Friend or Foe?

This the question on most of our minds. Artificial Intelligence has been slowly infiltrating technology and is predicted to soon take over. Is it here to help? Is it here to spy on us? Or is it here to confirm all our inadequacies as human beings? When the internet began to boom with billions of users, AI stepped in to manage the unimaginable amounts of unstructured data in order to provide each user with their own unique experience online.

So how is AI being used by social media today? We enjoy experiences like personalized content and easily following top trending news but do we know what goes on behind the curtain to make all these possible?

Behind the curtain

AI carries out many functions on our every day social media applications like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. They include;

• Deep Learning;

With an estimated 2.77 billion users on social networks, AI performs the important function of ingesting and deciphering large amounts of unstructured data to identify and understand trends, patterns, hashtags e.t.c. This is why you can get personalized content based on your interest, competitive hashtags or latest trends easily. It also allows effective segmentation which is significant for marketers

• Image recognition

AI has empowered software recognition tools to understand shifts in users’ patterns by analyzing billions of images post on social networks. It allows simple tasks such as tagging friends on photos on Facebook and can even help marketers identify potential promotional and marketing opportunities

• User engagement

Chatbots and virtual assistants facilitate highly personalized and intuitive user experience by engaging with users based on their interests. They have revolutionized brand engagement and conversions by enabling seamless interaction between users and brands. They also have the ability to manage requests for example chatbots used to request uber rides.

• Social Listening

This is important for marketers as AI is able to track conversations by focusing on particular words, phrases, and brands and uses gathered data to write targeted articles

• Empowering Influencer Marketing

Enables brands to select the right influencers, predict what incentives to offer them in order to inspire certain actions from them and even predict their performance based on the brand’s objectives.

• Competitor analysis

Manually analyzing many competitors’ profiles can be time-consuming. AI-based analysis save times and focuses on accuracy

• Brand sentiment analysis

This is where AI tracks conversations and brands to identify the impact of brands, whether positive or negative.

So AI is not so bad, is it? Let’s take a closer look at how specific social applications are implementing some of these functions.

1.Facebook deep learning

Facebook has billions of monthly users hence implements AI deep learning to analyze volumes of unstructured data and provide personalized experiences for each of its users. Deep learning also facilitates content optimization and segmentation for targeted Facebook ads. AI has also helped Facebook flag 20 times more suicidal expressions for review by human moderators as well as sending out suicide awareness messages.

2. LinkedIn’s Bright

LinkedIn acquired ‘Bright’ which enables better candidate matching for both employees and job seekers. Bright also analyses hiring patterns, work experiences and similarities in job descriptions.

3. Google’s Deepmind

Deepmind is an AI-empowered software that simulates neural networks just like the human brain to analyze and deduce patterns in order to achieve their objectives.

4. Twitter’s neural image crop system and ranker

Twitter uses this system to crop images using face detection or creating a thumbnail from an entire image. The system can decipher which parts of the image users would be interested in and puts these parts in the preview. AI also helps twitter rank trending posts and hashtags in order of relevance rather than chronologically.

In conclusion, AI is not a robot invasion lying in wait for the perfect time to rise up and take over the world. It is not here to eliminate our jobs rather it is here to work with us by carrying out tedious tasks and leaving us to focus on core activities. AI needs us as much as we need it, it cannot function on its own, contrary to popular opinion.