Oh, hey there, reader! Thanks for being here (wherever you ARE).
Now, I’ve got something to get off my chest today.
Are you ready?
Taking deep breaths.
To be honest right now, I’m both fueled up with passion- as well as frustration.
☑ Fueled with passion for the creative potential of where marketing can go with AI.
☑ Frustrated at the state of the industry, the advertising churn, the skepticism, the fear, the suspicion, the closed minds.
AREN’T WE SUPPOSED TO BE THE CREATIVES?
Why do so many marketers feel the need to have the answers before knowing the question(s)?
Why do strategists feel the need to always be certain?
We think we need to project confidence, but how about embracing curiosity?
It is our duty as marketers to be explorers. We must ask probing questions, learn voraciously, and never stop expanding our knowledge. As an industry, we should be open to new methodologies and technologies like AI. It is our responsibility to consider all perspectives, bring forward the most innovative strategies, and expand our horizons.
Take a look at a few examples of how AI is already transforming marketing:
- Restaurants utilizing AI to auto-generate daily specials based on ingredient availability, popularity, pricing trends and social media buzz.
- A craft brewery utilizing AI to analyze social media buzz, ingredient availability, and flavor trend data to inspire and generate recipes for experimental limited-edition beers.
- An independent film studio using AI to dynamically generate multiple alternate endings to their latest movie based on real-time audience feedback and interaction, allowing each viewer to shape their own unique cinematic experience.
- The scaling of large brands’ highly personalized email/ad content for customers using AI based on their behavior and preferences to drive engagement and loyalty.
- In e-commerce, rapid product development that matches demand by analyzing customer data, reviews, and feedback with AI to predict trends, optimize inventory etc.
As creatives, it’s on us to develop brand approaches that cut through the clutter in fresh ways. As knowledge workers, we must stay attuned to the times we’re living in. I feel strongly about breaking down preconceptions about AI and empowering you (and me) to step up your game.
AI is not here to take your job, it’s here to make you more YOU, and more human at work. It’s time we stop apologizing for not knowing something – that’s how we open ourselves to imaginative new ideas. It’s time to “get the dust out”. As Marie Kondo says, let’s “discard things that don’t spark joy,” or in this case, let’s offload tasks to AI that don’t ignite your best work.
Here is what you should be asking yourself:
- What do I want to do more of and what can I delegate to AI?
- What do I want to do less of and can utilize an AI workflow to solve?
- What else do I want to learn? (And what current AI tools can assist?)
- What do I love? (Keep going there with AI support.)
- What am I best at? (Keep refining your craft with AI.)
My personal journey, just like yours, is completely unique. It has set the stage for my relentless curiosity and the pursuit of understanding things differently. My unorthodox experiences across industries – music, adult entertainment, retail, radio – equipped me perfectly for the AI-driven marketing disruption happening now. That atypical background shaped how I think beyond boundaries and conventions, allowing me to embrace innovation.
So, what about YOU?
What I am asking YOU to do, is to bring more of your whole self to your work. Embrace your uniqueness and tap into YOUR core creative purpose. The experiences that shaped your perspective. The passion that lights you up. The wild ideas you could never execute before now.
Explore. Question more. Go outside of the norms with AI:
- Put the purple unicorn in the kitchen shot.
- Add extra zing when others zag.
- Throw spaghetti at the wall and rapidly test.
Bring forward what makes you wonderfully, messily, YOU – your most brilliant out-of-the-box ideas, your quirkiest vulnerabilities, your inimitable style. AI has no backstory, no context. Surprise people by making them FEEL something…… unexpected.
So how can you start?
1. Identify stale industry practices in your role that are ripe for AI disruption. How could you break out of that box?
2. Expand possibilities for your role, merge disciplines, break down silos. Could AI chatbots help scale your customer service while freeing you up for higher-level strategy?
3. Brainstorm creative campaign ideas that leverage AI image generation to enhance visuals or AI copywriting to rapidly test messaging rather than just replicating the status quo.
4. Experiment and test: AI provides ways to trial new ideas faster and adapt quicker. It facilitates more agility, like programmatic ad buying that optimizes in real-time.
5. Keep learning. Challenge yourself. Explore AI courses, tools, and communities. The future offers opportunities to solve problems in innovative ways and craft authentic stories. But we must challenge assumptions and not simply accept the same old answers.
AI cannot replace the human ability to participate in community, build trust, make real connections and live life.
AI is a tool powered by your ideas.
This is where you come in. That is what makes you irreplaceable.
It has not walked in your shoes or seen through your eyes.
- So be bold – burst out of those boxes!
- Question stale practices and processes.
- Expand possibilities for your role, merge disciplines, break down silos.
- Disrupt the expected.
- Surprise people by making them FEEL something unexpected.
- Wield AI as a tool to enhance imagination, enable experimentation at scale, stretch budgets further.
But never forget that AI cannot attend your client’s event, shake someone’s hand, share an inside joke, or exude trust. You offer something AI never will – authentic participation in life.
So participate fully – ask questions, challenge assumptions, get uncomfortable! Great innovations happen by exploring, going past departmental barriers and marketing formulas. The future offers chances to solve problems in creative new ways, delight people through experiences, and form real relationships. But we must push past the obvious answers and expected outcomes first.
Let’s open our minds and bust out of creative boundaries into a wide open world.
Let’s diminish limitations and test more fresh twists. We must be irreducibly, dynamically, and gloriously human.
What made you fall in love with marketing originally? How can you reconnect with that passion? Channel it as your guiding light forward. Let your unique essence shine through.
So be proud of your human spirit!
Do you, with AI.
