AI skills in demand as marketers wrestle with uncertainty into 2025
Econsultancy’s Future of Marketing survey shows AI as the top priority skill area, with some businesses crystallising their AI strategies in pursuit of process innovation and efficiency, whilst also valuing the brand and soft skills needed to adapt to uncertainty.
AI skills were in joint top spot with data and analytics, chosen by 40% of respondents as an area they and their teams need to develop to remain fit for purpose. Brand marketing placed third on 33%, and soft skills was next on 30%.
There’s another stat... which indicates marketers are getting to grips with AI and what it can (or more importantly should) be used for. In 2023, when respondents were asked to select the three biggest challenges to their organisation’s use of generative AI, nearly half of respondents (47%) cited ‘lack of clear strategy for using these technologies’. By the end of 2024, this figure had dropped to 29%. The biggest three concerns going into 2025 are now the reliability of the tech (e.g. hallucinations), lack of skills/training and security risks.
This seeming improvement in strategic understanding of AI is important. To quote Glyn Britton [CMO at SME comparison service Bionic], too many teams up till now have been “flipping the switch on default LLM features without asking whether it’s right for their customers or their brand.” |
Fast Track to Ecommerce: Partners and Platforms – Register by 25 February
This Fast Track is designed specifically for organisations that sell through retail partners and third-party platforms, to upskill teams of one to one thousand. |
