Is Your Customer a Machine? A Guide for B2B Marketing Strategists

The Fourth Industrial Revolution (or Industry 4.0) represents a profound shift in how we do business in the 21st century. Industries are integrating the Internet of Things (IoT), cloud computing and analytics, and advanced artificial intelligence (AI) throughout their operations.

As smart devices handle a growing number of work tasks, we are being forced to re-evaluate. What constitutes a 'customer'? Or, for that matter, an 'employee'?

Today we want to explore this topic from a B2B sales, marketing and business development perspective. Namely, how do we prepare for a world where brand interactions are increasingly with machines acting on behalf of humans, not the humans themselves?

A World of Machine Customers and Digital Humans

Much of the work day is dedicated to routine tasks we perform out of necessity. While important, checking emails and form filling isn't exactly the highlight of our day. As such, it is no wonder that people are turning to A.I. solutions to manage these business activities.

For example, virtual assistants and smart devices are now capable of making purchases on behalf of their users. These 'machine customers' (to borrow the term from Gartner) can research topics, order products, and interact with brand representatives. All with minimal need for human oversight.

• Tesla produces vehicles that can self-diagnose issues and automatically pre-order replacement parts as needed.

• Digital assistants like Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant can place calls, sort emails, and schedule appointments on their users' behalf.

• Amazon has created a shelving unit that can automatically place replenishment orders when items are used up.

Case studies aren't restricted to the buyer’s side of the equation. AI and smart devices are also problem solving for sellers. Many large ecommerce platforms use AI programs to offer personalised suggestions that facilitate online purchase decisions and sales.

A growing number of brands are working to develop hyper realistic 'digital humans'. These programs are designed to understand and engage appropriately for a better user experience. They can understand the emotional tone, not just the words of the speaker, as well as physical cues. These more empathic digital humans are starting to be employed in a myriad of marketing, sales, and customer service situations.

While the implications are perhaps clearer for brands producing or selling consumables, Industry 4.0 also affects professional services.

Insurance providers and legal firms are now using automated applications to handle routine services. Examples include services like template contract writing and claims processing.

The development of robotic process automation, machine learning, and deep learning algorithms means bots are increasingly capable of sophisticated tasks. In December 2022, a company called DoNotPay - a self-described 'robot lawyer' - demonstrated its ability to perform a live chat renegotiation of a customer's telecom bill.

The Sales and Marketing Implications of Doing Business With Bots

Decades of research have gone into helping businesses more effectively influence human behaviour. All of our sales and marketing efforts are shaped by the fact that human decision-making is not entirely rational. It is a meandering journey driven by prior experience, inspiration, emotional perception, logical decisions, personal relationships and word of mouth. 

Machines make decisions differently. A process based entirely on rules, logic, information and efficiency upends a large part of existing sales and marketing orthodoxy.

How are brands supposed to delight and engage customers that have no emotions? It will require a paradigm shift in how we design for great customer experience.

Non-anthropocentric Customer/Brand Interactions

Currently, marketing and sales channels are primarily built around two types of customer/brand interactions:

• Person to Person (P2P) – A human customer interacting with a human brand representative.

• Person to Machine (P2M) – A human customer interacting with an automated self-service system.

However, the rise of non-human business actors has created two new types of customer/brand interactions:

• Machine to Person (M2P) – A machine interacting with a human brand representative (either for a user or on its own behalf).

• Machine to Machine (M2M) – A machine interacting with a brand’s self-service system to complete a task.

Brands need to develop systems that can handle and optimise all four interaction types.

More Data-driven Sales and Marketing Strategies

While companies will still need to navigate human needs and behaviours, they must also consider how machines fit into the customer journey.

Sales and marketing teams will need data scientists who understand machine learning and can spot patterns in machine purchase behaviours. For instance, understanding the types of information machines need about products/services, so marketers can ensure said information is easily accessible.

Sales, marketing, and customer experience should also work together to create customer journey maps. These now need to include key intersections between human and machine activity.

Engaging the People Behind the Algorithm

Many smart devices are programmed to prioritise OEM products, or use proprietary brand services. Take HP smart printers, for example. These default to ordering from the HP Instant Ink program. While HP users can connect to Amazon replenishment services, Amazon will only sell them HP ink.

B2B businesses need to find a way to get past electronic gatekeepers. Companies will need to identify the people behind the algorithms, using techniques like stakeholder analysis, to engage and influence. Forming mutually beneficial B2B2C partnerships with the companies designing machine customers can help your business crack closed systems.

For example, say a device in charge of managing office supply inventory is coded with ten variables to consider. Your product meets all ten variables, but so do five competitors. If one of those competitors can offer a lower price, faster shipping time, etc., you'll lose the sale.

