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It’s National Pumpkin Seed Day, Reader! Have you ever made your own?

In today’s edition:

• 📷 Today's Tip of the Day is for Instagram

• 😲 Fear-free AI integration

• TikTok’s new story content

• Meta wants to use your tagged content

• 🗞️ Additional industry news from OpenAI, Snapchat, and more

Want to share an Instagram fee image on your Instagram story, but give it a different twist?

Use AI-Generated Backgrounds on Instagram Stories

To reshare a post on your Instagram Story with an AI-generated background, navigate to the post you want to share, then tap the paper airplane icon in the bottom right corner of the post. Select "Add to Your Story" from the menu that appears. 

You can then edit your Story by cropping or resizing the image and adding text or stickers. To access the AI backgrounds feature, look for the "Backdrop" sticker in the sticker tray and tap on it. 

A prompt will appear asking you to describe the desired background. Be specific in your description for better results, and consider the photo's content when choosing a complementary background. Wait for the AI to generate a few background options, then select the one you like best.

Finally, adjust the position or size of the background as needed, and tap "Share" to post your Story.

Note: AI-generated backgrounds are still in development, so results may vary.

Today's advice is provided with insights from Social Media Examiner’s Editorial team.

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A Strategic Approach to AI Implementation

If you've been tasked with AI implementation or want to introduce AI across your organization, you'll likely face pushback. To mitigate the fears and resistance, you must first help everyone understand why company-wide AI adoption is so important.

When properly implemented, AI can dramatically improve customer experiences, retention rates, and employee satisfaction, as team members are freed from mundane tasks and empowered to focus on more meaningful work.

Perhaps most compellingly is AI's potential for significant revenue growth. This tangible impact on the bottom line makes a compelling case for investing in comprehensive AI integration.

The following process for implementing AI across an organization relies on careful planning that results in stakeholder alignment at every stage.

Identify the Core Problem With Your CEO

The journey begins with a crucial one-on-one conversation between you and your CEO. This discussion aims to uncover what they believe to be the business's main problem so that you understand the high-level view of the organization's challenges.

Nine times out of 10, lack of revenue is the primary concern.

Gather Insights from Mid-Level Leadership

While team leaders may agree with your CEO on the overall concern, the surface-level answer often masks deeper, underlying issues. For example, If revenue is the main problem, you must uncover the underlying causes, such as poor lead quality or misalignment between sales and marketing teams.

So, the next step is to bring together the company's senior executives for an open discussion about the organization's main challenges. This conversation often reveals fundamental disconnects between departments and highlights areas where communication could be improved.

Choose Actionable Ways to Implement AI

With a clearer understanding of the organization's challenges, the focus shifts to identifying specific AI use cases to resolve these issues.

While you want to improve processes, you don't want to threaten anyone's safety or job security. Rely on department heads to pinpoint tasks their employees find particularly time-consuming or unenjoyable. For example:

• Competitive analysis: Using AI to gather and analyze competitor data more efficiently.

• Messaging and positioning: Leveraging AI to create and test marketing messages across different channels.

• Lead scoring: Implementing AI-driven lead scoring models to improve sales efficiency.

Pro Tip: Choose use cases that can be measured pre- and post-AI implementation so you can clearly demonstrate the ROI of using AI.

Create an Interdepartmental AI Task Force

Before you launch any AI implementation, your teams must feel comfortable learning about AI in a non-judgemental and supportive environment.

Hosting ongoing interdepartmental task force meetings can serve as a platform for sharing early successes and challenges and help identify potential AI champions within the organization.

Collaboration tools like Slack or Microsoft Teams are a great way to facilitate these interdepartmental meetings. These platforms can also host dedicated channels for AI discussions, allowing team members to share insights, ask questions, and celebrate wins in real-time.

Introduce Your Teams to AI Use Cases

Progressive, hands-on training for your teams can build confidence and skills among team members. Start with simple, quick-win exercises before moving on to more complex tasks. For example:

Start with recipe generation. Ask team members to input ingredients from their refrigerator into ChatGPT and generate recipe ideas. This task can be completed in about 90 seconds, providing an immediate sense of AI's capabilities.

