AI reshapes customer data, loyalty and marketing decisions

Artificial intelligence is changing how brands understand customers, operate loyalty programmes and manage advertising campaigns, as businesses move beyond isolated experiments towards systems that can act on customer data in real time.

Industry executives say the value of these systems will depend on the quality of the data available to them. They also expect AI agents to influence how consumers research products, evaluate loyalty benefits and engage with brands.

The shift is creating pressure for organisations to improve their customer data foundations while making loyalty rules, campaign information and marketing decisions accessible to automated systems.

Data context

Amperity co-founder and co-CEO Derek Slager said enterprise AI adoption is only as effective as the customer context that organisations can provide.

As adoption accelerates, businesses are finding that AI systems require reliable and current information before they can make decisions or take action.

According to a recent IDC MarketScape report cited by Amperity, the role of the modern customer data platform extends beyond bringing information into a single system.

Customer data platforms need to serve as a context layer that exposes customer, organisational and decision information that can be used by people and AI agents.

The report cited Amperity's AI-powered Customer Data Cloud as an example relevant to enterprise business-to-consumer organisations where "durable identity, data quality, marketer usability, and cross-functional operationalisation matter as much as profile unification itself."

"Enterprise AI is only as effective as the customer context behind it. As organisations move beyond experimentation and into production, they need data they can trust and context that's current enough for AI to make confident decisions," said Derek Slager, co-founder and co-CEO at Amperity.

That requirement extends across marketing and loyalty operations, where incomplete or outdated customer records can affect recommendations, personalisation and campaign decisions.

Loyalty shift

Australian Loyalty Association Founder and CEO Sarah Richardson said AI is becoming a major disruptor for marketers and is changing how consumers discover, assess and choose brands.

The Australian Loyalty Association's 2026 Asia Pacific Loyalty Conference will include discussions on AI, loyalty economics, behavioural science and customer data strategy.

Richardson said the growing use of AI tools during product research could alter the point at which businesses first interact with prospective customers.

"AI is becoming the new front door to the customer journey. Consumers are increasingly using AI tools to compare products, research purchases and seek recommendations before they ever reach a brand website. That has profound implications for loyalty, acquisition and customer retention strategies," Richardson said.

"The brands that thrive in the next decade will be those that can demonstrate value at every customer interaction. Loyalty is no longer just a rewards strategy. It's becoming a business-wide growth strategy."

The association expects brands to respond through improved customer data strategies, personalisation, behavioural science and a closer examination of the economics behind loyalty programmes.

Eagle Eye Account Executive Aziz Kastoun said loyalty systems are also being affected by the move from predictive AI towards agentic systems.

Predictive tools have commonly been used to identify likely customer interests or determine which promotion to present. Agentic AI introduces the prospect of digital assistants actively comparing offers and acting on behalf of customers.

"We are moving from a world where we 'target' customers to a world where we 'enable' their agents," said Aziz Kastoun, Account Executive at Eagle Eye. "Predictive AI told us a customer might want a discount; Agentic AI means the customer's digital assistant will actively negotiate for the best value."

Kastoun said this could require businesses to make loyalty benefits easier for automated systems to identify and evaluate.

"For brands, this changes everything. Loyalty moves from being an emotional 'vibe' to being machine-readable value. If your loyalty rules aren't simple, digital, and instantly accessible via API, an AI agent will simply bypass your brand for a competitor that is 'easier' to transact with. The shift is from persuasion to seamless integration."

Eagle Eye provides technology supporting loyalty programmes used by companies including Kwik Trip, Z Energy and Tesco.

Campaign decisions

AI is also being introduced across advertising planning, campaign activation, optimisation and performance analysis.

Nexxen has expanded its nexAI suite across its advertising technology platform. The company's tools include nexAI DSP Assistant, which is integrated into its demand-side platform.

Janice Chan, VP of Platform and Client Services APAC at Nexxen, expects AI assistants to become more closely embedded in advertising workflows during 2026.

"From a client perspective, AI-driven capabilities like those offered by nexAI are driving accessibility and efficiency. They simplify the process of translating complex data into actionable insights and campaign strategies, which can then be directly activated within the platform. What once required platform and optimisation specialists is now becoming more intuitive and seamless for marketers," Chan said.

"AI is increasingly embedding into day-to-day operations, and marketers can expect to see complex analysis and campaign optimisation handled automatically, while they dedicate their attention to strategy, creativity and delivering long-term value."

Marketing diagnostic platform RAMMP is taking a related approach by using AI to assess campaign risks and identify areas where customer trust may be breaking down.

The company has released a free AI plug-in that allows business owners to conduct marketing analysis through AI assistants such as Claude and ChatGPT.

The tool uses an MCP connector and is intended to provide real-time analysis of the customer buying journey before businesses commit resources to a campaign.

RAMMP Founder Dr Anna Harrison said smaller organisations have historically faced high costs when seeking a detailed marketing diagnosis.

"I've spent two decades in rooms with founders who've built genuinely good businesses and have no idea why their marketing isn't working. They're not bad at what they do. They've been failed by an industry that profits from imprecision," said RAMMP Founder, Dr Anna Harrison.

"Execution has been commoditised. AI made sure of that. Anyone can ship a campaign in an hour," Harrison said. "RAMMP delivers quality decisions at scale. Whether you're a marketer, a business owner, or an agency working alongside both, the question is the same. Is this decision defensible?"

Taken together, the comments indicate that AI's influence on marketing will extend from customer data infrastructure through to discovery, loyalty, campaign execution and performance assessment.