Transforming Digital Marketing with AI: Insights from Mumtaz Khamker

00:00 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

Hello and welcome to Women with AI. Today I'm speaking to a fractional chief marketing officer who's an expert in digital marketing, so I'm excited to hear her insights on using AI. Before we start the podcast, let me tell you a little bit about her. Mumtaz Khamker is an experienced growth marketing professional who specialises in digital, known for having a natural knack for uncovering and unlocking the revenue opportunities many companies maybe don't realise they have a knack for uncovering and unlocking the revenue opportunities many companies maybe don't realise they have.

00:26

Mumtaz has spent the last 17 plus years in digital performance and affiliate marketing on the agency side, with a passion for the growth aspect of affiliate marketing and the way it cuts across all digital channels means she's worked with agencies and publishers who specialise in carrying out PPC, SEO, social display and CRM for their clients. Mumtaz was lucky enough to get a secondment at Samsung, which gave her the exposure to weekly trade meetings at a high profile company. She's also a Harvard-certified Women in Leadership professional and enjoys speaking and sharing her insights on performance marketing and women in leadership roles. Mumtaz Khamker, welcome to Women WithAI.

01:00 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

Thank you, Joanna. Thank you for the warm welcome, and thank you also for the great introduction you just gave for me there. Thank you, Joanna. Thank you for the warm welcome, and thank you also for the great introduction you just gave for me there. Thank you.

01:10 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

Oh, fantastic, it's great to have you here. So, before we get into how you're using AI, for those that don't know what is affiliate marketing, Thank you, Joanna.

01:19 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

I'm going to try and explain it in as simple terms as possible. So affiliate marketing is basically when anyone with a website, it could be you, me, it could be a company like Quidco, Top Cashback, decides to put advertising links on their websites for retailers like ASOS or Samsung, and then what that means is if someone clicks on one of those links, goes, goes off to Samsung, let's say and buys something, then that publisher we call them publisher will get paid a commission for that sale, which is normally a percentage of the basket value. And that is basically affiliate marketing and anyone can do it. It doesn't need to be companies. It could be. If you've got a blog, if you're an influencer, you could also become a publisher as well, and some people make lots of money from it as well.

02:07 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

Wow, of course. So how did you get into doing this, and how has AI become part of what you do?

02:13 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

Sure, yeah. So I actually started my career in website production, build SEO and paid search, and then the company I was working for back then got, actually, we called it a reverse acquisition bought by a company that was doing affiliate marketing, the tracking for it, and that's how I really got into affiliate marketing. And then how do I see AI affecting affiliate marketing in particular? Affiliate marketing in particular, um, I think marketing right now is quite um manual, quite can be quite resource heavy. A lot of it's based a lot of on relationships. I know in the past a lot of people have talked about how can we speed things up, how can we automate things so people get on and do more of the strategic side of things as well. So I think you know the way it could probably help with affiliate marketing is it might actually help with the automation of booking placements. Basically, that's where I think it could probably affect affiliate marketing.

03:29 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

That's what I would say um yeah, okay great and so it's kind of to sort of to streamline, streamline it, I guess, and sort of make it, make it easier exactly so.

03:38 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

If you think about it, in the programmatic space, um, things have sped up and streamlined a lot where, um, you know, there's whole companies where you can, you know, dedicated towards being able to easily book placements on big publisher websites.

03:54

That's been missing a lot from affiliate marketing because of its slightly smaller aspect in terms of the publishers and B the relationship relationship aspect. But there is an argument that perhaps there is a way for AI to at least try and streamline, uh, being able to do that, that media planning and buying. So you know, like with traditional media planning and buying, um, the agencies will book, um mainly on sort of big sort of websites, normally wouldn't be hundreds and hundreds of websites. So you know you could, you could automate that. But also it, you know, you can sort of negotiate quite well with affiliate marketing. Typically a retailer would, could work with 200, maybe even like 500-odd websites and being able to automate, automate, that would be great. But so far, they haven't really been able to do that, and therefore, it's become resource-heavy. So if AI could help with automating perhaps even the long tail, that would be really good that's that's it, and so do you.

05:02 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

You advise these companies on that and how to do it. What sort of level do you have? Who is it that you advise?

05:09 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

yeah, sure, so I actually now I advise founders of small startups. Typically, it's just a couple of people. Um, quite a few of them are bootstrapped, you know. They they're using their own sort of um thing, um to to make their dreams come true. And I actually help them make their dreams come true. I provide honest feedback on their executions and their aims. Um, I guide them. I use a coaching mindset. Rather than sort of telling them what to do, I try and, uh, you know, guide them along to make sure that they are getting towards their goals. Um, but, um, you know, maybe not sort of instructing them per se because obviously it's their dreams, and I want to help them make their dreams become a reality. So, very much, um, as an advisor.