Next, move on to language translation. Have employees use ChatGPT to translate phrases into different languages. This exercise takes slightly longer, about 3-7 minutes, building on the complexity of the first task.

Finally, teach team members how to use ChatGPT to prioritize and organize their email inboxes based on subject lines. This more complex task can significantly impact daily productivity.

Now you can implement process to address the company’s most pressing issues.

Measure the ROI of AI Implementation

The final step in Gross's process involves establishing clear qualitative and quantitative metrics to measure the impact and outcomes of AI implementation. Track metrics such as:

• Time saved on routine tasks

• Increase in sales pipeline

• Improvement in lead quality

• Customer satisfaction scores

• Employee satisfaction and retention rates

Pro Tip: A data visualization tool like Tableau can help present AI-driven insights in a clear, visual format, making it easier for all stakeholders to understand the impact of AI implementation.

Today's advice provided with insights from Ashley Gross, a featured guest on the AI Explored podcast.

OpenAI Voice Assistant Training: OpenAI has announced a series of new tools and features as part of its latest rollout. The company has introduced a fine-tuning tool that allows developers to enhance the performance of AI models after their initial training. This tool enables the improvement of model responses using both images and text. The fine-tuning process can incorporate human feedback, where individuals provide examples of desirable and undesirable answers based on the model's outputs. Additionally, the company unveiled a tool that enables smaller AI models to learn from larger ones, potentially democratizing access to advanced AI capabilities. Lastly, OpenAI introduced "Prompt Caching," a feature that can reduce development costs by up to 50% by reusing previously processed text, thereby increasing AI development and deployment efficiency. Source: Reuters

Tagged Content on Meta Platforms: Meta has introduced a new initiative where it requests permission from content creators to utilize their tagged content across various platforms and experiences, including advertisements. In return, creators are offered the potential for increased exposure and reach for their content. Source: @lindseygamble via Threads

Pinterest Performance+: Pinterest has launched the Pinterest Performance+ suite, a new set of AI-driven advertising tools available globally. Key features include automated campaign optimization, reduced setup time, and flexible customization options. The platform has also introduced Promotions tools in several countries to help advertisers highlight discounts, responding to increased consumer demand for deals. Additionally, Pinterest has enhanced its user experience with personalized shopping recommendations and increased visibility for promotional content. Source: Pinterest

Snapchat Footsteps: Snapchat has introduced a new feature called Footsteps, which is exclusively available to Snapchat+ subscribers as a pre-release perk. This feature allows users to visualize their travel history on the Snap Map, providing a unique way to track and view the places they've explored. Footsteps display the user's exact path on the Map, but this information is only visible to the user, ensuring privacy. To activate Footsteps, subscribers must navigate to the Snap Map tab and confirm their choice by tapping 'Okay' on the Footsteps pop-up. Interestingly, when users first enable the feature, they might notice that some Footsteps are already on their Map. It's important to note that Footsteps only records a user's movements when they are not in Ghost Mode, allowing for control over when location data is collected. Source: Snap

TikTok Flip Stories: TikTok has announced a new feature called Flip Story, which allows creators to add a hidden second side to their Story content. This innovative feature enables users to share before-and-after photos, exclusive announcements, or sneak peeks, adding an element of surprise and engagement to their storytelling on the platform. To create a Flip Story, users can access the Create page by tapping the "+" button or selecting it from their Profile photo, then choose the Flip Story option. The feature requires creators to upload two images by capturing content directly through the app or by selecting photos from their device. Viewers can reveal the hidden content by pressing and holding the "Hold to Flip" button, which will display the second side for a few seconds. Creators can see separate viewer lists for those who have unveiled the hidden content. TikTok assures that all Flip Story content will undergo the same moderation process as regular Stories to ensure platform safety and compliance. Source: TikTok

Did You Know?

In Disneyland's Haunted Mansion, Imagineer Leota Thomas portrays Madame Leota. But when the attraction switches to The Nightmare Before Christmas overlay, Imagineer Kim Irvine portrays the face of Madame Leota. She's the daughter of Leota Thomas!