Are You Outsourcing the Wrong Things?

Let's get one thing out of the way, this is not an anti-AI article. AI tools are genuinely useful. They also have real limitations, and some of them you won't see coming. I get it, the lure of having AI write you 30 social media posts in two minutes. Give it another 10, and it can create graphics to go with. AI can write your emails, your website, even build your website and it can do so much more than we think.

Yet with every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

The overuse of AI is making consumers frustrated. Worse yet, it's eroding trust. Your greatest asset in sales is your ability to cultivate trust with your clients. Trust is a human experience, and AI is degrading that by the minute. I don't know about you, but I find myself questioning absolutely everything I see online now. Earlier today I saw a travel advisor posting about a new upcoming ship being released, at least 70 stories tall, asking people to book with them. No mention of it being AI generated or fake. As I read the comments, I quickly realised the advisor thought it was real. The image showed a ship at least four times taller than it was long …That's not a marketing problem, that's a credibility problem.

Recently I saw a post on social media by Gen X personality Kelly Mano sharing how, when you read them, "All ChatGPT flyers look the same." And they really do. There are two versions of AI flyers: 1) The balloons and party style and 2) The luxury implied style filled with dark moody jewel tones offset with gold or sand. We all know you used AI. Worse yet, we're scrolling right past it. If I see an AI flyer, I scroll on by, and so are your potential clients.

The novelty is wearing off. With growing conversations surrounding data centres, job losses and a whole host of other consequences, there is a growing segment of clients actively pushing back against AI. Gen Z is leading the charge, frustrated by what it means for the job market as they enter the workforce. Other generations are following because they've always relied on trust to make decisions, and right now they're not sure who to trust anymore.

I get the urge to use AI to touch up a photo, smooth out the lines, take off a few pounds. People have been photoshopping themselves for years. The difference now, is that AI is creating images that hardly resemble the person we know. It's more than removing lines or shaving a pound or two, they're creating a fantasy. They're creating someone who does NOT exist.

So, where is the line?

I personally use AI in my business. In fact, Claude and I brainstormed the topics for the blogs I'll be writing for The Compass on VAX for the rest of the year. It even gave me some suggestions on what to include, but I did not let it write the articles. I'm doing that. Why? Because I want the thoughts to be mine. 

Imagine having Claude write me an article on being human and why AI is taking away your voice. It would carry its own bias, its own preprogrammed perspectives and none of the personal experiences and thoughts that more than 20 years in this industry have given me. As a business coach whose entire business is built on knowledge from actually doing the work, selling the trips, dealing with difficult clients, making the errors, building the business from the ground up, what value could I give you if I didn't have a single unique thought, perspective or hot take? Why would you want to work with me? The same is true for your clients. People can tell when the content they're reading is AI generated. What about that makes you trustworthy?

AI is a great tool for tracking, summarizing and helping with behind-the-scenes processes in your business. It's a great brainstorming tool. I personally use it for analysing data, watching for trends and pointing out potential weaknesses or gaps. I even used it to decipher and create the embed code so you can find the podcast episode companion to this article, there was simply so much more I wanted to talk about, so I recorded an episode for you, because AI is great at tedious tech tasks, even if it does occasionally hand you code that works perfectly until it doesn't. Did it nail it on the first try? Absolutely not. But it still beats three hours of frustration.

In my business, we use tools to speed up what happens behind the scenes so we have more time for working with clients, creating new products and building out content to attract more clients.  Your message needs to clearly and completely reflect your voice, your clients and their problems, your expertise and where that combination meets, that becomes your message.

Outsource what doesn't impact your sales to AI. The things that matter, the things that lower your trust quotient, the things your clients rely on you for, don't outsource that. That's your secret sauce.