From “How AI Changes Your Customers: The Marketing Guide to Humanity’s Next Chapter” by Mark Schaefer
This isn’t a book about technology. It’s a book about people – your customers, your colleagues, maybe even you.
I’m not here to dazzle you with the latest jargon or paint a sci-fi nightmare. Yes, there are risks – and we’ll talk about them – but there is also enormous possibility.
Many years ago, my friend, teacher, and beloved mentor Robert P Crosby told me, “There is no such thing as a ‘weakness.’ There are only overdone strengths.”
I’ve seen it play out again and again. For example, confidence is a powerful trait. But too much confidence becomes arrogance. Being determined can get you far. Being overly determined can become stubbornness, which can ruin a career. Passion becomes burnout.
And so it is with Artificial Intelligence.
When AI shows compassion, it can help a neurodivergent person navigate a confusing world. But overdone, it becomes a seductive emotional crutch – a synthetic connection that detaches people from reality.
When AI handles our chores and solves complex problems, it frees up space for us to think, create, and connect. However, when the human mind becomes colonized by algorithms – leading to over-reliance – our decision-making muscles atrophy. Confidence erodes. Eventually, we may even lose our sense of purpose.
In the extreme, AI is both a liberation and an existential threat.
And so we arrive at the most unsettling questions of all: What does it mean to be human in an age when we’re never the most intelligent entity in the room…ever again? What does marketing look like when AI can simulate what we thought was uniquely human – art, intuition, compassion, and love?