New AI Marketing Study: 60% Do This Daily...  ## Metadata - Author: [[Social Media Marketing Podcast]] - Full Title: New AI Marketing Study: 60% Do This Daily... - Category: #podcasts - URL: https://share.snipd.com/episode/93ed04ef-e88a-4ed2-a346-0af1891cf0d9 ## Document Notes ## Highlights - **Two Types Of Marketers At Events** - Michael Stelzner describes two marketer camps: those who attend because they must and those who attend to get ahead. - He uses attendee outcomes to illustrate the value of proactive learning and adaptation. Transcript: Michael Stelzner Hey, it's Michael Stelzner here. After running social media marketing world for 12 years, I've noticed something fascinating about the marketers who attend. They usually fall into two camps. Camp number one is those who show up because they have to. Their results are declining, they're scrambling to catch up. And camp number two is those who show up because they want to. They're already achieving a level of success, but they know that change is coming and they want to go so much further. Both learn valuable insights, but their outcomes are completely different. As Emily Ray Shuddy said, I came away with a million ideas and new creative ways to approach my work. My business has since doubled in size and revenue. The AI revolution is here. Instagram algorithms keep shifting. Facebook's ad costs keep rising and the list goes on and on and on. What type of marketer will you be in 2026? Join thousands of marketers at Social Media Marketing World 2026 this April in Anaheim, California. ([Time 0:00:56](https://share.snipd.com/snip/3d57a5c6-98df-4cbb-b6fa-554128b12d81)) - **Most Marketers See Opportunity Not Threat** - Only 20% of marketers see AI as a direct threat to their own jobs, despite job-displacement headlines. - 70% believe AI will create new opportunities, showing optimism outweighs fear among marketers. Transcript: Michael Stelzner The marketing community. I used to be a copywriter. Copywriters have been freaking out ever since ChatGPT rolled out in November of 2022. We're hearing about it in the general news. We know that agents are coming, which a lot of people are scared they're going to take away jobs from customer support people and a lot of these other kinds of roles. And we're also hearing stories of major tech companies laying off thousands upon thousands of developers AI coders are better, faster, and cheaper. So a lot of the big concerns in the marketing community is that AI is coming from my job. Now, this is where the research gets really fascinating. The majority of marketers today are using AI on a daily basis, and we're going to nail into some of that a little bit later. But despite the fact that the majority of marketers are using AI, they do not see AI as a threat to their jobs. And here's the data. And it's really fascinating. Only 20% of marketers that we surveyed, and we surveyed a lot of them, 730 of them, all across the world, only 20% of them feel that it's a threat to their jobs. And of that 20%, I don't have the exact breakdown, but they're strongly agreeing and agree, but it's only one in five. So only one out of five marketers see it as a threat to their jobs. But this is where it gets really interesting. When asked whether they believe that AI is going to displace jobs, 36% said they believe it's true. So said another way, about one in three marketers, slightly more than that, believe that AI is going to take away jobs, but they don't believe it's going to take away their job. Now, here's another way of spinning this data. The majority of marketers that we studied do not see job loss as a problem, period. Because 64%, two out of three marketers do not think it's a problem for them, for the overall community. And 20% only see it as a threat to them. ([Time 0:05:20](https://share.snipd.com/snip/3a102531-54a7-4e7b-b5be-1b1cb3479707)) - **AI Use Grew Rapidly Into Daily Habit** - Daily AI use jumped from 37% to 60% in one year among surveyed marketers. - 84% increased AI use last year and 82% plan to increase it further next year. Transcript: Michael Stelzner Uh, remember this is our second annual study. So, um, we asked marketers how often are using AI daily, weekly, monthly? I can't remember all the options. But in 2024, October of 2024, 37% of marketers were using AI every day. Now, 60% of marketers are using AI every day. That's a massive, massive, massive increase, okay? That's like hockey stick kind of growth. It's almost doubling. And this is where it gets really interesting. 