AI is close to becoming the one-size-fits-all technology supercenter where you get everything you need to run an enterprise, other than actual humans. It’s easy to fall quickly in love with the promise of ROI, efficiency, accuracy and even creativity.

But you cannot lose your brand identity and forget the human connection that’s needed to maintain your customer base and their loyalty.

The use of AI in marketing is projected to exceed US$107 billion by 2028, a majority of that spend will be on advertisement optimization and automating customer journeys. Additionally, a lot of companies – some 50 percent of digital marketers in fact – are leaning into using generative AI to create content.

This is where the issues will begin to creep in. It is so easy to create an image, or a blog post, or even an article you want to publish on a website like this one, but AI isn’t you, it isn’t your company, and it does not have your voice.

There is a time and a place to use AI to complete tasks quickly, and there is a time to take your time and do things the old-fashioned way.

When to use AI in marketing

The safest way to know if it’s OK to use AI in marketing is by answering this question: Will this be used internally only? If the answer is yes, then you are close to 100 percent clear to leverage AI in your marketing department.

Internal recaps and documents take far too much time from teammates that have far more value to offer. Using AI to build out recaps can save your team 10 or more hours a week. This is something you cannot pass up and must leverage immediately if you are not already. Campaign reporting and analysis is an area where AI will provide immediate relief of person-hours and drive measurable ROI.

Meeting notes and next step emails are a time suck for your admin teams. Who needs to do what, when, why and deadline reporting should not be left to tired minds. It’s a lot, and even the best people will eventually make mistakes, leading to potential lost revenue. AI meeting companions are a must-have for any leader.

Apps like Otter AI and Read AI provide full recaps, action items and a complete transcript of meetings post-call. These formerly human tasks are necessary but can be incredibly time-intense for one person. By using AI, you free the employee assigned to those tasks for work that is more valuable.

Plus, when using them on client calls you have a full and accurate transcript of what your clients say they want, and what you and your team has promised to them.

When to make sure humans do the work

Ask yourself the same question; Will this be used internally only? If the answer is no, you need a human to do the work. It will take more time, but it is time well spent and the reason you hired these people. You want anything your company sends into the world to have your voice, personality and final stamp of approval.

Company blogs and videos with a team member listed as author have to be completed by a person at your company. It’s true, you can pop over to ChatGPT now and type in ‘write me an 800-word blog post about the five best ways to market financial planning to Gen Z’ and within 30 seconds, you’ll have an article. But it’s not you. It will not be in your voice or have actual advice from you. Your company is unique and should be your external facing point of view.

Under no circumstances should external articles and interviews be left to machines. You have to make this clear and unequivocal to your marketing team. Potential clients, colleagues, competitors and investors will see these. They will assume that everything in these articles and interviews are your beliefs. But AI simply offers a generalized and regurgitated regression to the mean piece of writing from everything already on the internet.

How to know if you’ve been cheated

Even the best-intentioned people and the best paid agencies will seek an edge where they can. They might use generative AI to create something for you when they are up against deadline, or when deliverables are stacking up. But you are paying them to do the work, not to drop a prompt in a GPT and then copy and paste it over to you.

AI detectors like GPTZero, Grammarly and many others that can tell you if you’re getting what you are paying for. One I have used is Stealth Writer. I can take any work delivered to me and copy and paste it in to see what has been reasonably written by a human, and what has likely been crafted by AI.

This will lead to uncomfortable conversations, but they need to be had. It’s your name and your company’s reputation being put into the world, you need it to be you, not some combination of information from the internet.

AI is the second greatest tool that marketing has ever seen – the greatest is the human mind. You need to be able to leverage AI to maintain your position and build a lead on competitors – but there are places where it will cost you far more than it will make you.

When you are presenting anything creative outside your organization, humans must be the ones creating and publishing. You cannot leave your voice or point of view to AI. It will convince the world your voice is unoriginal, uninspiring and simply a combination of what everyone else already thinks.

Ask yourself: Is that who you are?

Opinions expressed by The CEO Magazine contributors are their own.