• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer @lauriesullivan, May 30, 2019

Marketing plans that include artificial intelligence to optimize media buying and bidding continue to grow in importance, with a greater number of business-to-business (B2B) marketers using AI technology to improve the results of campaigns across most channels.

Among the B2B marketers working with infiniGrow’s platform, more than 80% use AI technology, but Google is not the leader in this trend. AI is one trend in several the company has identified.

InfiniGrow’s research highlights the expected increase or decrease in marketing spend in 2019 for each category and platform based on a survey of hundreds of marketing plans created using the company’s platform.

While advertisers are expected to increase their ad spend, based on their ability to use AI, Quora at 28% and LinkedIn at 26% will become the beneficiaries, according to data from InfiniGrow.

With 300 million monthly unique visitors and answers that are indexed and rank favorably in Google search results, B2B marketers continue to invest time answering relevant questions, as well as budgets for advertising.

Google will average a 9% increase across its properties -- a few percentage points higher than the forecast amount for Facebook, 6%. Twitter is expected to decline by 12%

Content marketing at 32% is the fastest-growing marketing channel, mainly because marketers are willing to forego the benefits of gated content to place it in front of as many prospects as possible and build their brand.

Event budgets also continue to increase. Ad spending is forecast to rise 27%, according to InfiniGrow’s research, as B2B marketers seek more personalized and intimate opportunities to engage with potential customers.