Macy has been working for CNET for coming on 2 years. Prior to CNET, Macy received a North Carolina College Media Association award in sports writing.
Meta is working toward a future where many of the ads you see on Facebook or Instagram are created from scratch by artificial intelligence, and thus more easily targeted specifically to you. Its goal is fully automated AI-powered ad generation by the end of 2026, the Wall Street Journal first reported. Following this initial news, TikTok also announced it's launching AI-powered advertising features on its platform and Meta unveiled that ads are now coming to WhatsApp -- further strengthening the threads between advertising and AI.
These moves could cut out roles for many human copywriters, designers and media buyers and potentially shake up the $600 billion global ad business, but it also could be a new, lower-cost resource for small and medium-sized businesses.
Along the way it will likely raise fresh questions about creativity and accuracy as AI edges into another realm of decision-making by humans. Meta has broad ambitions to weave AI across its platforms. It has already integrated its Meta AI chatbot across Instagram, Facebook, Messenger and WhatsApp, explored creating AI avatars on Instagram, and worked generative AI tools into its apps. Meta did not respond to a request for comment.
With competitors like Google and Amazon also building AI-powered ad systems, automating advertising is just one more piece of a much larger puzzle. To gain a deeper understanding of how this news affects the ad industry and the almost 4 billion people who use Meta platforms, I spoke to Gary Kayye, a professor of advertising at UNC Chapel Hill and an industry professional for over 30 years.
Kayye, who embraces and requires AI use in his classroom, views this as an opportunity for anyone in the world to make AI work for them when it comes to marketing and commerce. "All of a sudden, millions of individual creators who were intimidated by advertising can start small and grow," Kayye said. "Then, as they grow their businesses, they're going to advertise more and then they're going to spend more, so you're going to increase the amount of commerce globally."
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If you're on Facebook, Instagram or WhatsApp, expect to see more personalized ads. The AI-driven systems allow companies to specify which users it wants to target so the AI can hone the images, video and text accordingly, the Journal reported. They may even whip up new versions of ads in real time depending on where you are. You could see a car ad showing the car driving up a mountain if you're in a snowy location, or see that same car driving in city streets if you're in an urban environment, the Journal reported.
"The low-hanging fruit for AI in advertising has always been programmatic (ads)," Kayye said, referring to the digital advertisements bought and sold automatically using software and algorithms. "You upload an image, a short description, pick the audience, and AI can do the rest. If Facebook's AI can predict the right audience well enough, then create multiple ad variations and run A/B/C/D tests automatically, that could be sort of magical."
At the same time, media and ethics experts warn that fully automating ad creation could open the door to misinformation, biased targeting and further erosion of accountability in digital advertising. AI is susceptible to mistakes and manipulation, and it can be used to spread harmful messaging, such as AI-generated deepfakes.
There's also the threat to jobs at traditional ad agencies and marketing firms, something Meta is downplaying. "We believe AI will enable agencies and advertisers to focus precious time and resources on the creativity that matters," Alex Schultz, chief marketing officer and vice president of analytics at Meta, wrote in a LinkedIn post. "While we think there will ultimately be more automation in marketing, the role that agencies play is going to become ever more important through their ability to plan, execute and measure across platforms."
Kayye expects a shift toward AI automation will only affect agencies that don't diversify or expand beyond social media marketing, and those that have relied on one strategy for too long. "What really kills a business is being an assembly line of creativity," he said. "This will impact those doing the same thing for every client over and over and over. AI is going to expose that faster."
Humans will always have a role in advertising, Kayye said, since strategy, creative storytelling and building brand loyalty are very human endeavors. "AI still can't do original thought. It can remix, it can emulate, but it doesn't have a brain," he added. "Good prompting is a form of creativity. AI can write the copy, but you need to know how to ask it the right way, so it can give you something worth reading."
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Businesses would explain their product or marketing ideas to the AI ad tool and give it a budget goal. The machine would take over from there, generating ad copy, visuals, targeting strategies and even media placement decisions, all without human intervention.
In the short term, this would start with AI making suggestions or streamlining parts of the ad process. But over time, Meta wants AI to be capable of managing entire campaigns on its own, from start to finish, according to the Journal. A spokesperson for Meta told the Journal that advertisers would remain "in control" of their campaigns, but the broader vision paints a future where AI is the creative director, media planner and performance analyst all in one.
The new effort builds on the existing suite of AI-powered ad tools at Meta, such as Advantage Plus and generative tools introduced in 2023. Those features allow marketers to automatically create image backgrounds, write copy variations and test ad formats. The company said small businesses would be the key beneficiary of this AI approach, especially those lacking the time or resources to hire marketing teams.
"In the not-too-distant future, we want to get to a world where any business will be able to just tell us what objective they're trying to achieve, like selling something or getting a new customer, how much they're willing to pay for each result, and connect their bank account and then we just do the rest for them," CEO Mark Zuckerberg said at the annual Meta shareholder meeting last month.
