It's still effective if the actual person markets to gamblers based on their experience. It's more convincing than an AI. Perhaps AI marketing could work, but it will never be as effective as a person who is highly recognized on social media promoting a gambling site. AI has its limitations since it is created by humans, so it will never surpass the overall abilities of a human.
What's the AI marketing you're referred to? it's just a program. What I think AI marketing is like a spam chat where you can send it to every user and ask them to register with your referral link. This strategy will not work because they're skeptic to get link from a stranger, we're live in modern technology era where many people use technology to scam anyone, that's make people be more cautious.
Referral links is good when you have it but if you will use it you will have the 100% of winnings and as far as I know many gamblers used other referral link then they registered and when they are playing they will not win a good amount of money but for those people who have spreading Thier links then they will earn a lot of money.