Microsoft's nostalgic AI holiday ad

Plus: Amazon's new chatbot

November 29, 2023

Hey there! With Black Friday and Cyber Monday now in the rearview, marketers are taking a collective sigh of relief. The ad budget has officially dwindled, and you’re leaning into recovery mode. But the second you catch your breath…it’s time for 2024 planning. To get those creative wheels spinning again, we gathered this week’s marketing AI news. Let’s get into it.

Honda Ads Get Interactive with AR Murals

Source: Honda

Honda is taking to the sky to showcase its electric vehicles this holiday season. By pairing augmented reality (AR) with out-of-home (OOH) advertising, Honda is turning its digital ads into an interactive experience:

  • As part of its “Keep Dreaming” campaign—which commits to net-zero carbon emissions by 2050—Honda designed murals across LA, each displaying a QR code to activate an AR experience.

  • Once activated, the installation projected information about Honda’s electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft (eVOTL). The text seemingly descended from the sky, rotated in 3D, and took off again.

  • At each mural location, Honda brand ambassadors guided users through the experience and distributed branded swag.

Amazon’s New Generative AI Assistant for Businesses

Yesterday, Amazon launched Q: a generative AI chatbot specifically built for businesses. While Q is intended for use across business functionalities, it may be especially useful for marketing:

  • Q accesses internal company data, so marketers can ask the chatbot specific questions about brand standards, style guides, logo usage and more.

  • Q directly integrates with Google, Microsoft, and Adobe so marketers can quickly access information about design projects or brand copy.

  • After a social campaign runs, Q can analyze and summarize its performance and provide valuable insights for the next campaign.

Microsoft AI Ads Bring the Holiday Spirit

Source: Microsoft

Microsoft’s new AI holiday campaign—created with McCann—is encouraging anyone to make their own nostalgic “holiday masterpiece” with Microsoft Designer: 

  • This long-form ad depicts transmedia artist Ellie Pritts on an NYC street corner. Instead of using paint as her medium, Pritts sets up her laptop and pulls up Microsoft Designer.

  • As people pass her setup, Pritts asks them to share their favorite holiday memories—then creates AI generated images based on these stories.

  • The ad brilliantly plays into seasonal nostalgia, tying modern AI tech to familiar holiday traditions.

Meta Reveals New Political Ad Rules

There’s been a lot of buzz about Meta’s advertising policies surrounding the upcoming election cycle. Yesterday, Meta made it clear that it will be carefully monitoring advertisers for AI usage—impacting more than just political ads:

  • Meta will require all advertisers to disclose whether they used AI or any related digital editing techniques “to create or alter a political or social issue ad.” 

  • This will apply to any photorealistic image or video, or realistic audio that was digitally created—even if the ad depicts a realistic-looking person who does not exist.

  • During the final week of the U.S. elections, Meta will block all new political, electoral and social issue ads.

Around the Web

  • Discover the marketing secrets that transcend time! 🚀 In their upcoming webinar, LinkedIn and Sprout Social dive into the power of nostalgia and future-forward content to reveal how emotion-driven strategies can skyrocket your marketing strategy.*

  • Walmart is debuting a shoppable holiday series on Roku, TikTok, and YouTube.

  • Marketers have been experimenting with Google’s AI ads—here’s what they’re learning.

  • This company claims to be an AI-powered CMO.

*This is sponsored advertising content.

Thanks for joining us, and we’ll see you next Wednesday!