More and more people are turning to AI for help creating fitness plans, developing recipes from random ingredients, or composing professional work emails without expending too much energy. But even if you’ve engaged in a simple activity like using voice recognition on your phone, commanding an Alexa device to set a timer, or navigating via Google Maps, you’ve benefited from AI. And just last year, Google rolled out its AI-generated Overview feature that, like it or not, sits at the top of every online Search Engine Results Page (SERP).
No matter how consumers choose to interact with artificial intelligence, the truth is, this technology is well established – which means that AI marketing research and privacy concerns are also here to stay, and AI privacy concerns should be high priority for brands connecting with consumers. In short, if your business caters to people who shop with the help of AI or relies on AI tools like ChatGPT to function smoothly in today’s marketplace, this page is for you. In this blog, we’ll discuss measures your brand can take to protect your business data from AI privacy risks and how expert-led research can help you safely reach your next goals.
The Rise of AI Tools Trained on Your Information
Though the AI marketing explosion is still young, many AI tools have already carved out spaces for themselves within digital marketing. In 2024, approximately 42% of marketing and media leaders used artificial intelligence tools when writing or generating content. The reigning platform continues to be ChatGPT, a conversational chatbot that 65% of marketing professionals use for content generation, brainstorming, and market research.
Whether you’re hunting for new ways to speed up campaign brainstorming or need a quicker way to outline long-form content, chances are, there’s an AI marketing tool that can help. The ideas AI platforms generate can certainly help support internal marketing teams by handling tedious tasks.
It’s crucial to acknowledge, however, that this technology comes with a dark side: Popular AI tools like ChatGPT cull information and hone their responses by using personal data, including information you give it or language it scrapes from the web without your explicit consent, to generate relevant output. This means that any brand currently relying on or looking to incorporate AI should be taking AI privacy concerns very seriously.
Growing AI Privacy Concerns for Businesses and Consumers
While AI tools like ChatGPT can be helpful to marketers, they come with high risks of compromising sensitive and proprietary business data. OpenAI, the research company that founded ChatGPT along with two other rising AI models in the image and video spaces, is under fire for its loose standards governing the collection and storage of data.
Specific concerns include the fact that ChatGPT does not provide end-to-end encryption or confidentiality guarantees for user data. According to the U.S. Public Interest Research Group, “If you tell it your address, your religious beliefs, or your mother’s name, it collects and keeps that information. If you upload a file, like a resume—which usually has a lot of information about you—it collects and stores that too.” It’s also unclear whether or not ChatGPT shares user information with third parties or separates personal identifiers from geolocations.
While this data mining aspect may not concern individuals who are protective of their online inputs, the real trouble arises when hackers and cyber criminals attack. Remember the May 2023 data breach that impacted approximately 101,000 individuals and exposed their names, social security numbers, email addresses, social media handles, phone numbers, job titles, employers, and geographic locations?
Additional Risks of AI: Don't Let Sharing Business Information Be Your Downfall
Aside from the obvious loss in customer loyalty from data breaches like the ChatGPT takedown, businesses and their most sensitive information are also vulnerable, and they’ve got much more money and many employees’ livelihoods at stake. Furthermore, if a company or any of its clients operate in regulated industries like healthcare and finance, AI usage may jeopardize internal compliance policies or industry regulations like HIPAA or CCPA, which opens the door to a whole other set of dangerous problems.
Engaged Research Professionals = Elevated Security Benefits
So far, this discussion of AI privacy concerns feels glum and, well, not worth the risk. Why put your business in harm’s way? The truth is, like most elements of digital marketing, there’s a path through the darkness. Brands like yours can join the AI revolution, integrate artificial intelligence platforms into their brand research methodology, reap the benefits, and avoid the pitfalls – they just need a marketing research agency by their sides.
Professional marketing research firms, (human)x included, must adhere to rigorous data security and compliance measures designed to protect sensitive and proprietary data. Unlike public software like ChatGPT, private research agencies used closed AI models that maintain strict control over internal data access and usage. This advantage is huge, because it means that businesses who engage marketing professionals can enjoy the best of both worlds; the brand can leverage AI insights and automations while their partner marketing research agency handles data security and compliance.
Another key benefit to joining forces with marketing experts like the (human)x team is the quality of your AI results. Open-source AI-driven responses that rely on such a vast array of data with little to no human oversight can deliver misleading data and generic analyses. In stark contrast, professional researchers have years of experience and training, are hands-on to moderate AI insights, and can provide in-depth analyses with extremely high degrees of accuracy.
Our PhD-led research team has years of experience in brand research methodology. With an extensive track record helping brands uncover real human insights and align their goals with industry-specific trends, (human)x is well-equipped to assuage your brand’s AI privacy concerns in a secure and cost-effective way. Reach out today to learn more about Brand Triangulation and how it can work effectively to support your brand’s discovery research and pulse-check your positioning with target consumers.
