By Martin Harkin

Marketing teams are facing more uncertainty and pressure than ever before. They are contemplating how in the world to balance exploding content demand with higher performance reporting, constant brand and reputational risk, seas of fragmented data, complex multi-channel campaigns and, as always, delivering the silver bullet of measurable ROI. And that is before we even get into the unpredictability of geopolitics and the impact that is having on consumer and business confidence. 

Considering all this, it’s perfectly logical why many marketers, and brands, grasp for AI like a life raft – McKinsey’s ‘State of AI’ report reveals that 65 percent of organisations are regularly using generative AI. This is where we must take a beat and rethink how we use AI – we need to view it not as the solution in itself, rather as a creative material, like paint. We must choose when and how we use it, rather than hastily slopping it over everything and creating a mess. 

For starters, the way in which marketing teams get value from AI varies greatly. Chief marketing officers require AI platforms to translate brand data into clear insights that support growth decision-making. Communications teams have to produce content quickly while maintaining brand voice, accuracy, context and credibility. 

Digital and data teams are managing increasingly complex systems across customer relationship management, analytics and advertising – they need AI platforms that integrate with existing systems, while maintaining security and control. 

What is clear is they don’t need generic AI tools, they need platforms that connect insight, content and performance, grounded in brand context, data and secure infrastructure – all in one place. 

AI adoption, when done hastily, also creates new challenges – suddenly that life raft is full of holes. About half of workers surveyed by Pew research say they are worried about the future impact of AI in the workplace, with primary concerns circling around data security, brand safety, accuracy of outputs and loss of control. Confusion is not helped by the incredibly rapidly evolving AI marketing ecosystem, with a plethora of different tools specialising in content, marketing, presentation and AI search solutions, plus the catch-all large language models (LLMs).

While each of these solves isolated tasks, or holds specific advantages over the others, none address the full picture. Hence, teams using multiple AI platforms to try and address their needs, when what will actually transform their output is a single AI platform built for the end-to-end marketing workflow.

The advantages are enormous. Marketing teams will have full control, so the AI model can be embedded in daily planning, creation and optimisation, turning briefs into action incredibly quickly. Unlike major LLMs where data is open to anyone and everyone, those built in a secure cloud environment can be enterprise-ready and designed for governed use by navigating concerns around privacy and confidentiality. Brand playbooks can be confidently combined with agentic workflows and structured data, while also connecting to existing tech stacks to draw in as much intelligence as possible.

So, rather than reaching out for a life raft built by someone else, marketers should empower themselves and their clients by building their own luxury yachts. Competitive advantage won’t come from experimenting with multiple tools, it will come from operationalising AI across the entire marketing workflow via platforms created by marketing professionals for marketing professionals. ‘Give a person’ a fish versus ‘teach a person to fish’, and all that.

With all that said, no matter what way we approach the leveraging of AI and advanced technology, the one truth that should and will remain consistent if we want to achieve actual success is that humans remain central with their judgement, empathy and creativity. 

Technology accelerates. People decide.

Martin Harkin is the managing director at TEAM LEWIS Australia

Read more: How to create content AI can’t replicate