Is Efficiency Killing Your Brand?

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“Business moves at the speed of trust.”

- Steven MR Covey

When trust is high, communication flows, decisions are rapid, and collaboration fluid.

But when trust is compromised, an effective "tax" is levied on every interaction in your organization. Friction increases, speed drops, and costs increase. A lack of trust gums up the whole process.

And yet we are seeing brand after brand choosing to unilaterally increase this tax on themselves by breaking trust with their audience.

Let me explain...

More, more, more, faster, cheaper…

GenAI has drastically increased the potential velocity and volume of content production.

The number one concern among business communicators at the moment is how to service the volume of work they are being required to deliver with flat or down budgets.

That is leading far too many people to look for solutions which harm, rather than help them.

The immediate allure of synthetic content is its perceived velocity and scale. Post after post on this platform harps on about Super Bowl quality commercial that was created in 5 minutes, by a bloke in their underpants.

That's all very well and good. The problem is that it may well be destroying the very thing you are trying to build. Why's that?

Synthetic Content is a classic bait-and-switch

We are hardwired to spot a fake. We look for the micro-twitches and the 'soul' in the eyes. When we realize a video was prompted, not produced, the connection snaps.

Humans are more than eyeball/engagement statistics to be harvested

Social media has become worse than ever because it is faker than ever. People are treated as mere eyeballs to be harvested and engaged for algorithmic gain, rather than human beings.

This is bad. This is why everyone complains more than ever about social media.

I am not saying that all AI is bad.

There are many incredible uses of it – in such a wide variety of fields. These include all sorts of areas in production.

It is just so strange to me that AI and social media companies are allowing their own brands to be sullied by an endless stream of momentarily titillating, dishonest, energy-intensive visual vomit.

Jeff Goldblum in Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park: Chaos Theory

We are in the phase now where the world is falling over themselves to work out what AI can do. The problem – to paraphrase Jurassic Park’s Dr Ian Malcolm, played by Jeff Goldblum - is that everyone is “so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should."

Now, hopefully, not GenAI dinosaurs are going to break free and eat anyone, but it may not be doing anything for trust in your brand.

The Efficiency Trap

The question for every leader is:

Is your race to increase efficiency killing exactly what you’re trying to build?

If a brand is a promise, then trust is built through the act of delivering what you said you would.

In fact, ad man, Ogilvy’s Rory Sutherland argues that this is one of the most important facets of a brand.

Because they take a long time and lots of investment of all types to build, they are a promise to the consumer.

Effectively: “Our brand is a valuable thing, so we’re not going to sell you something bad and damage it”.

Art has always relied on the intersection of creativity and technology.

From the beginning of time, tools have been fundamental to the act of communication.

They have always been at their best when they amplified human creativity – as to be fair, elements of GenAI production does - not when they attempted to replace it.

So what should you do about it? Authenticity - the Human Signal

Authenticity is not a marketing buzzword; it is a biological underpinning of all cooperation.

Neuroscience shows us that our brains prioritize "Human Signals" - subtle nuances of tone, vulnerability, and narrative that AI cannot yet replicate without falling into the "Uncanny Valley."