One year has passed since ChatGPT was introduced in the Japanese market, and generative AI is now being used in a variety of ways within companies. There are many examples of text, illustrations, images, generation of advertisements, and automatic responses. Against this backdrop, how is generative AI being utilized and developed in B2B marketing?
We spoke to Ichiro Niwayama of Symphony Marketing, who specializes in B2B marketing and has supported over 500 companies for over 30 years, about the transformation and impact generative AI has brought on B2B marketing in the world and Japan.
Interviewee: Mr. Ichiro Niwayama, Symphony Marketing Co., Ltd. Interviewer: Mr. Toshihiro Yamada, Deputy Editorial Director, Toyo Keizai Inc.
Japanese B2B marketing is 15 years behind
YamadaThis
time, I would like to ask you about trends in B2B marketing in the era of generative AI.
When the generative AI ChatGPT was released to the public in November 2022, many Japanese companies jumped on it and it became a bit popular, but I feel that it has calmed down now. On the other hand, research shows that more than 50% of companies in the United States are already using generative AI such as ChatGPT. How do you think B2B marketing will change in the era of generative AI?
Before talking about
Niwayama-
generated AI, let me tell you that B2B marketing in Japan is about 15 years behind Europe and America.
-min (1).jpg)
Marketing automation (MA) began to become popular in the United States in 2000. In 2014, MA systems such as Eloqua, Marketo, and HubSpot were launched in Japan.
Yamada
:There is a time lag of about 15 years between the spread of MA in America and Japan.
Niwayama
is far behind in some fields, and when it comes to “Partner Relationship Management (PRM)”, which is how to manage distributors, many people don’t even know the term or its definition, and the concept itself is not very well known in Japan. Not popular. That’s how far behind we are.
Yamada
is late! That’s serious.
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/b2b-vs-b2c-marketing-2295828_final-b152d757d58e4afd8ed66b706d631af4.png)
There are over 10,000 generative AI products in the global B2B marketing market.
The same can be said about
Niwayama
generation AI. In Japan, people started using ChatGPT3.5 in 2023 and started making a fuss about how amazing it was.
This year, my company’s vice president and I split up and attended five marketing conferences in the United States and Europe. At a conference held in Arizona, it was announced that “Currently, there are zero companies developing marketing systems that have not incorporated AI, and 100% have incorporated it.Furthermore, this is version 4 of ChatGPT.” did.
YamadaThe
situation is completely different from Japan, which finally attracted attention with the appearance of GPT-4.
Niwayama:
In Europe and America, we implement it into the system rather than at the testing stage and let it do some pretty core work. The scope of generative AI is expanding tremendously.
Yamada:
It’s been exactly one year since generative AI became popular in Japan, and it’s also been one year since the web version of ChatGPT was released to the public, and worldwide it has been available to companies since around 2017. Does this mean that countries around the world have been working on this since then?
Niwayama:
That’s right. AI is being used more and more wherever possible, and in the case of the United States, the evolution of tools is amazing. A friend of mine, Scott Brinker, creates “MartechMap” (chaos map), which compiles marketing technology products from all over the world on one page, and in 2012, he sold 350 products. By 2023, the number of products will exceed 11,000.
Reference link
-
Martechmap
(2023 latest version PDF) -
History of Martechmap
(jpg: from 2011 to 2023)
Yamada
(while looking at “MartechMap”) Each one is a product logo. It looks more like a list of logos than a map.
Niwayama:
In such a fierce battle, it is impossible for a company not to incorporate the AI or generative AI used by its competitors into its own products. It’s no surprise that marketing tools implement advanced AI.
Utilization of generative AI begins in the creative field
Yamada:
In Europe and the United States, we have clearly seen that marketing tools are undergoing remarkable evolution due to generative AI. Among these tools, what role does generative AI play?
Niwayama
B2B marketing can be broadly divided into two areas: “data management” and “content management.”
Data management organizes and analyzes corporate and personal information. Content management is the process of creating web content to promote your company’s products/services, creating emails to be distributed, and thinking about which content should be delivered to which target.
Initially, we thought that AI would be used for data management, but there are still difficulties from the perspective of personal information management. So now, generation AI is mainly incorporated into content management.
Yamada
: In that case, the work called creative in marketing will be performed by generative AI.
Niwayama:
That’s right. I think there will be a lot of work that people used to do that will go away. In the United States, most of the writing work, such as web HTML coding and HTML email, is done by generative AI. The same goes for choosing photos and laying them out.
Yamada
people will only be doing the final checks. Are such American generative AIs also making their way to Japan?
