With AIGC and big data "multiplying", iClick is accelerating towards the dawn of a new era in digital intelligence

Foreword

The technology industry is lively with chatter. ChatGPT has been making waves since its recent launch, and global technology giants are flocking to grasp opportunities brought about by the AI revolution. The industry, which has been silent for a long time, is again buzzing with energy. Many professionals are starting to think about how the large language model (LLM) behind artificial intelligence-generated content (AIGC) will reshape the industry and affect the future. Predictably, the rise of AIGC and natural language processing (NLP) technology is integral to the new wave of AI fueling the next industrial revolution. AI is impacting the world on a much larger scale, particularly in the digital marketing industry. Advancements in interactive scenarios, content creation, and NLP will provide the digital marketing industry with limitless potential.

01 | With large models, high computing power, and multi-modality, AIGC is transforming the industry

Driven by huge data clusters, large-scale models, high computing power, and multi-modality, AIGC has upended the public's perception of artificial intelligence. The number of data model parameters currently used in ChatGPT, for example, is close to the number of neural connections in the human brain. According to research, when the quantity of data reaches a certain magnitude, AI will be able to make logical judgments and use natural language to achieve fluent and logical dialogue. This was previously unimaginable in the world of machine learning.

Furthermore, AIGC also supports functions such as translation, proofreading, content creation, and creative image generation, all of which will significantly improve the output efficiency of content marketing. Satya Nadella, the current CEO of Microsoft, likened it to "the knowledge worker equivalent of the Industrial Revolution." The emergence of AIGC has subverted and reshaped the traditional content generation model and unleashed the productivity potential of content creators.

With the sharp drop in AI training costs and the optimization and improvement of AIGC algorithms, the trend of general-purpose AI has become unstoppable. Applications of AIGC are demonstrating multi-modality and multi-scenario. For enterprises, digitalization is the only way to reduce costs and increase efficiency. AIGC, as an extension of digitalization, is bringing exponential growth to the efficiency of enterprises and is taking the lead in commercialization in the ToB field.

For digital marketing professionals being caught in the undertow, how can we address the revolutionary changes being brought about by AIGC? Should we flow with the tide? Or stand on the shoulders of giants to completely rebuild the system? Let’s find out together.

02 | In the era of AIGC, how can digital marketing companies embrace the technological revolution?

1) AIGC is a “threat”, but also an opportunity

After the launch of AIGC, there was a lot of talk surrounding the idea of “AI replacing people”. Conversely, we also found that when it comes to complex, market-dependent business problems, we still need human brains to explore and solve them. In reality, it is not an argument of whether “technology will replace human beings” or “human beings will leverage technology”. When it falls into practice, the key question becomes, “how can we use technology to better serve society?”

The future of productivity and lifestyle will see more and more interaction between man and machine. To companies holding rich experience within a certain field and practitioners deeply involved within a certain industry, the emergence of AIGC is not so much a "threat" but a wake-up call. In addition to maintaining a sense of awe, we must learn to become "technology-enabled people", so that we can maintain our competitive advantage and turn "threats" into opportunities.

With a strong belief in technology and innovation, iClick Interactive (NASDAQ:ICLK) has been using innovative technologies to boost enterprises' digital transformation since its establishment 14 years ago. Building on the rich practical experience accumulated from many years in the big data and artificial intelligence industries, iClick combines AIGC with its own iterative database, develops various products based on business scenarios, and expects to use the levers of technological change to help more companies digitally transform.

2) The future of large language models (LLM): Replacing bigger models with more precise models

Diving into the underlying technology of AIGC–LLM, we found three key reasons behind AIGC’s ability to bring about disruptive change. First, large data sets. Second, fast implementation of algorithms. Third, high demand for computational power. The abundance of data will lead to the development of more and more intelligent AI technologies. However, we must note that increasing the amount of data also increases the amount of noise. With a smaller signal-to-noise ratio, the efficiency of mining valuable insights from said data is compromised. The quality of data is of paramount importance. High-quality, valid, verified data in particular can deliver greater advantages when combined with AIGC.

For B2B digital marketing companies, larger models are obviously not essential. The future lies in AIGC based on more accurate models. iClick has been heavily involved in the digital marketing industry for many years and continues to dig deep into the technology of precision marketing models. It combines NLP core algorithms with big data algorithm models to empower intelligent marketing from a multi-dimensional perspective. iClick is exploring the integration of AIGC into its product data analysis module. By using natural language processing technology, it can quickly and accurately analyze marketing data – including key metrics such as number of leads, lead lifecycle conversion, and ROI – to help companies understand user needs and preferences. At the same time, AIGC's text generation function can be used to quickly create personalized and customized content for precision marketing directed at "a thousand people with a thousand faces".

Based on the underlying logic of AIGC, the accuracy of AI-generated content comes not only from the continuous learning of text but also from human-machine interactions and the subsequent subjective feedback from humans. The way in which AI digests these results is very similar to the human learning process. It does not rely simply on "sucking in" data but builds a complete knowledge system to achieve progress through continuous interaction, communication, and learning with different humans. It is crucial for practitioners to continually reinforce instruction capabilities, use more precise instructions with more precise models, train smarter AI, and better enable industry change.

