Generative Publishing Platform Connects Human and Artificial Intelligence to Enable Experimentation, Acceleration and Elevation of AI as a Fundamental Element of Marketing Functions and Solutions

LONDON, Aug. 20, 2024 -- Omnicom Media Group agency PHD Worldwide has launched Ascension, a publishing platform offering a comprehensive and ongoing exploration of the impact of Generative AI on the marketing industry; and how clients and agencies alike will need to evolve their organizations and offers to effectively leverage the technology to drive business growth.

Unique among agency thought-leadership platforms, Ascension is a generative magazine that blends human and AI-generated content to capture the latest advancements and insights in the rapidly evolving field of AI.

"PHD's mission is defined as Intelligence. Connected. - bringing everyone and everything together. And today, that includes artificial intelligence," says PHD Worldwide CEO Guy Marks. "As a generative publication that evolves as the world updates, Ascension explores how AI is going to reshape marketing—from initial experimentation to full acceleration and eventual elevation – and provides actionable information and insights to help us, and our clients, to rise with AI."

Editorial Perspective Informed by Research

To ensure content that best serves marketers' needs - and does more than simply add to an already cluttered and confusing generative AI information landscape - PHD partnered with WARC to benchmark AI perspectives, surveying more than 700 senior marketers and agency experts. The findings  revealed significant gaps in desire vs adoption, and perceived vs actual AI knowledge; conflicting expectations around the functional impact; and subjective interpretations of the evolutionary timeline.   

In response, Ascension offers a clearly defined editorial perspective: exploring the impact of AI across seven distinct marketing executive functions; and mapping how these functions will evolve across three specific adoption stages. 

The Ascension Seven

Ascension identifies the seven different executive functions that are required as part of the day-to-day development of marketing communications:

  • Sensing: The function of understanding stakeholder needs through listening, interpreting, and empathizing
  • Visioning: The ability to identify and articulate needs or opportunities, setting the course for future growth
  • Defining: Translating a vision into an actionable strategy, setting parameters, objectives, and methodologies
  • Generating: The creative heart of marketing, involving the creation of concepts and content
  • Developing: Building upon and adapting what has been generated to ensure it is well-crafted and fit for purpose
  • Judging: Decision-making processes involving evaluation, choosing between alternatives, and steering project direction
  • Actioning: Task organization and project execution, orchestrating collective efforts to meet deadlines and achieve goals.

With the research revealing that marketers see higher impact across  the Defining,  Generating, Developing and Actioning functions,  Ascension will:

  • Explore requisite shifts in the roles of creatives, strategists and planners
  • Reveal the essential new skills/roles that will be required to sustain growth in an increasingly AI-driven marketing landscape
  • Examine strategies for re-skilling/cross-skilling that will be critical for effective AI-human collaboration
  • Map how all of the above will evolve across three eras of development

The Three Eras of Ascension 

Understanding that marketers need to be able to assess AI actioning in the context of the broader marketplace evolution, Ascension provides a developmental road map from this moment in time to the end of the decade that encompasses three distinct eras:

  1. The AI Experimentation Era (2024-2026)

    This phase will be marked by the individual use of LLMs and Diffusion models, new software with GenAI capabilities, utilization of existing platforms such as Microsoft Copilot and Adobe Firefly, and the early integration of GenAI into enterprise platforms. It will be a period of pilot projects and refinement, setting the stage for more profound changes to come.
  2. The AI Acceleration Era (2026-2028)

    Following the early experimentation, AI will become a fundamental element of marketing – with more mature applications of GenAI in existing platforms. It will be used by a large portion of the workforce, albeit mainly for efficiency and effectiveness. This era will focus on replacing and/or enhancing current functions.
  3. The AI Elevation Era (2028-2030)

    With efficiencies and effectiveness realized by existing platforms, the focus will turn to creating more intelligent systems that can take greater control of decision-making. As individuals are freed up, attention will shift to elevation – exploring new marketing capabilities beyond what we can envision today.

PHD Worldwide Chief Strategy Officer Mark Holden, who conceived and architected Ascension said "To outgrow, you need to outthink. An important part of that is providing an accurate map of the future. That's why PHD has always emphasized thought leadership, with the latest being their "Ascension" project. This comprehensive initiative explores AI's impact on marketing, offering insights and practical advice to help businesses adapt and thrive in an AI-driven landscape."

Ascension is the latest addition to PHD's thought leadership library - a collection that includes seven books exploring meaningful change moments over the past decade. To access visit https://ascension.phdmedia.com.

ABOUT PHD

PHD, an Omnicom Media Group Agency, helps the world's leading brands outthink, outpace, and outgrow the marketplace with a next-generation network of tools, talent and technology engineered for connected intelligence. Collaborating on the AI-powered Omni operating system, 6500 people in 81 offices across 74 countries connect data, technology, and human expertise to deliver modern media solutions that drive brands and businesses forward. Headquartered in the UK, PHD is currently the most awarded media agency network in the world according to the WARC Media 100, an independent ranking of campaigns and companies for creativity and innovation; and was named 2024 Global Media Network of the Year by leading US advertising publication Adweek.

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