Brand Differentiation Beats Competition

Introduction

0:04 I think it's something that is intrinsic and we can use AI to help us, but also it can hinder us. Creativity is more than that. Creativity is the magic of nothing exists and then something does. Brand is about helping people to understand what makes you special. Use AI to build version one of what you're thinking. If that's your...

What creativity really means

0:26 Creativity is the magic of nothing existing and then something does. That's how my guest today put it. Not something together from what already exists, but making something that's never been seen before. It's why AI generated work so often feels right, but not quite right. Something niggles. You can't always say what. Today's conversation gets into whether AI can actually be creative. By chasing the same tool as everyone else means blending into an average nobody wants.

0:55 And while good branding was never about beating your competition, it's about being different from them.

Introducing Adam Jennings

1:00 If you ever wondered whether you're outsourcing your thinking, not just with the AI, but with the AI itself, just your workload stick around if you enjoy the conversation then please subscribe we're on YouTube and all the major podcast platforms let's uncover what is better with humans in this episode I'm joined by Adam Jennings. Adam and I worked together previously around 10 years ago. Adam then went on to set up Contour, a studio that builds brands and the systems underneath them

1:27 for founded businesses on the way up he partners with founders directly sometimes for years working with businesses that have outgrown their brand and working with them to launch the one that finally fits and a lot of sports the outdoors and chatting about brand growth so Adam great to have

Catching up after ten years

1:43 you thank you very much for having me it's uh it's really lovely to to join you it's nice to catch up after I didn't realise it was 10 years but it's been a while it's been really lovely to to sort of catch up again yeah definitely and actually when I was um reading the bio back I was like oh yeah bikes right you say sports but I remember bikes was always like a bike is still a big deal I'm still out on bikes all the time I'm doing triathlons and competing in mountain bike races nothing has changed to be fair nothing has changed from me being about

2:13 eight years old I still colour in for a living and I ride bikes I'm still the same kid it's good

Colouring in and the fear of losing creativity

2:18 I love it well that's really uh really great to hear and interesting you talk about colouring in I think as we think about AI in terms of this is part of the worry people have isn't it will I will I still will I still get to colour in I remember this is just come to mind now I think it must have been at college or maybe I'd gone to an open day or something this was back when the computers weren't great but I remember

2:46 there was this I've I was never really that great at drawing or art personally I remember the first time that I saw a graphic programme where I could draw a square or a circle and I could put colours in it and for me that actually was like great I can I can do something you that I couldn't do that I couldn't actually do before I mean since then I've I have done a little bit of uh I can this book how to draw in 30 days this was more this was over a year ago and I'm

3:12 still I'm a bit better than I was but uh you got to put the time in but when we when it comes to that what are you seeing in terms of uh your use in of AI in creativity I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna

Is AI intrinsically creative?

3:26 maybe open with a contentious statement I don't I don't know if AI is intrinsically creative but I think that AI is a tool as part of a tool stack to allow you to be creative is is not going anywhere and I think that's that's what the future is and I think it depends on where you sit in the conversation but for me and the work that I do AI is is is very much a piece that

3:53 allows me to either pull ideas or uh like gather thinking into something that allows me to move move decisions forward but as soon as I try and do that I'm not going to be creative I'm not going to trade it as a creative output tool it's still not there and that's not me saying it won't be but I think that we've got to remember and all the fear-mongering and excitement around AI it's only as good as what you're putting into it it's going to give you great answers if you

4:18 give great prompts it's going to get things wrong because it's proven that it can do that but creativity is intrinsically human the fact that you are creating something out of nothing whereas AI is creating something out of data that it has gathered and pulled and pulled into a place from something that already exists and and at its core creativity is going I'm going to put this paint on this paper and make something that no one's ever seen before and um I'm not anti-AI but I I know that it can't create without learning it can't create without

4:50 having something to build from and creativity is more than that creativity is the magic of nothing exists and then something does rather than going I'm going to pull these things and copy it um in a in a hands-off robotic sense it just doesn't feel the same yeah I love that I think I'm going to grab that soundbite and use that let's say you know the magic of creativity is that we you know something didn't exist and then it exists and that's a really important point

5:19 that there are some concerns about the about creativity being lost but of course really it's a choice I mean if we if we actually use as you say use AI for inspiration we can create things but if we only use AI to create things eventually we'll kind of run out original things to create because we're not bringing in the creativity gravity right we we have to you know you you use AI enough to get to

5:45 create things for you you will start to see I mean we see it anyway we already see a lot of people that use AI will be able to tell an AI generated image they've got better and better but there there is something something that isn't quite right about it and I remember this um I think previous episode but I'm going to say anyway because it's come to mind there's this book by called Blink by Malcolm Gladwell and in his books he tells this story about there was this a um an expert in uh in Greek

The Malcolm Gladwell statue story

6:17 architecture and uh and he actually there was a statue they had to come and authenticate so so him and another another expert went on to authenticate this statue and they and they were he was like I know something's wrong but he couldn't tell what and he did all the tests and it came back as you know it's yeah it's real it's genuine a few years later some new tests came out went and checked and then they checked it and