But, what if your product had an 11th variable that competitors don’t have? Something that makes it easier for the smart device or the end user—such as superior platform integration. If you can convince the smart device producer to include that 11th variable in their purchasing algorithm, your product will always sell through.

The Continuing Need for the Human Touch

In some ways, smart machines and AI algorithms may be more reliable business agents than human ones. They can process large amounts of data and make informed decisions based on logic and rules. They don’t get frustrated or distracted or forget to place essential resupply orders on time.

However, there will always be situations where people want to interact with people. Machines are not infallible. They fall victim to code errors, hacking, software issues, hardware failures, and so on.

Take a recent case involving Ticketmaster. Their website was overwhelmed by scalper bots during a presale event for Taylor Swift’s 2023 tour. The site crashed, and verified users were pushed into long queues, resulting in massive brand backlash. In such cases, human involvement is critical to mend relationships damaged by the machine’s error.

Moreover, as we learned during the pandemic, humans are inherently social animals. Some qualities of human interactions simply can’t be replicated in the digital world. AI and smart devices are not a substitute for humans. Instead, they provide a complementary mode of doing business.

Three Steps Businesses Can Take to Prepare for the Future

Machine agents are becoming an important interface between companies and human consumers. B2B marketers need to build future-proof strategies, relationships, digital experiences and value exchanges that account for both humans and bots. Some important questions to ask include:

• Are core sales and marketing functions likely to shift to a digital system, reducing the need for human involvement?

• Do you have a capital-intensive legacy business that limits your ability to scale down/pivot effectively?

• How will the balance of power in your business ecosystem shift as smart technology impact different parts of the value chain?

• How are ecosystem partners managing the transition to AI and connected devices? Will pressure from current partners cause your brand to make decisions that go against its long-term interests?

More than optimising routine work, machine customers and AI-algorithms are poised to transform entire markets. Companies that are slow to adapt risk fading into obscurity. Consider the cautionary tale of Kodak.

However, for forward-thinking brands, this latest phase in the digital revolution creates opportunities to innovate new business models. To pioneer new ways of engaging with humans and machines (and subsequently grow their share of market).

Capitalising on AI technologies will require vision, careful planning, and the ability to convince naysayers to invest in the future.

Include Machine Customers and Digital Humans in Your Business Model

Explore how AI and smart devices could act as market-growth additions through purchasing/selling your products and services.

Could they simplify the buying process by automatically ordering supplies or researching necessary service upgrades for clients? Could they act as a self-service liaison between you and human end-users?

Also, consider the role you want your company to play in the world of machine buyers and sellers. For instance, will you manufacture machine actors of your own or use another brand’s solution/system? Will you sell directly to machines through your e-commerce platform or on digital marketplaces? Or will you create direct partnerships with brands to use their smart devices as a channel to reach end users?

Develop Parallel Customer Experiences

Understand that connected devices and virtual assistants will push the boundaries of customer expectations. It will be important to develop parallel sales and marketing infrastructures - one for machines, and one for humans.

For machine customers, focus on developing programmatic, automated sales and marketing processes. Remember, information will be more important than persuasion, and speed will trump empathy.

Since bots don’t need to be delighted, invest resources in creating seamless M2M transactions. You might create a data schema on your e-commerce platform that includes enhanced inventory/product information. Or invest in an automated sales and fulfilment process that fully meets the client’s service-level agreement requirements.

For humans, focus on relationship building and give B2B buyers the omnichannel experiences they demand. Frame yourself as a supportive partner by creating engaging educational content and services that provide buyer reassurance and added value. For example, a dashboard that provides not just data but insight.

Also, make person-to-person interactions count. When engaging with potential customers and decision makers in person, prioritise empathy and customer success over upselling.

Invest in High-quality Data Capture Systems

Quality data is absolutely vital for digital marketing. This fact is even more true when dealing with machine intelligence.

You need a sales and marketing platform capable of tracking every single interaction a machine customer has with your brand (or that your service bot has with a customer). You also need data experts who can parse this information to uncover meaningful insights. 

One of the reasons smart devices are so powerful, from a producer's perspective, is they can capture extremely detailed data about people's behaviour and environment.

Of course, brands must balance their ability to collect information with people's desire for privacy. It is important to act as a responsible data custodian and be transparent about what information you’re collecting, why, and through what means. Also, be very clear with users about how you will use, store, and protect their data. If data capture is not strictly necessary for the core functions of a product/service, offer an opt-out.

Your Marketing Partner for the Future

1827 Marketing specialises in developing agile B2B sales and marketing strategies that can quickly adapt to changing market environments. Book a demo to learn how our expert strategists can help your business face whatever the future holds!