Are you a John Henry?

A recent LinkedIn forum discussion posed an important question. Is marketing more art than science or more science than art? What do you think?

First to address the question, it has indeed become much more scientific, and every recession seems to force this evolution by leaps and bounds. Moreover, it seems to claim a bigger and bigger stake of the overall….what I’ll call the “business communications” pie. Pay-per-Click campaigns, for example, are advertising but are highly measurable and were first championed by “online marketing” agencies. Social media, our most recent shiny new object, should be quite frankly the domain of PR agencies, but are much more often promoted and used by marketing professionals.

Second, let’s assume this wave of marketing becoming mostly scientific, and taking over advertising and public relations disciplines, what will the future hold for us. Sadly, I think its a darker story. Here’s why: Most companies will always find cost-cutting to be more financially advantageous than earning more money because cost-cutting directly benefits the bottom line. Top line results, like revenue, still have to trickle down over time to deliver business value.

Therefore, expect to see. . . (ready for it?) M.A.I. – Marketing Artificial Intelligence appear within the next ten years.

MAI will allow businesses to connect with deeply relevant and powerful data sources, negotiate with online properties via live-feed statistically-based bidding algorithms, load and rotate creative on the fly across all platforms (online and offline), and best of all, not ask for a raise, beg to engage in some idealistic rabbit hole, or not be able to answer the all important question, “how much are we directly benefiting from that spend?” It will control the pipeline, break down the communications barriers between sales and marketing as well as marketing and IT, and present a far greater capacity to more nimbly respond to important marketplace and competitor trends. With MAI there’s no consensus to build because all decisions are data driven. There’s less time spent negotiating or wooing other department heads in meetings and conference calls. This is completely consistent with the Life Hacker trend we’re spotting.

We’re already seeing the “Model-T” versions of this both with automated messaging tools like some of Unica’s products (unica.com) and with the turn-key social web platform found in HubSpot (HubSpot.com).

It is also completely consistent with recent business history to find software to replace humans. Marketers who think of their approach as a unique and precious blend of talent and skill, will find themselves as this century’s “John Henry” unable to keep up with technology that eclipses their best efforts.

Instead of 5 to 10 person marketing departments, we’ll see one person. Ironically, that person may just be a Creative.

Thoughts? Are you a John Henry?