We have talked extensively about the benefits of machine learning in the field of marketing. We pointed out that machine learning is actually driving the digital marketing revolution. However, the benefits of machine learning can be applied to the broader field of marketing as well. One of the most disruptive and beneficial applications of machine learning is with conversational intelligence. As a business owner, you probably spend a considerable amount of time interacting with your customer getting to know their pain points and prescribing solutions.

Artificial intelligence has already permeated our lives as consumers. The transformation was discreet, but it has made things better in every way. The last time you used Netflix, an AI helped you decide what to watch, when you shopped on Amazon, an artificial intelligence influenced what you purchased, and when you ordered that Uber, an AI helped find the best driver for you. In all of these instances, artificial intelligence improved the way in which you interacted with the product or service. Ultimately, the positive interaction that was generated when you found the perfect show to binge-watch, toaster to purchase, or got a ride, was due to an AI that optimized your experience.

This article was originally published on Forbes by Gong.io Sales -- an industry ruled by the numbers. Meet quotas, shorten the cycle and always, always, always be closing -- even when there's no time to do it. The breadth of articles, strategies and philosophies on the subject is seemingly endless. Some offer ways to improve administrative workflow, allowing sales staff to spend more time actually selling.

In the Gong Labs series, we publish what we learn from analyzing sales conversations with AI. Subscribe here to read upcoming research. By the time you try that slick closing technique you read about online, it'll be too late. Your deal's fate will already have been sealed. The actions you take earlier in the sales process define your outcome.

In the Gong Research Labs series, we publish data from analyzing sales calls with natural language processing and AI. Think back to the mid-to-late 1990s. The status quo for the Internet marketer back then was one of guesswork. Marketing analytics technology had not yet emerged in a meaningful way as a tool-of-the-trade, so marketers would create and run their online campaigns, and simply hope they worked. Today, that would be unheard of.

Somewhere between 2009 and 2010 a new and exciting technology broke into the forefront of Artificial Intelligence research. Within a few months, a combination of advanced computing power and huge amounts of data set the stage for a new era in AI. Sophisticated algorithms, invented back in the 1950s, previously considered no more than an academic thought experiment, were transmuted into the cutting edge of the industry. These algorithms -- Deep Neural Networks -- broke boundaries, smashed records, and obtained novel achievements in the field of Artificial Intelligence, that had been all but lying dormant for decades. One of the areas where these achievements were most prominent was Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR), i.e., the task of automatically transcribing voice recordings into written words.

SaaS solutions firm Gong last week released the findings of a study on sales phone conversations, including an analysis of gender speaking patterns. Women delivered slightly longer sales monologues, averaging about 9-12 seconds longer than those their male counterparts gave, but men generally spoke faster, the study found. Men tended to speak at a faster pace, averaging about 2.88 words per second compared to the average 2.79 seconds for women, the study found. Men also paused longer -- averaging about 1.5 seconds compared to women's 1.3 seconds. Women had a higher degree of success in progressing deals, with a 54 percent probability of reaching the next milestone, while men registered a 49 percent probability, the data indicated.

Chorus.ai, a startup that uses AI (artificial intelligence) to analyze sales calls, announced today that it has raised $16 million. The round was led by Redpoint Ventures. The San Francisco- and Tel Aviv-based startup provides a software-as-a-service (SaaS) offering that uses in-house developed speech recognition, natural language processing (NLP), and AI to transcribe, analyze, and deliver real-time feedback on sales conversations. The aim is to improve sales rep performance and help companies understand why some deals don't close. "Studies show that win rates increase by 33 percent with a proper coaching program in place, yet most managers don't have the time to sit in on calls, and no one has the capacity to learn from the thousands of meetings that take place each quarter," said Roy Raanani, CEO and cofounder of Chorus.ai, in a statement.

Israeli Artificial Intelligence (AI) startup Chorus.ai The company, which adds AI to sales conversations and learns what works to close more deals, is also launching its flagship platform out of stealth mode after a year in development. With offices in Tel Aviv and San Francisco, Chorus' software combines artificial intelligence (AI), data analytics, and natural language processing (NLP) to unite sales conversations into a single dashboard, helping companies learn what works, and multiply successes across their sales teams. Chorus describes itself as the Waze for sales conversations. Boosted with Natural Language Processing and AI, it helps sales teams learn what to say and what to avoid to route them more quickly to a closed deal.

Startup Gong.io came out of stealth mode recently, announcing a 6 million in Series A funding. Gong's cloud-based artificial intelligence software helps improve the performance and productivity of B2B sales teams by analyzing their conversations with prospects and providing guidance about the best way to close a deal. Says Amit Bendov, Gong co-founder and CEO: "There are probably a thousand books on successful selling on Amazon--and they are all based on anecdotes." Instead, Gong brings science to the art of the deal, augmenting experience and intuition with facts and figures drawn from analysis of big unstructured data--all the conversations conducted by all members of the sales team. Over the last 20-plus years (most recently as CEO of fast-growing business intelligence startup Sisense), Bendov has developed a number of successful sales teams, all selling remotely.