Artificial intelligence is already a protagonist in many digital marketing strategies, optimizing campaigns, personalizing communications, and accelerating results. However, one of the main challenges faced by brands is to use this technology without giving up their unique and authentic voice.
At the same time that AI allows for scaling content and automating interactions, today’s consumer values what is genuine. According to a 2024 Edelman Trust Barometer study, 81% of people say they need to trust a brand to decide to buy from it. This means that more than efficiency, maintaining humanity in communication is essential.
“It’s not a matter of choosing between technology and humanity. The key point is to know how to use artificial intelligence as a means to enhance creativity, rather than as a substitute for it,” says Raphael Lassance, a Growth expert, partner, and mentor at Sales Clube, Brazil’s largest sales community.
The use of AI in digital marketing must follow certain guidelines to maintain the authenticity of communication. AI is a powerful tool for scaling, testing, and optimizing. But it is necessary to have a well-defined stance and ensure that the brand’s voice is always present, even in automatically generated messages. What creates connections are human emotions, and that still cannot be automated.
Below, Lassance highlights five essential practices for those who want to use AI strategically without losing the essence of the brand:
- Clear tone of voice direction: the tools need to be fed with the values and language of the brand. Without this, they risk generating generic and depersonalized messages;
- Active human curation: even with automation, human oversight remains essential. Reviewing texts, images, and interactions ensures empathy and sensitivity in messages;
- Purposeful content: using AI to speed up content production is valid, as long as the materials have real utility for the public. Superficiality undermines trust;
- Data as empathy allies: the tool allows in-depth analysis of behaviors and interests. Using this information to deliver value, and not just to sell, is what builds relationships;
- Tests with responsibility: AI facilitates creating campaign variations, but it is essential to constantly assess the impact of these variations on brand perception.
The combination of artificial intelligence and digital marketing is expected to become increasingly sophisticated in the coming years. But for this to generate real value, it will be necessary to remember that, in the end, we still communicate with people. And people connect with stories, not with robots.