06:00 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

That's what I would say, right, and are you seeing, have you sort of come across that maybe people are trying to use AI themselves? And yes, does that have an effect? And have they, have they been successful? Or have they sort of tried it and come back to you? Or do you, do you sort of worry that the AI might do you out of what you're?

06:20 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

doing or no. So so let me let me tackle that last question first. Actually, um, so will AI impact what I'm doing? So, basically, like with AI right now, it is very much what you what you read in the trade press that it it works with whatever it's been inputted with. So whether it's, I don't know, articles from newspapers, I know there's a lot of suing going on at the moment from some of the publications in the US with OpenAI or whether it's, you know, the fact that the chatbots have been fed the internet. It's, you know, the fact that the chatbots have been fed the internet, um, information from the internet, um, up till, I think, you know, the last year or so. The point is it's it's like a textbook; it's regurgitating things. It doesn't have, at least from my knowledge, it doesn't quite have the ability to do critical and creative thinking. Now, it's very much an automated process. So this is why human beings will still be needed, but at the same time, it would be really important for us to hone our critical thinking and creative thinking skills because, yes, AI will automate a lot, and therefore, if you are one of these people that has a textbook thinking mindset, then I would probably say I would hone your critical thinking and creative thinking mindsets because this is where AI right now doesn't have a place. And I'll give you an example um, I, I use ai, um to give me an initial view when I'm reviewing contracts, whether they're for myself or for any of my clients. I might sort of upload it into Claude or ChatGPT and see you know what they'll initially say.

08:37

A few weeks ago, there was something that the chatbots mentioned and said you may want to check this particular clause. And they also still have it and say, you know, check with an actual lawyer. So I checked this particular clause with one of my lawyers that I know, and the lawyer said, Mumtez, actually, this clause, what this? What it's actually saying is x; it's actually not going to affect you at all. It's not, it's, it's not a risk at all. Now, the, the, the two, three chatbots that I'd uploaded this legal document to had all said be careful. But it needed me to speak to a human lawyer, yeah, who actually read the clause and said no, this is actually what it's saying and it's fine, wow, so that. So hopefully that answers your the question regarding am I going to be done out or is this or other people going to be done out, and sorry, john, I forgot what your first question was as well.

09:45 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

Well, I think I have as well. Now, I was just thinking of more questions after that one. I think it was how it's changed. Um, well, yeah, how it's impacted you. But, as you say it's, it's impacting you because it's helping you to be more effective and efficient.

10:06

But and if other people are trying it, you know the worry I was wondering was are people that you would normally advise thinking, oh, I can do this myself, I don't need Mumtaz, I'll just stick it in AI. But, as you've just shown that example you've given, which is brilliant, you can ask the chat GPT or the chat bot or whatever. You're putting all the information in to get that. But sometimes you do. You need that human expert because, you're right, it is just learning, it's just all it's done is taken. It is a textbook, so it's taken everything.

10:37

And I guess the caveat is that it's probably going to say, oh, but you should be careful, and then that's when you need the experts. You're right, it's about honing skills, isn't it? I think that's that's the the good thing about it. I think that's the the conversation that we should be having. You're right, it's not, you know, taking over the world and putting everyone out of jobs. It's going to just change the jobs and make sure that everyone does hone their creativity or their skill set so they can be the expert.

11:00

Because AI is, it's just a text, it's just an online textbook, isn't it really? As you say, it's been fed that information, because that's my concern is just making sure that all the information that's there is up to date and is fair and is equal and has you know, everything that's needed for for the right information to be taken from that. So, yeah, I think that's really interesting that you can put in all the the details and take it back. But, um, so how else do you use ai? Do you use it in your personal life? Have you used it for other things as well as as for business?

11:36 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

Yeah so. So, I don't tend to use it for personal things, but yeah, so I've used it in the legal aspect, um the example I just gave. And then I do recall, what you had originally asked me regarding what, how my clients are using it as well and are they using it? So, yeah, so again another example, one of my clients is trying to get her website live. She's a fashion designer and she's.