84% of marketers said that they've increased their use of AI over the last year, which is not a surprise to you and me at all, but 82% plan to actually even increase it more over the next Year. So if you start to think about where we're going with this, this is, we're going to be potentially at this point next year, we're 90% of marketers using AI daily. And if you're not using AI daily, this is a bit of a wake up call, you know, because this is a massive adoption, a massive behavior change among marketers. Okay. The marketing community has gone all in on AI. If you are sitting on the sidelines, you are in the minority, okay? If you're not using it daily, you are in the minority, and you might actually be falling behind. And that's a bit of a problem because if everyone around you is embracing AI, they're becoming more valuable to their employers. They're becoming more valuable to their clients if they have clients. They're becoming more valuable to whatever situation they're in. And the people that are perceived to be more valuable are the ones that are going to be able to retain their jobs. They're going to be the ones that are going to be able to gather new opportunities. They're going to attract those kinds of opportunities. ([Time 0:13:17](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c63ff459-e2e4-4f5e-8054-f83affa6ebb8)) - **Learn AI To Reclaim Time** - Spend time learning AI because it saves time long-term; most marketers report time savings as the top benefit. - Prioritize a small learning investment to unlock outsized efficiency gains. Transcript: Michael Stelzner And then what we did was we did a qualitative analysis on this. And of course I used AI to help me with this, you know, because why not? I used all the different models. I used all of them to kind of help me get, get at this, but this was really surprising. Um. The biggest challenge that marketers have, which is kind of a parallel to what we've been talking about, which is one in four marketers approximately, which is 23% said learning and Understanding AI is their biggest struggle. Learning and understanding AI is their biggest struggle. And that might explain, Dan, why 40% of marketers are not using AI every day. But this is where I think the finding time to learn, by the way, what's part of this, is the reason why they don't have the time to go out and learn. They don't have the time to understand it. And I can understand this at a conceptual level. And Dan, you can too. When you're like, you've got a million things on your plate and you know that you should be doing this thing called AI and using it for your work, but you still have to get all these other Obligations done. In your mind, you can say, I'm going to make a goal to do this. And then you never find time to do it. Right. But, and that stops you from actually using AI to its fullest. And it's the reason why, like one in four marketers said, understanding it is their biggest challenge. But this is the part that's the big unlock. One of the biggest benefits, actually the biggest benefit, according to our study, of using AI, according to 90% of marketers, is that it saves them time. And of that 90%, 59% strongly agreed. And then the other one was like, what's my math, 31%. So 59% of marketers strongly agree that using AI saves them time. So let's think about the paradox here. The biggest benefit of using AI is it saves you time. Yet the number one challenge marketers say they have is they don't have enough time to learn AI. I mean, it kind of makes me laugh again, but I understand like if you're not yet using AI and you've not yet had the benefit of actually realizing the time savings that come from it. I'm going to say this another way. Dan, if I told you that if you did one thing for one hour, it would it would automatically give you three hours extra time a day. Would you do it? All you had to do is spend one. It's a no brainer every day. Right. Right. What if I told you you could spend eight hours and then all of a sudden you get you get an extra 20 hours a week and you never have to spend more than eight hours. You would do it in a heartbeat, right? So people just haven't understood that the small investment they make in learning AI has a massive unlock, which is giving them time. Yet it's the biggest challenge that they face. ([Time 0:20:30](https://share.snipd.com/snip/6471af50-e95b-47b0-807a-318327efe29e)) - **Start By Mastering Prompting** - Learn prompting techniques first; 81% of marketers want prompting training and it unlocks more advanced AI tasks. - Use templates and practice to make prompting intuitive and reproducible. Transcript: Michael Stelzner So I'm just going to move right onto it, which is what's the single biggest challenge or no, what's, what's the biggest topic that marketers want to learn more about AI topic. He already kind of gave it away, which is learning prompting techniques. Okay. So 81% of marketers said that they want to learn prompting techniques. Um, and that's like pretty much at the top of the list of things they want to learn. Now, um, here's why, first of all, most marketers are new to AI. 77% of the marketers we studied have been doing this for less than two years. And those that are doing it that have been doing it for two years, you know, not, not all of them are using it every day. Right. So some of them are using it sporadically. And, um, but the truth is that AI is a lot more than prompting. I feel