03 | iClick will apply a combination of AIGC and big data models to shape new marketing patterns

With enough computing power, AIGC can not only produce more accurate results but also generate content 24 hours a day. During the process of implementation, the iClick technical team applied AIGC to specific industry scenarios. For example, the integration of industry knowledge graphs and big data models in vertical fields can help enterprises shorten the gap between digitization and digital intelligence. As such, the landscape of the digital marketing industry is slowly shifting.

1) AIGC has brought about a paradigm shift in NLP technology, making text and data analysis functions more intelligent

As the underlying framework of AIGC, NLP technology itself can conduct an in-depth analysis of massive network data, and identify, extract, match, and process complex text data with much higher efficiency and accuracy than manual work. It effectively improves data insights, provides real-time data analysis, and supports marketing decision-making for enterprises. It also helps enterprises better understand user behaviors and market trends, and significantly improve the efforts of enterprise marketing. With the iteration of technology, users can enter specific instructions into the AIGC model to accomplish a specific task. This new method of "text generation + instructions” marks a paradigm shift in the field of NLP. Specifically, AIGC's natural language processing technology can help users quickly and accurately obtain intelligent analytics, superseding the original one-dimensional data analysis model, and helping enterprises to maximize data efficiency.

iParllay, a marketing automation growth expert under iClick, has innovatively launched a marketing automation BI dashboard to help companies solve the issue of "unused data". The dashboard supports one-click generation of visual data reports to help decision-makers and front-line operators adjust their business and strategic directions. Along with generated templates, the platform also supports customization of multi-dimensional data analysis models based on the diverse needs of enterprises. With the integration of AIGC, a more intelligent analysis model will help iParllay's marketing automation function to make iterative improvements, as well as help enterprises use more "smart" data analytics to drive smarter business decisions.

2) AIGC’s automatic generation function transforms the method of content production

Based on text and data analysis, AIGC can organically organize the results of data analysis to generate content. Content creators can use AIGC's efficient and accurate language generation capabilities to save time searching and screening information, organize ideas, polish text, and ultimately improve the brand image and user experience. Different forms of content can be generated to target different audiences, and different media, and cover different topics and events. Content generation has been revolutionized. The automated generation of high-quality articles, headlines, and other textual content has improved the efficiency of copywriting across digital marketing, content creation, brand communications, and other fields.

3) As AIGC brings more “intelligence” and a burst of creativity to the user experience

Over the course of the development of artificial intelligence, “creativity” has been regarded as the key difference between humans and machines. Now, based on the diffusion model, AIGC has more “openness” and “intelligence” than ever before. It even supports the automated generation of creative images, which far surpasses the power of human cognition. As soon as AIGC set off a frenzy of intelligent creation around the world, major companies have been adopting AIGC-related technologies and businesses, one after another. Recently, iClick has been developing software for the automated generation of creative images based on a diffusion model. Supported by neural network algorithms and deep learning technology, machines analyze millions of pictures to automatically generate highly realistic images. These images can be used to speed up the production of high-quality advertising and marketing materials, and significantly improve creative output capabilities. The software also supports functions such as image selection, image processing, image synthesis, and image style conversion, which can be applied to various scenarios, and empowers brands with multi-dimensional support to meet their various marketing needs.

According to Gartner’s latest report, data generated by AIGC will account for a huge 10% of all data by 2050. The landscape of digital content, currently dominated by user-generated content (UGC) and professionally generated content (PGC), will soon shift towards an era of both traditional human-generated content and AIGC being developed in parallel.

4) AIGC’s intelligent question-answering and knowledge management functions will help enterprises digitally transform

AIGC has played a huge role in not only creating content generation but also in information aggregation and extraction. AIGC’s ability to understand, analyze, and create ideas will help enterprises to amass industry knowledge, build their own base of expertise, support functions such as question-answering and knowledge management, and automatically answer questions posed by users. It can also identify issues, address them with high-quality solutions, and streamline information sharing between employees and customers. These benefits will help companies save labor costs, optimize the customer service experience, and improve organizational efficiency.

When an enterprise experiences growth, an “increase of entropy” is unavoidable. Management and business operations must work together to prevent any weakening in enterprise vitality. Digitalization can bring order to disorder, as well as prevent gradual decline. Digital transformation driven by AIGC technology can bring about a “decrease of entropy”, promote sustainable growth, and enhance the competitiveness of the enterprise. As an enterprise service technology company, iClick firmly believes that the digital transformation of enterprises will have an important role to play in the rapid commercialization of inclusive AI technology. We aim to build on our technical foundation of big data and artificial intelligence, and continuously innovate and upgrade our technology and products, to meet the “sales” and “marketing” digital needs of our corporate customers.

iClick recently announced that it is among the first batch of enterprise partners with priority access to Baidu's "ERNIE Bot" (文心一言). Soon, iClick will be able to explore the full capabilities of the ERNIE Bot through Baidu AI Cloud. Next, iClick will apply Baidu's success in intelligent dialogue technology to various scenarios of enterprise digital operations and online marketing.

Conclusion

It cannot be denied that the rapid development AIGC will cause some of the basic tasks in digital marketing to be replaced with advanced AI technology. However, in the face of the "anxiety" brought about by technological innovation, many professionals are choosing to use these advancements as motivation to progress faster. Instead of simply flowing with the tide, we must, like a prospector in a gold rush, seize the opportunities presented by the coming era. By standing on the shoulders of giants, we can build a brand-new world.