What Can Markie The Virtual Assistant Do?

Aaron Gilbreath | October 31, 2022

The industry’s first local marketing virtual assistant helps channel partners intelligently solve their local marketing challenges in numerous ways

You may have heard about the increasing role artificial intelligence and marketing virtual assistants play in local marketing. What you may not know is exactly what an AI marketing virtual assistant does to improve the user experience. BrandMuscle’s virtual assistant, Markie, offers an excellent example of a VA’s incredible capabilities.

What Does an AI Marketing Virtual Assistant Do?

In the simplest terms, local partners who struggle with marketing can ask Markie the virtual assistant to provide them with personalized marketing recommendations and to execute specific tactics for them using artificial intelligence. But things get really interesting in the details. Let’s look at how BrandMuscle is using Markie to improve certain local partner use cases:

Markie’s Essential Tasks

Markie’s essential tasks range from sending partners local marketing guidance to opting partners into subscription marketing packages, to answering marketing questions through SMS text, email, or a chatbot within the BrandMuscle Intelligent Local Marketing Platform.

Specific tasks that Markie performs with a few clicks include:

  1. Automatically submit co-op fund or MDF reimbursement claims
  2. Customize brand-approved templates
  3. Access marketing campaign reporting
  4. Guide partners through local marketing campaign execution details
  5. Recommend how partners use their co-op funds

Markie’s abilities get even more sophisticated, including:

  1. Proactively notifying a local partner when they haven’t submitted a claim in a while.
    Maybe the partner still has funds, so we’d like to reach out and reengage them. Markie can provide that nudge.
  2. Suggest a strategic media package to opt into based on how many funds they have available and based on metrics like their prior performance data and marketing maturity.

Answer Partner Questions With Expertise

To build rapport with a local partner, BrandMuscle designed Markie to be able to answer simple questions and to address more complex questions that require marketing expertise, such as:

  1. “How much money do I have in my account?”
  2. “What marketing materials are available?”
  3. “What tactics are approved by my co-op program?”
  4. “What’s the value of paid social advertising? Tell me why that’s important.”

How Markie Makes Personalized Recommendations

Markie makes personalized recommendations for partners, and it’s exciting how the buying signal can trigger a marketing activity in such an advanced exchange. Here’s how that works:

Markie can use AI to detect changes in Google web search trends in the local area where a partner operates. As Google detects these trends, Markie sends an SMS text to the local partner suggesting a strategic opportunity for them to opt into. If the partner happens to be one of those 88% of local partners who say they are not marketing experts, then that partner might rely on Markie to explain it or be able to ask more questions about it. Again, here’s where Markie can start to build trust and share some of its collective marketing expertise.

Markie can certainly provide a partner addition detail, can engage in more of a back and forth with the partner, too, and even potentially bring in a human to help if we start to sense frustration with the end-user. Ultimately, a quick interaction like this leads to a really smart enrollment for this local partner, and it could not be more frictionless, since Markie is able to start the campaign with just a few SMS messages.

We might see similar conversations for when the AI model detects things like customer foot traffic data in the area, if there have been any shifts or noticeable changes. We might also look at competitive data, whether in relation to something like an increase in ad spend by a competitor, or whether foot traffic is increasing in a competitive area.

Another important element to consider is weather forecasting data, which is interesting. Local marketing must take into account weather and its effect on consumer behavior. If you’re a retailer that sells snowblowers, for example, you may want to remind your local partners that snow is in the 10-day forecast for the first time this season, and you should run an ad. This is absolutely somewhere where Markie can help make that smart marketing decision.

Here’s where we go back to a crucial insight from The State of Local Marketing Report data, that says that brands must minimize the effort it takes for partners to participate in their marketing program in order to amplify the impact to the bottom line. With the rate of AI-powered innovation currently accelerating technical innovation in the local marketing space, including AI and virtual assistants, there are endless possibilities available to organizations who are open to evolving and have the vision to drive that change from the inside.

Think about where your AI learning journey is today. Do you use AI? Do you want to use it more? Where do you want it to take your business next?

Ready to Use an AI-Powered Virtual Marketing Assistant at Your Business?

Watch the full webcast, Drive ROI With AI: The Future of Channel Marketing With a Virtual Assistant,or contact BrandMuscle to find out how Markie, the industry’s first local marketing virtual assistant, will drive program utilization and enhance customer, partner, and employee experiences.

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