like prompting is like the table sticks. It's kind of like saying, um, uh, uh, Disneyland is just the Peter Pan ride. You know what I mean? That's all it's just kid rides. Well, it is if you're just in that section, you know what I mean? There's like so much more to it. And, um, the, the, I think what's happening here is that, um, prompting is still one of those things that's kind of difficult for people. And that's why so many of the videos that Dan has created for our YouTube channel are about techniques for all these kinds of prompting techniques. And I've interviewed a lot of experts on this as well, including Dan. But prompting is the basic stuff. The challenge with prompting is you're just looking at a screen. You don't know what to put in there, right? And that requires creativity. And if you're not super creative by nature, that's why I understand a lot of marketers probably are like, what can I do with this thing? It's like a blank Microsoft Word or Google Doc. What can you do with that? Well, you can write a book, you can write a report, you can write all sorts of things, right? But it's like a blank slate. But the next order of things is AI tools. And AI tools, 80% of marketers want to learn how to use AI tools. And that's the natural expansion beyond the chat GPT experience. And then automation and workflows are number three at 79%. ([Time 0:25:48](https://share.snipd.com/snip/eea3d3c2-c6f7-4169-a0de-b5d184b714ee)) - **Prompting Improves Communication Skills** - Prompting trains clearer communication because better context yields better results from AI and humans. - Improving prompts makes you a better brief-giver across teams and tools. Transcript: Michael Stelzner And AI tools, 80% of marketers want to learn how to use AI tools. And that's the natural expansion beyond the chat GPT experience. And then automation and workflows are number three at 79%. So Dan, what's your thoughts on this? Dan Sanchez I feel like prompting is a foundational skill for AI. And it kind of caught me by surprise because once you learn it, you kind of move beyond it. ([Time 0:27:44](https://share.snipd.com/snip/0f7dd646-5131-4c6d-96d8-9b348f2fe8d1)) - **Gemini Is Rapidly Gaining Ground** - ChatGPT remains dominant at 90% adoption, but Google Gemini leapt from 33% to 51% in a year. - Gemini's growth signals a major competitive shift because it's integrated into Google's ecosystem. Transcript: Michael Stelzner No shock, no surprise that the number one platform, and we allow people to choose from all the major platforms, click all that apply. 90% of marketers are using chat GPT. Okay. That's not a surprise at all. But the big shocker is that, and I'm going to pause. Everybody who's listening, can you guess what came in second? It's not Claude. It's not Grok. It's not Meta. It's Google's Gemini. But it came in second in a major 51%. 51% half of marketers are using Google Gemini. That's up from 33% last year. That is a massive shift. Like I can assure you like chat GPT didn't go up much. It went from like 80 something to 90, but the fact that Gemini went from 33% to 51% is a massive, massive move in only a year. ([Time 0:31:31](https://share.snipd.com/snip/5aa6fdf3-41fc-4cb1-954e-109a2d6019e4)) - **Why Gemini's Adoption Accelerated** - Gemini succeeds because it's multimodal and bundled into Google Workspace many businesses already pay for. - Its native access to real-time data and integrations makes it highly practical for marketers. Transcript: Michael Stelzner First of all, most small businesses have Google workspace. Okay. And Google did something that kind of angered everybody, but then all of a sudden they were happy with it is they said, Hey, instead of charging you all for our Gemini, we're going to just Include it with your monthly fee, but we're going to increase your cost. So at first everybody was upset, but the fact is that now every small business on the planet probably has a Google account and now they have access to Google Gemini and Google Gemini is Integrated into freaking everything. Okay. Um, I'll let you talk about what it's integrated to in just a second, but it's also the first multimodal model that is exceptionally good. And when I say multimodal, what I mean is that they can watch video, they can listen to audio, they can read images natively right out of the gate. Okay. So, um, let me just get your reactions to it. I've got, we've got a lot more we can say here, obviously. Dan Sanchez I was surprised because I've run this poll myself and asked people like, which one do you use? What's your top tool? And I think the way you set up this survey, it was choose all that apply. I would have never got, cause I only gave them a single choice, but when you give them multi-select all of a sudden, some more information becomes apparent and that people are sure. Yeah, 90% chat GPT, it's maybe their main tool. But more and more, Gemini is coming up as a second. And it kind of shows like it could take first place for a lot of