9 Ways Your Business Can Plan For Artificial Intelligence Posted on : Mar 25 - 2017

Artificial intelligence (AI) is seemingly everywhere today. Whether it's using a virtual assistant like Siri or Alexa, improving sales insights through analytics, or hiring the best talent with AI-based recruiting software, many businesses have already started incorporating this technology into their everyday processes.

While you may not necessarily need to make artificial intelligence the core of your operations right now, most experts agree that AI's role and importance in business will only continue to grow. Nine members from Forbes Technology Council each shared a way that companies can begin preparing for AI right now.

1. Not Everyone Needs A Plan, But Everyone Needs To Research

I think for smaller companies, it is too early to create a plan, but I do think it is important to stay updated on AI and how it is being implemented in an applicable industry. As AI becomes more common in practice, it would then be good to create a plan based on other plans or models that have established some best practices. - Chalmers Brown, Due

2. AI In Your Business Plan/Roadmap Is A Must For Startups

Big VCs will not take meetings with early-stage startups unless they have some kind of plan to incorporate AI into their business model. Having said that, most of the bankers have no idea what "AI" really means. Early-stage startups must be able to apply some machine learning/deep learning/AI techniques into their technology, even if that means leveraging tech like WIT.ai (owned by FB) or LUIS.ai (by Microsoft) - Ben Lee, Neon Roots

3. When Considering AI Goals, Companies Should Be Realistic And Pragmatic

Every company needs to have a strategy to achieve many of the goals that AI research is making progress on, such as increased productivity through automation, or more personalized customer experiences at scale. However, companies should be realistic about their current capabilities and not be pursuing complex AI goals at the expense of short term improvement through the use of commodity technology and present-day best practices. - Bill Magnuson, Appboy

4. Introduce Real Intelligence Before Artificial Intelligence

Not every company needs an AI plan now. AI should be brought in when a company is acutely aware of specific weaknesses or processes they want to scale. Most companies are behind the curve in terms of data comprehension and general business intelligence; they should first focus on their real intelligence, and only bring in artificial intelligence when they understand where they need to improve. - John Derham, IQ Media

5. Companies Need To Plan For Their AI Plan

Not every company needs an AI plan right this second. A good place to start is understanding the different ways AI can ultimately support them. Next, they need to understand the “why” of AI and after that, the how. Introducing AI in the right places can quickly evolve a company, so make sure you have a transition plan in place to support it in advance of widespread implementation. - Or Shani, Adgorithms

6. Train Your Team With Open Source AI Resources

Unless you want your company to get left behind, you absolutely need an AI plan. Machine learning and deep learning will become integral to every company’s core technology. The first step toward creating an AI plan is to start training your team with open source resources from the likes of Google, Facebook, and Amazon. I recommend checking out libraries like TensorFlow to get started. - John Krystynak, AppLovin

7. Use Artificial Intelligence To Extract Valuable Insights

Using artificial intelligence to extract insights from data is critical for companies that want to create a competitive advantage, as we head into what IBM CEO Ginny Rometty calls "the era of cognitive business." Structured and unstructured data has been growing exponentially in the past few years, and extracting insights from the growing sources of relevant data can't be managed by humans alone. - Cristina Dolan, Trading Screen

8. Establish ROI Goals For AI And Data Analytics

Even the smallest firm may be able to find an edge by applying machine learning to its data assets. For large firms, there's huge potential to gain marketing insight and increase automation. Establish the ROI for your initiatives: top line (grow sales, reduce churn) and bottom line (reduce labor, streamline processes). Then ask a data scientist to build the analytics model and start testing. - Matthew Russell, Digital Reasoning

9. Examine AI Opportunities For Support Staff Needs

There is great potential for using AI within professional services, particularly as it relates to support staff. At its simplest level, AI has existed within programs such as Dragon Dictate for many years. By examining AI opportunities within your business, you will be able to maximize your own efficiency and retrain support staff to spend time on things like e-marketing to grow your business. - Chris Stock, LEAP Source