12:03

She actually said to me she was using one of the chat bots, to help her with copywriting for sections of her website. So I basically looked at it as well. I and the way we, the way we both use it now is we get examples of copy from the bots like Canva is great, Canva, magic right is great, uh, but also Claude and ChatGPT, but then what we then tend to do is we then edit it and come up with our own style. So, again, it probably helps as a, as a support and as in maybe inspiration, but we don't actually end up using verbatim what the bots give us for the copywriting.

12:56 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

Yeah, I think that's the way to do it, isn't it? That's the positives and the opportunities, giving more opportunities, maybe? Isn't it, rather than impacting us, to put us out there, exactly, exactly and?

13:10 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

exactly, and going going back to the whole, um, creative thinking aspect when it comes to copywriting, a chat bot right now, if you said, can you put it in this tone of voice, I think it might struggle, whereas you know us beings. If you say to someone OK, here's some example copy from the bots, but what we want to do is the tone of voice. The brand persona for this brand is, I don't know, warm, engaging, inclusive. You have to edit the copy to make it warm, engaging, inclusive, because the bots won't really understand what you're trying to do.

13:53 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

They'll just spit out to you, um, what they think, basically yeah, and what they've just seen up, but exactly, it's a, it's not a he or a she, it's, it's an it and it's just giving you what it thinks you you need. So it is. It's that important part of having the human to check it afterwards. So do you see, because we're here on on women with ai, do you think that that it is going to outsizily impact women or do you think it's the roles, or is it a level playing field at the moment for all, all of humanity?

14:26 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

I think it's. It's gonna be a great leveler. But obviously there's always going to be bad actors, um, which we have to be aware of. I mean, you know we see it in the press all the time. You know deepfake here. You know you know copyright issues, as I mentioned earlier, openai being sued by, I think, the latest series of publications in the US like Chicago Tribune. There's going to be it's like the gold rush of the dot-com, the initial dot-com era. It's a gold rush at the moment. When there's a gold rush, it's Wild West. When it's Wild West, there's always going to be some bad actors. But it doesn't mean you shouldn't embrace it, you should totally embrace it. It will be a great leveller. I don't think it matters whether you're a woman or anything else. I think just embrace it.

15:26

I read this week that Amazon have now brought out their sort of business assistant AI called Q. I had a quick look at it and it looks amazing. So it's for companies. So the examples I saw in their video was if you're a HR manager and you want to speed up or streamline onboarding process for new employees, you can with just with text prompts and, using your company data, you can give the queue a text prompt, upload the data and it will build an app for you and if that works for you, then you can use it across the organization. So, if you think about it.

16:20

Coming back to your question about women and I know there's been a lot of general talk about enabling women to continue to have great careers despite having children and and you know the need for flexible working if you think about that side of things, then like whether it's Amazon Key or another app being able to have an AI assistant that helps you streamline your workload, meaning that you can do that flexible working, meaning that you can juggle all your hats and have a successful career and, you know, can you continue to have a great family life. That is a great leveler. Of course it's a great leveler yeah, why not embrace it?

17:10 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

I think it's. It's strange people aren't using it. I'm speaking to someone in the office this week and I said, oh, have you used chat gpt to do you know this for your projects? And they were like oh no, I haven't even thought about that. So I said, oh wow, you know, let's have a little session and I can talk you through. And then I was thinking, oh no, but then he'll know all the secrets that I've been using it to save time and come up with things. But, as you say, you know, it's about being honest. Maybe, I don't know. Do you? If you've used it, have you told clients? Well, yeah, do you tell clients you're using it? Do you think that's important?

18:03 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

Yeah, I mean yes, yeah, again, I'll use it for like extra support, extra check. So, yeah, I'll. Sometimes, yeah I'll, you know, like the lady who's got in chat, gpt or Claude, um, but yeah, not I. I don't think there's a need to disclose all the time, but yeah, where it makes sense I would, I would be. Uh, you know, there's no harm in being transparent.

18:21 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

Really, yeah, fantastic and you do, um, you do one-to-one consultations as well, don't you? So you're sort of you have that's obviously how you like working. I think that's really nice because then, as you say, it's nice to have that human touch. Even if you are using AI, you need to sense check it with someone. And where do you? You say you're reading the articles. Where do you find that you're sort of doing most of your learning? Is it just sort of? Do you find that you're sort of doing most of your learning? Is it just sort of? Do you have, like, google alerts set up or do you? Is it?

18:56

just sort of consuming all the news that you can or where do you recommend people.