people. I've heard more and more people moving over to Gemini as their primary tool. And it's because Gemini is just getting better. I think they're just not constrained as ChatGPT is by the amount of compute, the amount of big server capacity. One, ChatGPT is getting hammered because they have 700 million people using it. So it's the most popular tool. But they can't release their new video stuff. They're having a hard time getting their Gemini. But Gemini is putting out things where now even plus users or people who have like a, just the small paid account like we do, you know, have access to the best world-class video model. And now it's actually good. I'm actually making things with it. It's actually becoming available. The image model is fantastic. They have an audio model over in Notebook LM, which is a great tool in itself. And they're putting out all these different tools and slowly integrating it into their ecosystem. It's getting harder not to use it. Michael Stelzner Well, and let's talk about, okay, this is fascinating statistics. 68% of marketers want to learn more about how to use Gemini. Okay. That's, that's huge. Okay. So Gemini is built into Gmail. It's built into Google Docs. It's built into Google Sheets. It can help you with mathematics, analysis, all that kind of stuff. It's built into their slide, whatever their tool is. I don't use that slide tool. I'm pretty confident. But that part, I actually don't know if it's built into it. It's obviously built into Google search, right? It's that thing you see at the top. If you start to think about all the Google products and services that we use every day in our life, it's kind of a lot. ([Time 0:32:32](https://share.snipd.com/snip/29617a01-95b6-4f20-82e4-c5077964f3ec)) - **Use Integrated AI Where Your Data Lives** - Test Gemini for tasks tied to Google Docs, Sheets, Gmail and real-time data to leverage its integrations. - Prefer tools already inside your ecosystem when data privacy or convenience matters. Transcript: Michael Stelzner Well, and let's talk about, okay, this is fascinating statistics. 68% of marketers want to learn more about how to use Gemini. Okay. That's, that's huge. Okay. So Gemini is built into Gmail. It's built into Google Docs. It's built into Google Sheets. It can help you with mathematics, analysis, all that kind of stuff. It's built into their slide, whatever their tool is. I don't use that slide tool. I'm pretty confident. But that part, I actually don't know if it's built into it. It's obviously built into Google search, right? It's that thing you see at the top. If you start to think about all the Google products and services that we use every day in our life, it's kind of a lot. And because Google is so integrated into the life of humans in general, it has access to information that it can get in real time. Every Android device is a Google product. So all that real-time data Google has access to. Google Analytics is on every website in the world. So Google has access to all websites in the world at all times, dynamically. I mean, like when you start to think about this, you're like, okay, wow. And Google has massive, massive data centers already. They got no problem with money either. They're profitable, okay? So you just start to think about, and they're building incredible tools on the backend. Like we've just mentioned a couple of them, Notebook LM, VO3, they've got this new thing that's like automation thing. I can't remember the name of it. Do you remember what it's called? Opal. They just keep coming out with stuff. And, you know, I remember I was told by Chris Penn a long time ago, who's one of our speakers at Social Media Marketing World, Total AI, for lack of better words, nerd slash geek. And I mean that in the best way. He said, don't discount Google. Cause he said to me that the, the company with the most data is going to win. And unquestionably Google has access to the most data, but it's not just that their models are fricking smart. They're very, very, very good. And in some regards, they're not as good as Claude. And some regards are not as good as chat GPT, but in other regards, they crush them. Dan Sanchez Like this nano banana thing, I haven't messed with this at all. But can you explain what the heck that is? Yourself, you ask it to change it to something. If you've ever asked it to change it, like, hey, put me in an astronaut suit, you notice like the face isn't quite right. Or you take a picture of your room and be like, hey, redesign the room. And it does. And it looks like the room, but the windows move, the door is in the wrong spot, the whole couch got flipped around weird. You know, like it would get it, but not get it. Nano Banana is hitting it almost with like 100% accuracy. You could take a picture of a room, be like, show me what this room looks like from the other side. And it's going to look like it should. All the furniture is in the right place. You upload a photo of yourself and all of a sudden