example, they can automatically generate titles, descriptions, images and categories for each page based on the content itself, saving you from having to manually enter all this data yourself.
There are two tools you can experiment with if you want a super fast website builder that includes search engine optimisation, analytics, domains, SSL certificates and all of the basic functions to get a site up and running for $9-10 per month.
Mixo.io or durable.co.
They are not going to be the same calibre as a professional, although it really is impressive what they can produce.
But there is one that offers more features.
10web.io: With this generator, you can build or recreate any website in minutes with the power of AI.
This works with WordPress sites and has access to 50+ widgets, hosting, management and even migration from your old website… Wow!
For one website the cost is again, only $10, but there are additional costs for some of the extras. The AI Assistant can even write your SEO-optimised articles. All inside WordPress.
By leveraging AI-powered website builders, SMEs can level the playing field with larger businesses that have dedicated web development teams.
4. Unleash Your Visuals and Images: AI-Powered Image Manipulation Tools
With AI-powered image manipulation tools, you can transform ordinary photos into stunning images that will grab attention.
AI-based tools can automatically remove unwanted elements from images, touch up photographs, add effects or generate entirely new images based on user input.
This technology is able to preserve all of the original details in the photo so users don't have to worry about losing any valuable photographic information while editing them using AI-powered software.
There are so many image manipulation and generation tools available and the number is increasing weekly. But if you want one that will enhance, remove, colourise, upscale and restore then try out…
AiLabTools.com: The all-in-one image editor powered by AI that will quickly transform your images with a variety of amazing tech.
With this tool, you can do everything from removing unwanted photo bombers to adding fun effects.
AI-powered image manipulation tools can be incredibly useful in helping small businesses and entrepreneurs to spruce up their visuals and stand out from the competition.
5. Unleash Your Networking Dominance: AI-Powered Social Media Tools
Social media marketing AI allows businesses to automate key steps in their social campaigns – from content scheduling and distribution to customer segmentation and analysing campaign performance.
These tools use artificial intelligence to help you automate mundane tasks and manage your accounts more effectively.
For example, an AI tool can help you:
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Keep track of your brand's sentiment
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Identify trends and opportunities for engagement
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Generate automatic reports with actionable insights
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Analyse competitors' activities and performance on a daily basis
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Monitor the performance of all of your social accounts in real-time
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Automate conversations with customers and prospects through chatbots
The possibilities are endless with these tools; they'll help you increase brand visibility, engagement and reach on social media — all while saving time and reducing manual labour when running campaigns.
So if you want to unlock the power of AI marketing on social media, this tool is essential!
Ocoya: A platform to create and schedule content quicker. It will help you generate and post content quickly - both manually and automatically.
Generate banners, videos and music for social media. Or simply put it on autopilot via API. With over 10 integrations, including Shopify and Woocommerce, the advanced analytics measure all engagement metrics and provides you with suggestions to optimise.
A free plan gives you one social profile to experiment with and then if you want to expand that to other platforms, the starting package is $15/month. It really is a cracking deal for the numerous features available.
And for a nice little free AI tool for social media and other marketing duties, try out the Chrome extension - Merlin ChatGPT.
Simply select any online content, choose whether you want to create a reply, summarise, or just add some fun, and voila! You'll get a reply at your fingertips.
Now, AI won't currently rival expert social media managers — humans will always be better at networking — but it can certainly streamline the process.
By leveraging AI-powered social media tools, SMEs can compete with larger businesses that have dedicated teams.
6. Unleash Your Streamlined Workflow: AI-Powered Assistants
AI assistants can take SME marketing to the next level.
From identifying potential opportunities and providing valuable insights into customer behaviour, these crucial AI tools for business enable you to make more informed decisions.
They also provide timely customer service by learning customer preferences and proactively offering assistance or scheduling meetings — all without human intervention.
With AI assistants, you can streamline your workflow, automate routine tasks and free up time to focus on growing your business.
I could create a whole article on this topic as there is a wide range of business management apps that fall under this category. But one that covers most of your business automation would be this one.
Zapier.com: Are you ready to save time, boost productivity and scale your business? Get the most out of your time by automating the busy work. That way, you can focus on the important stuff—like strategy and growth.
Increase your ROI by streamlining your entire lead lifecycle. Respond to customers faster, even with a lean team. And get ideas on how to make your business more efficient.
The free tier gives you the basics of automation with 100 tasks pm and the starter package comes in at around $15 for 750 tasks.
AI-powered assistants are quickly becoming an indispensable part of the digital landscape.
Whether you’re a one-person show or have a team of people helping you, AI-powered assistants can help streamline your workflow and provide valuable insights.
7. Wow Your Audience: AI-Powered Presentations
Unleash AI-powered presentation tools to help create stunning presentations quickly and easily.
These tools use algorithms to design slides, generate visual content and optimise the overall presentation for maximum impact.
Helping you to deliver powerful messages without spending hours designing and rehearsing.
The best part?
These AI-powered presentation tools also provide businesses with valuable insights into their audience.
By analysing user data, businesses can gain a better understanding of their target audience and tailor their presentations accordingly.
To make sure your presentations stand out and really wow your audience, this AI-powered presentation tool is indispensable for small businesses and entrepreneurs.
Decktopus.com: Say goodbye to manual resizing and rearranging of elements. Just give Deckto a topic, and it will give you a fully prepared presentation. Easily customise your presentations with a wide range of themes, fonts and colours.
You can also level up your presentation game by collecting information and feedback from your audience in real-time. Add a personal touch to your decks with audio narration. Connect your own custom domain for a personalised brand experience all for a very reasonable price of $4.99 per month (at the time of writing).
With a free trial to judge for yourself how amazing this AI really is.
Conclusion: Transform Your SME Marketing with AI Tools
As we've seen, AI tools can be a game-changer for SMEs looking to improve their marketing and grow their business.
From copywriting to data extraction, website building to social media management, AI-powered tools can help SMEs automate and optimise their marketing tasks, freeing up time and resources for more strategic activities.
But for now, you can start by exploring the essential AI tools we've covered in this article, and experimenting with them to see how they can improve your marketing performance.
Don't miss out on the opportunity to unleash the power of AI marketing - start using these tools today. You won’t be disappointed!
Final note: Please check the website policies and terms and conditions before using them for your business, so that you are happy with any data sharing and security protocols. And all prices quoted were correct at the time of writing.