The average person sees hundreds or thousands of brand messages every day, and most are forgotten within seconds. AI has made that challenge bigger. Or in reality, worse. AI has made average “free,” and it has made average… everywhere. Meaning, just as the old saying goes: “rising tides lift all boats,” so everyone having access to AI for marketing, strategy, writing copy, and so on, gives access (especially for small businesses or teams) to capabilities they did not have before, while at the same time, leveling the playing field and giving the competition the same access.
Too many businesses believe AI has handed them an edge, without realizing their competitors ask the same questions and get the same answers. I’m not only talking about “AI slop,” where too many people simply accept the first thing that AI spits out. Of course, this happens way too often, and that’s part of the problem. It’s also not all of it, and it’s just the first layer.
When everyone starts from the same place, being memorable is more important than ever. One of the challenges we learned from the cruise industry, for example, is the “white ship syndrome.” If we were to remove the logo from a cruise industry website, ad, billboard, commercial, or whatever, could you still know which cruise line the content is promoting? When they all say "cruises equal fun, come play on our private island, eat our awesome food, drink as much as you want,” and all show pretty much the same kind of content and imagery, what stands out and differentiates one from another? The “sea of sameness” (pun intended; sorry for all the water and boat references) is actually increasing when everyone inputs the same questions for AI, accepting the same baseline of what it gives them, and then publishing it as if it’s the most genius piece of marketing content they have ever created.
Not to throw too much shade… well, maybe a little… it makes everyone the same, and, everyone as equally boring.
Being memorable, standing out from your competition, the rest of the crowd, doing something that differentiates from the others in the industry, seems obvious. Of course, that has always been important. However, too many businesses in too many industries simply don’t.
The stakes are a bit higher now, as everyone relies on “average.” And "garbage in, garbage out” has not been replaced with AI; it will likely get worse. We see it. We all set it, and we are bombarded with it every day. The most important marketing decision you can make is how you will be memorable to your audience the next time they are in the market for your product or service.
Be unexpected, friends.