18:58 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

Yeah, find out about ai. Yeah, I would say, consume all the news that you can. Everyone's got their favorite publications or favorite news sources, so I obviously pick up anything on LinkedIn. I will pick up things from the Economist as well. And then, when it comes to retail in particular, there's a chap who does a great retail newsletter on LinkedIn called Oliver Banks, and interspersed with that, he also include articles regarding how uh retailers are using ai as well. So, um, I think in the most recent one he mentioned that sd loader is collaborating with um, with open ai, to produce um, to produce some um uh specific apps, uh for product development.

19:49 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

I think oh wow, talking about makeup and things like have you, did you see the dove advert recently that was about uh, using pictures, you know like and it showed.

19:59

If people haven't seen it, we can, yeah, put a link in about seeing how women look. You know, if you google like what's the? Give me a picture of a perfect woman and it's, you know, some blonde, blue-eyed, young looking image of a woman, and then it's just how depressing that can be if that isn't how you look. And then it showed all the. It basically says we're not using AI, but then obviously they were using AI to show you those pictures but yeah did you see it, I did, I did.

20:26 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

It's amazing ad, yeah, and a fair play to them they're. You know their ads have always been great, um, always been really engaging and really hit the point home yeah, fantastic.

20:35 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

So what? What excites you about AI? What do you think in the next sort of like, maybe three to five years, what would you hope for, or how do you think it will shape things? Or is it just can we not, can we not tell?

20:48 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

I don't think we can tell, but this is probably going to sound counterintuitive to what I said earlier. But I actually think it would be interesting to see if we can get a chat bot that has a little bit of critical thinking in it, because I think that would be quite interesting to see, um, you know, if it is able to start thinking more laterally, thinking more creatively. And how would that measure up against a human's um critical, creative thinking ability? Um, because it's this not to sound negative, but I think as a society we are in danger, and, and especially the, the younger future generations, we are in danger of getting content fatigued out. We're overwhelmed by so much content every day, whether it's tv, the internet, newsletters are. There's just so much going on. The younger generation, particular, is exposed to so much social media that they're losing the ability to um think creatively as well.

22:03

I would say I see this because this is what I've experienced when working in organizations where there's a a large young workforce and I've seen this in quite a few of them and I think, unfortunately, is because they've been trained to not use a calculator, not not, you know, not try and do things the long and hard way.

22:29

They just go straight to tiktok or the internet, or now bai, I guess. So, if you think about it, to reverse that would might take a while. So, but we still need critical thinking, we still need creative thinking. So we might need a bot or two to support us in that way as well. Support the future generations, because obviously you know us gen x, gen y, you know we're not going to be around forever. So we have to think about the future generations and right now I think they're struggling to cope. Um. So yeah, I agree, I think they need the support, and if there is a bot that can support with not just the automation but also with a little bit of creative thinking, that'd be interesting as well yeah, almost pushing back, so not giving the answer.

23:24 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

Yeah, straight away. That's the thing, isn't it? You can ask, you know, your Alexa or your Siri sorry saying that so you can't hear me um, and they just give you the answer. But you're right, you don't know. Is that actually the right answer? At least if you've done it yourself, you know, maybe that is googling it. But also, you know, do encyclopedia britannicas exist anymore? But it's doing your own research because you come across so much other information while you're looking for the answer for something, isn't it? So it's kind of yeah, maybe we've made it too easy, so it might be interesting if it sort of pushes back, and I think I did. I did a chat with David on the creatives with AI podcast and he mentioned that chat.

24:03

Gpt now doesn't give you the exact answer. Sometimes it will say you know, here's some advice or here's something you know, maybe do it like this. So, instead of just writing your plan or doing exactly what you've asked it to do, it might say well, here you go. These are some points. Why don't you include this as well? So maybe that's that's what the learning curve could be and that's what we should be striving for. And you're right, this is the beginning, isn't it, of of all of this, because it's it's just exploding, so we need to sort of get in there and make all these suggestions, if we can. So, uh, absolutely brilliant, but um, so I've really enjoyed talking to you today, montaz. I mean and you're on I mean, what's the best way for people to get in touch with you if they're interested in a consultation and some coaching?

24:50 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

sure, yeah, absolutely well, they can. They can find me on linkedin so it's Mumtaz Khamker. I can share the url with you later or they can drop me a line.

25:03 - Joanna Shilton (Host)

We can put the link in the notes. Yeah, yeah, fantastic, that's brilliant. So, um, yeah, thank you on task for coming on. Women with ai, it's been lovely to speak to you and, uh, yeah, really insightful, thank you thank you, joanna.

25:18 - Mumtaz Khamker (Guest)

Lovely to speak to you too. Have a great afternoon, goodbye, bye.