NiwayamaThe
Salesforce and Adobe events held in Japan the other day were also all about generative AI. As the accuracy of translation has improved, it can now be used in Japan as well.
YamadaAlthough
the use of AI has been around for a long time, the dimension of what can be done with generative AI is becoming different from what was previously possible.
Niwayama:
That’s right. It can be said that there is no option not to use generative AI.
To effectively utilize generation AI, it is essential to establish marketing and select tools that suit your needs.
Yamada:
What challenges do Japanese companies face when using marketing tools equipped with generative AI?
Niwayama
: It is said that there are 20,000 Japanese companies that have introduced marketing automation. However, most of them only use MA to send emails. That is the big problem in the first place.
Tool vendors can teach you how to use marketing tools, but they can’t teach you how to do marketing itself. Therefore, B2B marketers must first learn the basics of marketing in order to master the tools. The next important thing is to choose a tool that suits your company’s needs.
Eloqua, which appeared as the world’s first MA tool in 2000, was aimed at enterprises (large companies), Marketo, which was created in 2007, was aimed at mid-market (medium-sized companies), and HubSpot (which appeared around the same time) HubSpot) is for startups and SOHO. This hierarchy has not changed in America to this day.
However, in Japan, these three MAs landed at the same time in 2014, causing confusion. Large companies are buying HubSpot, and small businesses are working hard to buy Eloqua. Many buyers did not have the knowledge to choose MA, and many companies adopted it as it was marketed.
Yamada:
What should I do to choose the most suitable MA?
The absolute theory for choosing
Niwayama
tools is “3S”. These are Strategy, Structure, and System.
The first step is to create a strategy and then create an organization with sufficient quality and quantity necessary to realize that strategy. By doing so, you will have a complete set of requirements for what the tool will do and who will use it, allowing you to choose the right tool. Japanese companies are the first to introduce tools without a strategy. I don’t even create an organization. That’s why MA can’t be used either.
Yamada
: It’s important to learn the basics of marketing, create a strategy and organization, and work on it. In order to develop your ability to utilize tools in your organization, how about trying out a generative AI-equipped tool that is inexpensive and easy to use?
Niwayama:
That’s good too. Nowadays, you can use the cloud to introduce it without any initial investment, and it is correct to use something light to accumulate knowledge, and when you have accumulated know-how, replace it with something that suits your needs. I’m awake.
Yamada:
It seems like there will be a vendor lock-in (restricted to one vendor).
Niwayama:
It’s okay. Unlike accounting systems, marketing tools can be transferred to other products relatively easily. The only thing you have to give up when replacing is the web log, and personal information etc. can be replaced with CSV etc.
Yamada
: You mentioned earlier that there are 11,000 marketing tools in the world, but are there actually that many tools in use?
Niwayama
: America’s top companies use an extremely large number of tools. MA products are becoming more multi-functional, include forms, and chatbots powered by AI generation. However, that alone doesn’t meet our company’s needs, so we use Drift Automation, and we don’t have enough intent data (data to identify what customers/companies are interested in) from LinkedIn alone, so we use multiple solutions such as ZoomInfo and Bombora. That’s how I use it.
It is very important to catch up on the latest technology information and create the optimal combination for what you want to do, and this usage is becoming a trend in B2B marketing around the world.
Yamada
: Not only are the MA tools themselves evolving, but the standard way to use them is to add other products to them.
The emergence of generative AI improves the position of B2B marketers
What does the emergence of
Yamada
-generated AI bring to B2B marketing?
At
Niwayama
America, people with experience in marketing operations (MOps) now have the role of monitoring technology, determining which ones the company should adopt, and reporting to the upper management. My position within the company has also increased significantly. Tools are evolving so quickly that unless a specialized team is watching, they can’t keep up. This is entirely due to generative AI.
YamadaJapan
has not reached that level at all.
Niwayama:
Unfortunately, most companies in Japan have not yet established MA in their sales activities, and the use of MA tools is still a long way off. Naturally, we are not able to utilize generative AI either.
YamadaThere
was an OpenAI conference (DevDay) in November 2023. Participating companies in the United States were from a wide range of industries, with many in high-ranking positions in attendance, but there were almost no participants from Japanese companies.
Niwayama:
In Europe and America, we have been using ChatGPT since version 1 and have had many generations of experience, so we have become more specific about what algorithms are good for what we are trying to do and how to use generative AI. In Japan, ChatGPT is still amazing and AI is scary. We have to catch up quickly from there.
YamadaI
understood that not only the on-site level but also the top management level needs to have knowledge about B2B marketing and generative AI. Next, let’s ask about management and B2B marketing in detail.
(continued in next article)
Past interview articles with Ichiro Niwayama
