Research from ON24, an intelligent engagement platform for B2B sales and marketing, has found that the adoption of AI tools in B2B marketing is growing, with 84% of businesses planning to integrate more AI into their marketing strategies.
From a survey of more than 500 US-based B2B marketers, “The State of AI in B2B Marketing” found that more than half of respondents (53%) are already using AI significantly in marketing and 1 in 3 (33%) are actively testing AI and building a roadmap for implementation.
The top reasons why B2B marketers are increasingly turning to AI include a belief that it will lead to better buyer experiences (84%) and improve personalization efforts (83%). Nearly 9 in 10 organizations (85%) agree that businesses that use AI will see stronger revenue performance than those that don’t.
Financial services (67%) and technology (53%) are the industries that are using AI in B2B marketing the most. They are followed by professional services (50%), manufacturing (50%) and life sciences / pharma / healthcare (44%). Life sciences / pharma / healthcare are the industries that are planning to up their adoption of AI the most, and are expected to double their usage of AI the next year, with 86% of companies planning to invest in AI.
The study found that marketers are currently using AI primarily for content development – Promotional content development (landing pages, email copy – 63%), analytics and measurement (59%), content development (e-books, blogs – 49%), audience segmentation (47%), and webinars and virtual events (45%) are the most prevalent AI uses of marketers today.
Increased productivity is one of the biggest drivers behind AI adoption. 91% of respondents believe that integration of AI in B2B marketing will increase productivity. 87% of businesses agree that AI will make marketing automation more efficient and effective.
Marketers believe that better data and insights (54%), efficiency (52%), time saving (50%), improved ROI (48%) and better business results (44%) will be the key reasons for investing in AI.
Medium-sized businesses are the fastest adopters of AI. Companies with revenue between $25M and $100M (61%) are using AI more than those with revenue less (50%) than $25M and $100M+ (48%).
