At the 17th AIMAC Conference in Lisbon, Carsten Baumgarth presented the first research results on the AI Art Infusion effect. The art infusion effect generally describes the phenomenon that integrating art into marketing (packaging, advertising, events, etc.) automatically improves the judgment of the product or brand. Interestingly, this effect applies to “beautiful” and “unattractive” art and has been extensively empirically confirmed. The objective of the research project is to analyze whether and how this general kind of infusion effect is valid for the integration of AI art. The first main findings of the project are:

1. AI-Art is perceived as art by consumers and is even rated more positively on average compared to human art.
2. AI art also triggers the art infusion effect.
3. The art infusion effect is less pronounced if consumers correctly and incorrectly perceive the integrated art as AI-generated.

On 16 May 2024, Prof. Baumgarth gave the keynote speech “From hype to superpower: How AI is changing brand management and brand work” at the B2B Media Days, the congress of the Deutsche Fachpresse.

The storyline of the presentation was the manta that we need to move from gimmicks to real use cases for brand management in the field of AI. In addition to a few concrete use cases, such as the use of AI in the development of brand positioning, the design of brand-specific and brand-consistent assets and the evaluation of live communication (e.g. trade fair stands) using AI, seven recommendations were formulated for the use of AI in brand management:

1. Your AI knowledge will never get past a beta stage!
2. Welcome your new AI colleague with open arms!
3. Domain expertise is becoming increasingly important!
4. Pay attention to brand safety!
5. Reflect on the ecological, ethical & legal effects of your AI-supported brand work!
6. Develop sustainable business models!
7. Move from experimentation to business case!

B2B MEDIA DAYS 2024 – KONGRESS DER DEUTSCHEN FACHPRESSE am 16.05.2024 im Palais in der Kulturbrauerei in Berlin /// Foto: Mo Wüstenhagen

The 17th Global Brand Conference, which took place from April 22-24 in Edinburgh, provided exciting and up-to-date insights into global brand research with around 100 papers presented. Alexandra Kirkby and Carsten Baumgarth presented a framework and first results on the transformative power of AI on the day-to-day work of brand managers. The session, which was also chaired by Carsten Baumgarth, was the only session during this year’s GBC with a focus on the interface of AI and brand. In a second presentation, Anja Lambrecht and Carsten Baumgarth presented the results of their study on the influence of augmented reality on brand strength, analyzing in particular the influence of the personality trait narcissism. The conference, which this time took place under the conference theme “Conscientious Brands: Making Sustainability and Responsibility Work”, provided an excellent platform for knowledge exchange and networking as well as a starting point for new research projects.

The Expertenrat Technologiemarken e.V. is taking off again with a new Board of Directors. Prof. Dr. Carsten Baumgarth (Chairman), Jens Karolyi (Vice Chairman), Prof. Dr. Karsten Kilian (Treasurer & Secretary) and Dennis Merker (Board Member) were elected to the newly formed board at the general meeting. We would like to thank the previous Chairman Jürgen Gietl, who did not stand for re-election for professional reasons, and Dr. Florian Maier for their work. The new Board of Directors will tackle new projects and develop formats – digital and live – with full energy. The first major project is the development and launch of a new website, as the previous website was unfortunately hacked.

No other topic has influenced brand science and brand practice as much as AI in the last two years. After the play and experimentation phase, the focus is now on developing, testing and implementing concrete use cases for the integration of AI in brand work.

In a recent article in the trade journal, Carsten Baumgarth and Steffen Schmidt provide an up-to-date overview of the opportunities and challenges of using AI in holistic brand management. The article has been published in the magazine planung & analyse and can be downloaded here.

We cordially invite you to Berlin on 20.4.2023 from 18.00 – ca. 21.00 at the HWR Berlin. Prof. Oriol Iglesias and Prof. Nicholas Ind will present their latest book “In good conscience: do the right thing while building a profitable business” for the first time in Germany. Dr. Sebastian Stricker, Co-Founder of share and ShareTheMeal, will share his first-hand and deep experience on purpose brands and social business. Following my Instagram project “Brückenbau Marke”, I will report on five impulses from brand science on sustainability & co. Our president Prof. Andreas Zaby will open the event, which we are hosting together with ESADE Alumni and the Institute for Sustainability of the Berlin School of Economics and Law.

You can find the program & free registration here.

The fifth B*lab report on “Craft beer brand “Sip Soho” – AI tools in operational brand management” has just been published in both German and English. In this working paper we present the test of 27 so-called ready-to-go AI solutions for the generation of brand assets of a fictitious start-up brand. The paper provides an up-to-date overview of such generative AI tools, summarizes recommendations for the use of these tools and formulates open questions for the important and necessary discussion in practice and science. You can find the English edition as a free download here.

Research results should be available as quickly as possible. Our working paper series B*lab report, launched at the end of 2020, makes a contribution to this. The now 4th issue publishes the best papers of master students of the course “Advanced Brand Management” from the summer semester 2022. The spectrum ranges from slow fashion to brand coolness through violation of gender stereotypes to brand activism in the context of employer branding and co-creation. You can find the issue here.

Prof. Baumgarth has been appointed to the main jury of the Effie Award for the first time. Together with around 30 experts from the agency and corporate world, the most outstanding campaigns in various categories will be determined in September 2022. The Effie is a global award that was first presented in the USA in 1968. In Germany, the Effie has been organized by the German Association of Advertising Agencies (GWA) since 1981. Compared to other awards in the communications industry, the Effie evaluates not only creativity, but much more strongly the results of communication. The awards will be presented at a ceremony in Leipzig on Nov. 9, 2022.

A few years ago, I presented the first version of a brand canvas. This was used and further developed in many projects in practice and teaching. Since 2022 the B*canvas 2.0 is available. And now there is also a short and compact manual in printed and digital form with background information on the canvas method in general, structure and elements of the B*canvas in detail as well as application scenarios in practice and teaching.