Even simple AI tech can see big savings and productivity increases
Spark marketing director Matt Bain uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) every day. Microsoft Co-pilot drafts his email responses. Chat-GPT-4 gives him summaries of large amounts of information and drafts agendas for his off-site meetings, complete with breaks and an icebreaker exercise.
He estimates this is saving him about two hours a day in menial tasks.
Spark started implementing AI strategies four years ago and what started as a relatively small investment has delivered 17 per cent compounding efficiency in marketing every year. “A double-digit improvement is much larger than you would expect for most tech rollouts,” Bain says.
Now Spark is on a mission to help other businesses move “one technology generation forward” with advanced digital technologies like AI.
Earlier this year, Spark published a study by NZIER economists, which found that a 20 per cent uplift in advanced digital technologies could boost productivity and increase industry output by up to $26 billion in the next decade – potentially boosting GDP by up to 2.08 per cent.
The study calls for a national AI strategy like Australia’s AI Action Plan, which sets out a vision for Australia to be a global leader in the development and adoption of AI. A national AI strategy could ensure we support our local AI industry to thrive – so New Zealand remains a creator of AI, not just a consumer or net importer.
Bain goes further – New Zealand risks being left behind if it doesn’t start using advanced tech, he says: “AI is the next best transformation for the economy and the way people live and work. It will shift people’s ability to create and transact. It’s an opportunity for NZ to really get ahead. There is no reason we can’t keep up with the rest of the world.”
Huge return on investment
The biggest barrier with AI is getting started, Bain says: “A lot of people think it sounds very difficult. Even at Spark we started with one single model four years ago and experimented.”
For small businesses, a modest investment in Microsoft Co-pilot or Chat GPT-4 can lead to significant increases in productivity.
“If you are actively using these technologies 10 times a day, you are taking back significant time spent on boring stuff that you can replace with more valuable work.”
Businesses of all sizes can benefit from AI, says Bain - from a sole trader looking for information about taxation, to a large business building AI capacity in-house. “We have been on this path ourselves and are doing a lot of work to make sure we are at the forefront in NZ and helping our customers.”
Spark’s AI journey
About four years ago, Spark started investigating how to use AI to help its customers. The company used to spend a lot of money on the kind of marketing which ended up being “noise”, Bain says.
The marketing team started small with a predictive machine learning model. The aim was to predict customers’ needs and send them the right promotion at the right time, rather than using a scattergun approach.
The model could predict when a customer might need a new phone, for example, and send a promotion for the kind of device they were interested in, with other products complementing their interests.
A tech-savvy customer might want to receive information about the latest devices available while a more price-conscious one might prefer the best deal.
“Fast forward to today, our customers receive marketing messages tailored to their individual circumstances and needs, and when they are most likely to respond. This also frees up our people to focus on the customer service experience.”
Generative AI helps Spark call centre staff to find the right product or plan within seconds rather than having to put a customer on hold while they search for the right promotion to offer.
Bain says New Zealand businesses have been slow to uptake this kind of technology, but it has become more accessible in recent years.
Caution required
All that said, some caution is needed. Before Spark started using AI tech, the company drafted a set of ethical principles, which it has made available to the public. This included the ethical use of data, bias, fairness and what areas should be off-limits.
A big area of concern is data protection, Bain says. Any data uploaded to a system such as Chat-GPT is no longer private. This is why big companies need to invest in their own internal secure models.
Basic education around advanced technologies is key to helping businesses get started with AI, hence why Spark is delivering an AI for Business Mini-MBA programme to a number of its customers.
“We want New Zealand businesses of all sizes to have the skills and understanding to get started on this journey. We are a big business, and we have an incentive to help our customers move ahead of the curve.”
Read the full report and learn more about how to accelerate your business with advanced technologies, visit spark.co.nz/report