AI is ubiquitous these days: it runs chatbots, it writes blogs, it makes images, and AI website builders promise to build you a “perfect site in just minutes.” While AI can be a great tool for speeding up the work process and coming up with ideas, leaning on it too heavily, not editing to give it your personal touch, and not verifying information can damage not only your marketing efforts, but also your reputation.

Think about the last time you called customer service and had to navigate through an endless AI voice-automated phone system. How many times did you yell “agent” into the phone before you got to talk to an actual person? Instead of helping you, it frustrated you. Instead of connecting you to the agent you needed to talk to, it kept you stuck in a seemingly endless loop of options and queries that didn’t fit your problem. That’s what happens when a business hands too much of its marketing over to AI. The human touch is missing, and customers feel confused and miss seeing your value.

AI Content is Generic and Boring

AI can generate basic ideas, words and paragraphs in seconds, but it can’t understand your brand’s voice, your community, or your customers the way you do. Without a human being involved in the editing process, AI-generated blogs or website copy feel bland, repetitive, or even inaccurate. Even worse, AI has been known to “hallucinate,” making up facts or citing sources that don’t exist.

Publishing this type of content gives you lots of website filler, but it can turn away the potential customers you’re trying to reach. Customers want to know who they’ll be dealing with. Authenticity means not using the same boring phrases that are on hundreds of other sites. Originality is your best way of standing out!

Search Engines De-Prioritize AI Content

Google has made its policy on AI content clear. Quality, original content will score better placement in searches. While AI isn’t forbidden, unhelpful content is. That means if you flood your site with unedited, generic AI writing, your rankings may not only stagnate, they can actually drop. Over time, this will make it harder for potential customers to find you online since they’ll be clicking on the links of your competitors before they ever see your site in their search results.

Customer Experience Suffers

Back to your frustrating call to the cable company, public service, or your bank: when a customer calls, they want to talk to someone who understands their needs, not a robot voice that keeps asking the same questions and bouncing them to the wrong departments. Your marketing efforts work the same way. AI is fast, but it has no empathy, nuance, or human understanding. Without a human mind involved in shaping your message, you risk coming across as distant, confusing, or even…robotic.

The Balance Between AI and Putting in the Work

AI is a helpful tool. We use it at Wild Iris Marketing to brainstorm ideas, organize information, and speed up some of our tasks. But what we post or hand off is always edited, fact-checked, and deeply reshaped by a person who understands the goals, needs and brand voice of our clients.

The most effective marketing balances the efficiency of AI with the creativity and empathy that only humans can provide. That balance makes sure your website, blog, and campaign isn’t just technically correct, but that it is able to connect with real people. Because connecting with people is what marketing is all about!

The Hidden Cost of AI

Businesses often rush to AI thinking that they’ll save time and money. Why pay someone and then wait for them to finish a project when you can get instant results from ChatGPT? Eventually though, these businesses discover that the results aren’t right and that they don’t click with potential customers. Others end up stuck with a website of AI-written fluff pieces that end up hurting their SEO. The businesses that thrive are the ones that treat AI the way we do: as a tool, not a replacement for actual work.

No one wants to get stuck talking to a robot when they call customer service, and no customer wants to feel like a robot is running the businesses with whom they choose to work. They want to feel heard, understood, and valued. They want to connect as humans. That’s something only people can provide.