Evaluating Emerging Trends in Advertising Practice: The AI Paradigm

Artificial intelligence (AI) has recently garnered significant attention from advertising scholars due
to its potential applications in the field. This research aims to contribute to this emerging field by
identifying emerging trend in advertising practice within the AI paradigm and also examine the
impact of AI on advertising effectiveness and consumer behaviour. The study adopts the
Technological Determinism Theory which helps to explore how the emergence of AI is transforming
advertising practices and how advertisers are adapting to and shaping this new technology. The
qualitative research design was adopted employing a semi-structured interview method for data
collection with a population of 101 and a sample size of 20 which was selected through purposive
sampling. Findings showed that Ad personalization, voice search optimization, chatbots and
predictive analytics are growing trends in advertising practice. This study concludes that artificial
intelligence is both the present and future of advertising; with consumer expectations higher than
ever before, it is imperative that brands must leverage AI to deliver the right messaging on the right
platform thereby enhancing their ROI and improving their digital ad performance.

Keywords: Artificial intelligence, Disruptive technologies, Machine learning, Return on
Investment, Digital advertising