How To Leverage Generative AI To Develop Global, Agile, & Effective Go-to-Market Strategies

In today’s increasingly-congested marketplace, customer experience is becoming a dominant factor. A Gartner study found that 80% of firms expect a top-notch customer experience to be a main competitive advantage.

For companies doing business internationally, providing the best customer experience possible requires additional effort. A survey revealed that 76% of shoppers prefer information in their native language, regardless of their level of English proficiency.

While this, in principle, might seem complex, it doesn’t have to be so. Thanks to the growing adoption of generative AI tools such as ChatGPT, businesses now have the capacity to tailor their go-to-market communications and make them available in multiple languages.

By thinking outside the box, organizations can leverage generative AI to, as the old adage says, think global and act local, and boost their prospects for international growth.

Here’s how.

#1: Streamline the market adaptation process

Generative AI has an incredible production capacity, being able to create up to 20 times more original multilingual content while maintaining consistency and quality. The best part is that one can accomplish this within a previously-specified budget.

This efficiency not only enables more effective A/B testing and segmentation processes, but also facilitates faster go-to-market (GTM) trials across multiple regions, which reduces costs and shortens the timeline in which the company can be ready to launch.

Large technological firms have not been oblivious to this. For example, Google and Microsoft have recently launched generative AI capabilities directed to business customers, including copy-and-image-generating tools.

However, it is important to remember that users trust the content created by other users more than they do that that is generated by marketers. This is a reason why review-related sites have become extremely valuable resources all across the board. Social proof remains a key factor that influences a customer’s journey and their decision-making process.

Yet, there is a catch-22 in this. If a company is just entering a new market, this means that they likely have zero locally-generated content to rely on. They have no users that can spread the word in the market’s native language.

There’s a way around it, though. AI-powered Intento, a San Francisco-based startup, collaborated with Joom, a European cross-border retailer, to utilize AI to make user reviews available in the prospective customers’ local language. The project scope involved millions of products right at market launch, and it was extremely successful. Customer satisfaction was boosted, and time-to-market was reduced by 50%.

#2: Rapid roll-out of native-language support for better productivity

Many aspects of communication are more efficient if initially done in the target buyer’s native language. In another successful application, one of Intento’s clients was able to skip through the usually lengthy, extensive product feature translation and transcreation process, and use AI to automatically generate new content and descriptions in the required language. This allowed a high-GMV product line to be expanded across five different geographies, and to attain a top position within them, between the top 3% and 10% selling products.

Multinational food company Subway is another case study that is worth looking at. During the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, most businesses–especially those that depended on retail or in-person transactions, which vanished overnight–had to digitize at an extremely fast pace.

Before that happened, Subway had a two-week, in-person course to onboard franchisees. To accommodate the emerging restrictions, Subway immediately transitioned the course to one that could be completed through several eLearning modules. Using Intento’s platform, Subway customized a series of AI models, selecting the top-performing AI system per language, and made the materials available to franchisees worldwide. This saved Subway over $1.5 million, as well as two years of labor.

#3: Using completely personalized messages from the get-go

Through AI, brands can send consumers artfully-personalized messages from the very beginning. Nike is one of many fashion companies that is already capitalizing on this, and in the tech world, Adobe has recently announced AI integration to personalize digital experiences in the cloud. This will be an extraordinary tool for marketers, who will now be able to tailor their campaigns and interact with customers in a more engaging way. Other iconic companies, like Coca-Cola, have signed direct deals with OpenAI, to intensify its already compelling advertising and marketing efforts.

With the assistance of generative AI tools, companies can bring the “magic” back into their communications, and create messages that appeal to consumers’ feelings, maximizing the chances that they will opt-in for a purchase. And, as mentioned, the fact that they can do it in the buyer’s own language further compounds the effect. This enables businesses to, more than promote products and services, build relationships, and strengthen the trust and loyalty required to sustain a client-provider relationship over time.

#4: Going beyond text–harnessing the power of audiovisual communication and customized avatars

Written language is not the only way in which generative AI can help leverage effective go-to-market strategies. In addition to this, to successfully enter a new market, companies need to learn to speak to potential customers in a way that is visually appealing for them. Ideal local models have different characteristics–such as eye shape, height, skin color, etc–and the design of the perfect avatar can be streamlined through generative AI tools.

It is important to say that, as these tools keep developing, more opportunities will open up. For example, in the future, we see the potential for incorporating video and voice into these tailored approaches, which will further enable the scalability and localized transfer of communication. For example, we could see a Nespresso advertisement featuring George Clooney’s voice translated to any language. This strategy could be optimized to increase a product’s appeal by tagging it to a popular celebrity, and having this public figure connect with the target audience in a way that they can relate to them.

Final Thoughts

In conclusion, generative AI is an extraordinary tool that can be leveraged to develop successful go-to-market strategies that can think globally and act locally.

By generating content that is available in the potential user’s native language, optimizing the design of local avatars, and appealing to their values, interests, and culture, companies can reduce the time involved in launching their products and services in a new market, and further drive international growth.

Generative AI tools, if used appropriately, streamline the market adaptation process. Furthermore, by enabling personalized messaging from the get-go, brands can use these innovative technologies to build trust and a two-way relationship with consumers, which solidifies the necessary loyalty and identification required to build a lasting and thriving community and customer base.