I spend a lot of time writing and talking about artificial intelligence these days. The security industry is awash in data. Too much for humans – or even fairly sophisticated algorithms – to make sense of. And AI is probably our best shot at leveling the playing field with threat actors. (They’ve been kicking our asses the last few years.)

This also has me thinking about the potential applications of AI to sales and marketing. Sure, getting on a sales call with an expert solution seller and technical resource will always be the ideal way for a security buyer to engage. But prospects need to fight through a gauntlet of web forms, chatbots, qualifying questions, and other annoyances to get to that point. Very few actually make it through. And even if they do, the sales rep usually isn’t swinging at a pitch that’s in the strike zone.

Does this mean we should outsource sales to robots? Of course not. But what if we use AI to give our salespeople superpowers that help them AND buyers?

There are similar opportunities in marketing. Right now, very little of the marketing content that security vendors create is good. Some of it is excellent, like the big-ticket threat research reports that some vendors do. But most of it is SEO bait and noise to feed the social media scroll machines. Why? Because creating high-quality content that actually helps buyers self-educate is expensive and time-consuming.

What if we take our best storytellers and 10x their output through AI assistance?

All of this probably seems a bit theoretical and unrealistic. And maybe it is today. But the tools to do these things aren’t as far off as they seem. So let’s spend some time thinking about how we can apply them effectively and responsibly. (Slowly walks towards rabbit hole…)

-Doug

I spend a lot of time writing and talking about artificial intelligence these days. The security industry is awash in data. Too much for humans – or even fairly sophisticated algorithms – to make sense of. And AI is probably our best shot at leveling the playing field with threat actors. (They’ve been kicking our asses the last few years.)

This also has me thinking about the potential applications of AI to sales and marketing. Sure, getting on a sales call with an expert solution seller and technical resource will always be the ideal way for a security buyer to engage. But prospects need to fight through a gauntlet of web forms, chatbots, qualifying questions, and other annoyances to get to that point. Very few actually make it through. And even if they do, the sales rep usually isn’t swinging at a pitch that’s in the strike zone.

Does this mean we should outsource sales to robots? Of course not. But what if we use AI to give our salespeople superpowers that help them AND buyers?

There are similar opportunities in marketing. Right now, very little of the marketing content that security vendors create is good. Some of it is excellent, like the big-ticket threat research reports that some vendors do. But most of it is SEO bait and noise to feed the social media scroll machines. Why? Because creating high-quality content that actually helps buyers self-educate is expensive and time-consuming.

What if we take our best storytellers and 10x their output through AI assistance?

All of this probably seems a bit theoretical and unrealistic. And maybe it is today. But the tools to do these things aren’t as far off as they seem. So let’s spend some time thinking about how we can apply them effectively and responsibly. (Slowly walks towards rabbit hole…)

-Doug