10 ways AI makes me a more productive marketer (and human)

You couldn’t drag me back to life before AI. It saves me so much time each day, both in my professional and personal life, that I genuinely can’t imagine how I used to get by without it.

When ChatGPT first exploded in popularity, I fell into an anxiety-driven spiral about the inevitable loss of my job. As the initial dust has settled and the potential impact of AI has become more apparent, I’ve learned that it can actually assist marketers at becoming quicker, better, and more efficient. 

As Head of Marketing at Upheal, here are some of the ways I use AI to make me a more productive marketing leader:

1. Organizing ideas

A major part of the creative marketing process is brainstorming. I tend to write ideas down when they pop into my head, whether that’s on my laptop, scribbled in my notepad, or sleepily typed into my phone in the middle of the night.

Do you find it hard to make sense of random thoughts and ideas? Copy and paste your notes into an AI tool and sort them by idea, theme, or timeline. Download it all into a CSV and you’ve saved yourself hours creating an easy-to-understand spreadsheet!

2. Summarizing topics or articles

Brainstorming goes hand in hand with research. If you’re researching a specific topic and you want to narrow it down, asking your AI tool to summarize articles or documents can save hours of your time.

You can quickly scan an overview and the relevant points before shortlisting the articles or themes you want to research in more detail.

3. Note taking in meetings

According to a HubSpot survey, 63% of marketers already use AI tools to take notes and summarize meetings. As a marketing leader, you need to juggle moving parts, talk to multiple stakeholders, and keep your finger on the pulse of multiple competing campaigns.

AI note takers are worth their weight in gold. Focus completely on the meeting and know that your AI tool is taking accurate notes for you so you don't miss the details or drop the ball on a major deadline. Plus, if your handwriting is like mine and basically illegible, this also means you’re not trawling through your notes a week later trying to work out what those scribbles could possibly mean.

4. Troubleshooting (when YouTube’s no help)

Marketing life often means using multiple different tools and software, and with that inevitably comes hours of troubleshooting. You can watch several different videos and still not stumble upon the exact scenario you’re struggling with.

Struggling with a complicated automation workflow that interacts with Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager? Ask your AI tool to show you what to do in simple, easy to understand steps. It’s a game changer.

5. Pulling text from images

I recently found a long PDF from an old marketing campaign which I wanted to use but didn’t have the working document. I asked my AI tool to read the PDF and provide the content in a format I could copy and paste into a document to edit. So much time saved!

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Life outside of marketing

As a working parent of two young children, time is precious, so any way I can save time is beneficial. Here are 5 more ways that AI has made me a more productive human:

6. Meal planning with a twist

With young kids and some fairly specific dietary requirements, it’s been so helpful having AI generate ideas for meals. Looking for a weekly recipe plan for two adults, a toddler and an infant, focusing on whole foods that are low in oxalates, avoid dairy, and might actually be eaten by a stubborn 3 year old? For bonus points, create the shopping list from the actual store you shop in. 

7. Toddler-friendly activities

In my optimistic pre-kid days I thought I would be one of those Insta parents who cuts homemade organic snacks into little animal shapes and designs fun and wholesome crafts every weekend. My kids definitely wouldn’t get screen time or eat McDonald's! Then reality and sleep deprivation hit and it turns out I’m just not that parent.

AI has come in extremely useful for those rainy Saturday afternoons when you don’t want to leave the house but you feel guilty putting on another episode of Paw Patrol. From indoor obstacle courses and treasure hunts to sensory bins and puppet shows, it’s easy to be creative.

8. Sleep schedules that work

If you find yourself running on fumes, implementing a consistent sleep schedule can help. There are many variations out there but I asked my AI tool to create a schedule for an infant and a toddler that had them both asleep by 8pm, with allotted times for age-appropriate nap times and wake windows during the day.

The schedule actually worked pretty well. With both kids asleep by 8pm, you’ve got a few hours to run around the house frantically doing errands before collapsing in front of the TV to watch the same episode you’ve been trying to finish for days, before passing out on the sofa after 5 minutes and eventually dragging yourself to bed for a glorious 12 minutes before your toddler is up screaming because he can’t find his water bottle. 

9. Road trips with itineraries

I took my toddler on a transatlantic plane flight last summer and I’m still traumatized. Until we get brave enough to tackle flying again, we’re sticking to places we can drive to. There are multiple cities within driving distance of our house that are super kid-friendly. 

I asked for suggestions for 3-day itineraries that focus on toddler-friendly activities, plot out cool stops along the way, suggest family-friendly hotels, and offer appropriate options for naps during the day. You can get some interesting ideas for road trips in your area that you might never have considered!

10. Bedtime stories

Bored of reading the same book for the 3000th time? Ask your AI tool to create a fun bedtime story for the nights when your creative brain is fried. Use your kids’ names, pets, or favorite toys and wrap it all up in a fun fairy tale. Here’s an extract for a 3-year-old that loves dinosaurs, Taylor Swift, and water bottles:

The show began, and to Ben's amazement, the dinosaurs started to sing and dance to Taylor Swift’s favorite songs. The T-Rex played the guitar, the Triceratops drummed, and the Pterodactyls did an amazing aerial dance. After the concert, the dinosaurs gave Ben a special gift: a tiny, magic water bottle that could turn any drink into a sparkling, delicious treat. Ben thanked his new dinosaur friends and promised to visit them again.

If used in the right way, these tips for using AI can make you more effective both in your professional and personal life. 

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PS - just make sure you always say thank you! For one, it’s nice to be polite, and two, why not stay on the good side of the robots, just in case?