Marketing Productivity Gets a Boost From AI, but ROI Lags, Emplifi Reports

AI may be helping marketers hit their targets, but demonstrating social media return on investment (ROI) remains a challenge, according to a new report from Emplifi, an autonomous customer experience (CX) platform. The new survey, “The State of Social Media Marketing 2027,” reveals that 87 percent of marketers say AI has improved their team’s productivity. Yet fewer than half (48 percent) say their team can confidently demonstrate social media ROI to leadership through clear attribution and data.

The report also highlights challenges related to team capacity and burnout across marketing organizations. More than half of respondents say they use AI tools that their company has not approved at least some of the time, up from 42 percent last year.

“In 2027, the strongest social strategies will not be defined by how much content teams can produce. They will be defined by how well they turn every interaction into measurable business value and a better customer experience,” said Claire Wilson, CMO of Emplifi.

Only 38 percent of marketers report their productivity increase from AI as significant, suggesting that, for most teams, the gains are meaningful rather than transformational. Adoption is strongest in caption and copywriting (72 percent), ideation (70 percent), image generation (64 percent) and reporting and analytics (64 percent), while 60 percent are not yet using AI for community management.

Meanwhile, 37 percent of organizations have a fully defined AI policy for marketing, while a further 41 percent have partial guidelines. Brand safety and content quality are the biggest barriers to broader AI adoption (26 percent), followed by a lack of skills or training (19 percent) and integration with existing tools (16 percent).

When it comes to proving impact, reach and impressions (58 percent) and engagement rate are the KPIs marketers most often rank among their top three, while fewer than one in three include social-attributed revenue among their top three KPIs. Attribution remains the most commonly cited reporting challenge.

Reporting also continues to demand significant time. Approximately 62 percent of marketers spend four or more hours a week on reporting and analytics. However, 69 percent say AI has saved their team at least three hours a week on these tasks over the past 12 months.

Optimizing social content for discovery and search is also gaining traction, with 86 percent saying it is a formal priority or on their radar for the next 12 months. Nearly half (48 percent) actively monitor how their brands appear in tools such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity. Three in four have adapted social content to improve visibility in AI-generated results, but only slightly more than one-third follow a defined strategy. At around one in five organizations, AI visibility has no designated owner or no defined approach.

Influencer marketing budgets are also expected to grow. More than 50 percent of marketers anticipate increasing their influencer budgets over the next 12 months. Among teams with an allocated budget, 64 percent plan to increase spending, in line with last year’s 67 percent. However, plans to increase collaborations with virtual or AI-generated influencers have fallen to 35 percent, down from 58 percent. Instagram is the leading platform for planned investment, while Reddit is the only platform where the share of marketers planning to increase investment (31 percent) exceeds the share currently using it for marketing (28 percent).

Social teams are also managing growing demands. More than half (54 percent) of marketers say their social teams have grown over the past year, while 86 percent report an increase in content and campaign volume. Four in five describe their workload as manageable, consistent with last year, but the share who experience burnout very often has risen to 24 percent, up from 17 percent. When asked what would most improve team capacity and output, marketers pointed to smarter automation (21 percent) and better AI tools (18 percent), with these technology-focused solutions collectively cited about twice as often as additional headcount (20 percent).

Looking ahead, AI tools and automation are marketers’ top investment priority for the next 12 months (31 percent), ahead of short-form video production (19 percent) and analytics and reporting (15 percent). Three in four expect AI’s role on their team to grow over the next two years.

“AI is giving social teams hours back, with more than two in three saving three or more [hours] a week on reporting. The question now is how that time is used. Teams that pour it into more content will only add to the pressure. Teams that invest it in listening, responding and better judgment will deliver stronger customer experiences and work their people can sustain,” Wilson added.