it has you from a different angle dressed in a totally different outfit. And it looks like it was just taken from the other side of you and you're wearing a different outfit. Michael Stelzner It looks accurate. And so- And how do we find, where do we find that? It's built into Gemini, right? Gemini.google It's just one of those little features under the menu or something like that. You upload an image and that's it. I mean, like they changed the image. Yeah. Folks. I mean, like it is exciting to see Google finally get something right. Cause I remember the Google plus days where they tried to compete with Facebook and they completely, you know, failed on that front. So, um, Google is, is a shocker and someone to for sure pay attention to the fact that it's growing this much is absolutely, uh, fascinating. And then, uh, let's see, what else do we have here? Is that it on that one? Dan Sanchez Yeah. I think one more thing to say is that a lot of people are calling the image thing. They like the Photoshop killer and it won't kill Photoshop. That's a whole design tool. But like, imagine what you would have taught said, like, Oh, if we could Photoshop this nano banana can just do that with the prompt. Now upload your image, Photoshop it to do this. It's done. And I think that's why it's such a magical tool. Yeah. Michael Stelzner And by the way, folks, just, you know, my prediction, I believe that Google Gemini is going to be like the major one that everybody uses next year. And it might even rival open AI, like internally inside of social media examiner, we're going to move to get everybody to use Gemini because we're already paying for it. And it's already integrated with all of our data. And we feel more safe about allowing Gemini access to our Google Docs and Sheets because it's already the ecosystem that we already trust where I don't feel comfortable giving that Data to open AI because I'm just not sure they're not going to use it to train the model. ([Time 0:34:52](https://share.snipd.com/snip/de77949e-b949-44a3-b3a2-00b3070cda36)) - **AI Video Is The Next Frontier** - Video adoption is high in importance, but only 22% use AI for video; 69% want to learn it. - Video was technically harder for AI, but new models learned physics from YouTube data to close that gap. Transcript: Michael Stelzner It's kind of fascinating. Um, across multiple fronts. First of all, most marketers, according to our research are, um, using video. And as a matter of fact, in our study from the social media marketing industry report that we published earlier this year, 46% of marketers claim video is their most important form of, Of content, more important than the written word, more important than audio, more important than images. Okay. Visuals. So that's the single biggest, it's a pie chart, right? So, um, so practically almost without a doubt, like, like video is the thing for social marketers. Okay. Um, but only 22% of marketers are actually using AI for their video efforts. Okay. And I think I understand why, and I think we can unravel this in just a minute, but 69% want to learn more on how to use it. So, um, I'll just share my thoughts and then I want to hear your thoughts, Dan. But I feel like I feel like video was like the last frontier, right? Images are, for lack of better words, video are moving images, right? So you've got like 30, 24, 30 images per frame. I mean, per second, sometimes 60 per second. That's a lot of processing power. And as a result, I think that that's just like AI hasn't been able to handle that yet. Plus some of the challenges early with video was understanding physics. So like if a ball is bouncing on concrete versus going through blades of grass, like all the physics to understand how the grass needs to change as the ball goes through the grass, the Reflections of the sun, a lot of that kind of stuff, the physics just weren't there. And I listened to a podcast interview recently with some folks from Google, and I can't remember the name of the show, but they were talking about how they used YouTube. And that's the other big thing we forget. Guess who owns YouTube? Google, right? They used YouTube videos to train AI models to learn about reality. And basically had these AI models watch millions, maybe even billions of hours in video. And these AI models were able to discern physics by watching video. They were able to understand how things need to look and, and how things need to move when they're moving through things. And basically the AI model was able to figure out a physics model without being trained in physics at all, which is why we're now finally at a point with Google VO where it absolutely looks Completely realistic. But I think it comes down to processing power. And I just think the video things that have been out there have been animation, child's play kind of stuff, which is probably why most people haven't used it yet. ([Time 0:40:08](https://share.snipd.com/snip/9ac5f0dc-77b1-4c44-aba3-92d70f4fa70d))