The Generative AI Paradox In Building Meaningful Brands

GAI has had its mainstream breakout moment in the world at large and we’re now galloping through everyday applications at a fast clip. Like any new technology, things take a while to heat up before they quickly hockey stick in awareness, growth, and monetisation, before becoming the norm.

Or perhaps, put a different way as observed by Ben Evans in his ever-excellent annual trends presentation, titled AI, and everything else, “new tech generally goes from stupid to exciting to boring”. And we’re currently somewhere between stupid and exciting.

With GAI being such a vast and unchartered landscape, it’s a given that we’re all a bit clueless about where ‘the norm’ will land. Somewhere between curing cancer and armageddon, depending on who you care to follow.

From a business perspective, this has caused an explosion in the formulation of enterprise-ready application models that have business transformation, economic game-changer and growth accelerant written all over them in neon flashing capital letters.

What about the ethics I hear you ask? Great question, and you can catch me talking about this topic and good stewardship in several talks of the last decade elsewhere. Today I’m going to focus on business and brand, or we’ll be here a very long time.

Brands: beware of chasing pseudo-personalisation

The quest for optimisation and performance is strong. This has pretty much been the only AI game in marketing for some time now as teams look to slalom through media algorithms to increase ROI.

All of this has led to a somewhat generalised prescription of sleek UI, lots of SEO gaming and ‘the fewest clicks wins’ approach to any digital experience. All under the guise of ease and convenience, with a side order of personalisation because being customer-centric = we understand your time is precious.

So, here’s the paradox: targeting and enabling a more personal experience through this lens has mostly delivered a ‘resemblance’ of what a great experience is, rather than an actual one.

You’ll know what I mean if you’ve ever gritted your teeth through a faux-friendly clunky chatbot experience with a drop-down menu approach, designed to replace a more intuitive human interaction. Inevitably topped off with a ‘tell us how we did today’ finish that is the very definition of feeling ‘triggered’.

Although AI has incredible capabilities to make every interaction more tailored to us and what we like, its current application mindset, rooted in transaction engineering, inevitably leaves brand on the sidelines, begging for an opening to play a more meaningful role in elevating the experience.

It’s not difficult to pivot from where we are today, using what we already have. It just needs an appetite for controlled experimentation in trying new approaches. Retail is already taking the lead with fairly rudimentary in-store virtual changing room assistance, as well as personal stylists and home styling into your home. GAI can easily take this to the next level in creating an experience that’s both personal and unique to you, including your mood, from one day to the next.

Brands: set the terms, let technology do the legwork

Truth is, as humans we don’t want things only because they’re right for us. We want things for what they feel like and for what they say about us. In other words, we seek cultural meaning and enjoyable, often novel, experiences. That’s exactly where brands live.

You only need to look at brands like Oatly to see this in action. On the one hand, it’s just an oat milk amongst many, on the other it’s reached near cult-like status. Through sheer force of personality and novel approaches they’ve built the kind of following that means they could probably mobilise an uprising. If the magic of Taylor Swift could be manifested in a chatbot I suspect the Oatly team could make it happen.

Great brands resonate at a deeper human and cultural level; they give us joy, comfort or simply confidence.

Meanwhile, AI and now GAI give us the ability to interact in ways that are not just personal but with something very akin to affinity, connection and affection. Delivered through experiences that can become more meaningful over time as they begin to feel less IBM and more Pixar.

If ever there was a time to move brand from hanging out in the backseat into the driving seat to emotionally engage on a deeper level, it’s right about now.

Brands: make it meaningful, make it memorable

For more years than I care to remember, we’ve been advising clients to focus less on explaining and more on demonstrating i.e. don’t tell me you’re funny, make me laugh.

Storytelling in all its forms will remain critical, regardless of how technology evolves. Brands are stories that become a shorthand to meaning, with experiences the vehicle to making them real.

The promise of GAI is a more emotionally immersive experience that can be tailored in a way that tunes into your requirements and your mood i.e. I’m in a hurry, so let’s be quick today, or maybe I’m feeling scared and need you to support me right now.

This means building models from a different mindset; with a 360-degree view of how brand can be part of delivering performance and value, with an inherent commitment to moving beyond a transaction via the shortest track. Most likely with a more anthropomorphic interface delivering character and personality in a way that’s unique to your particular brand and philosophy.

This of course means that any company without a clear sense of both (brand and philosophy) will likely be left behind in the race to capture our hearts as well as our wallets – especially as the explosion of open-source enterprise-ready application models becomes increasingly ubiquitous.

Carefully crafted prompts (for now) at the ready, we’re in for a fun ride.