6:44 it was and it was it was fake i think that's something that we always have to remember when we were creating something that we need to be open about how we created it what did we use to create it and and if we have used ai as an example just be aware that there might be things in there that somebody that you know that you're not going to be able to do that you're not going to be able to do that you're it might look great and perfect but actually as humans there's a little niggle there's something

Blending into an average brand

7:09 that says you know what it's not not quite right agreed no i i think it depends on how you're using and where you're using it now for everyone so my my world is brand and brand growth if everyone on the planet built their business with the same brand consultant there would be overlaps and mirrored assets that would be be delivered across every business that you worked with the quicker the planet adopts for argument's sake chat gpt or claude as their creative partner

7:41 the quicker everyone blends into this average of what creativity looks like within these platforms and most people want a brand because they want to do something fantastic or great stand out and unfortunately if you're using the same consultant for every project ever or the same tool for every project ever you're going to start to blend into this average of all brands and that feels like a really uh it feels like a missed opportunity because going back to our conversation

8:09 about creativity it's there to pull something out of us that we want to say or communicate or or portray and design is function design should be there to tell a story or to communicate something that you should or shouldn't do um an interaction and currently ai doesn't deliver that it feels transactional it doesn't feel like it's built on relationships and the reason that it's so easy

8:38 to identify when ai uh is being used is because it feels transactional you don't feel like there is any rapport you don't feel like the graphic style is talking to you because it's talking to everyone um we've all gone down high streets and seen flyers children's invitations like everything created with ai and you could swap your name or your logo for your competitors and you'd look the same and the magic of creativity is that we're not all the same we're all different like shaun you and i

9:07 could have an identical business and we would still bring it to life differently even if the service offering was the same because we're different people with different experiences and different clients ai doesn't understand that nuance it just goes you're doing this business and you're doing this business here's the generic solution to that problem whereas brand magic creativity like all of it is about going well what makes shaun special and what makes adam special and

9:32 why do we tell that story why does adam talk to this audience why does shaun talk to that audience it's not about right or wrong it's about understanding the nuance between people and then nurturing that relationship into something that you can communicate that's where the magic is and it's really easy to forget that because a new tool meant you could launch your brand in a minute but if we're so to to my business and where i'm i'm at if everyone can build a brand right now we need better brands more brands doesn't mean anything

10:02 everyone can launch a business on a friday afternoon but if you're doing something meaningful when you build a better brand that has purpose has value communicates your story that's when you're going to pull your audience in that's where you're going to excite people and that's where the magic comes from and it's not that i couldn't do that but unless you have that creative ability to harness a tool you're going to struggle to come to that conclusion without without like the creative mind fed into into whatever ai you're using yeah yeah

Ask, create, evaluate: using AI as a tool

10:33 lots of great stuff that you've you've mentioned there and this whole piece about you don't want to be doing ai thinking for you i i there's plenty of sort of acronyms and things people use but i i i took it in terms of ace you know i say that actually we need to be the ones asking ai so we're the ones conceptualising and saying well this is this is the requirement that the need this is the context required then either the human or the ai can do some of that create that

11:01 creation piece at execution piece and then we need to really evaluate it and that evaluation is where we go you know it's not quite right maybe we need to revise that or maybe we take it take it out of ai and we say okay that's enough for me now to work on the next step and i really i really love it it's really kind of it's almost like counter kind of business culture in terms of what you said about actually if you

11:28 work with the same person for yeah you keep working with that you don't actually get that those other things fed in i think that's a really interesting thing and i'm like wow what a thing to say right as in terms of like going and but this is true and that when yet we're in business there's this then well yeah you want to retain people we want to retain people you want to get ongoing business but also you want to see the best result and what with your and with what you're suggesting that that's when you're going to get the best results saying well this this person has got me

11:56 so far and maybe i just need a different thing that thinking about how do i you know how do i as you said that thing of how do i make it special how do i make other people help other people to see what makes me special what makes my business special and i love that that idea that actually brand is about helping people to understand what makes you special what is what is different about you and not just special but again it's that principle of often again people will go oh right

12:25 i want to just my brand be amazing everybody's going to want to work with me you know well you want your brand to speak to your target are you going to want your brand to speak to your target you want your brand to say this is why i'm special for you and when that somebody's watching your videos or looking at your website and going wow it feels like this company was like was this is the nirvana right isn't it the such this company was made for me these guys are speaking my language and yet so often we and this is the danger i think with with whether it's a or other technologies

12:55 there's this danger of we don't it almost makes it easier for us us to avoid that narrowing down that kind of niching into a space of saying i need to determine what makes me special and i need to determine who's going to want what i've has the need that my special fit the phrase i always return to in this topic is good branding is not there to beat your competition it's there to differentiate you from

13:22 them it's the fact that you are the right solution for this audience who you you are focused on it's not about going well like again if i said you and me both run creative studios it wouldn't be about going oh well we're i'm better than shaun it would be a case of this is why i'm different shaun's great and does his thing adam's great does this thing this is why you should work with me it's not about trying to one-up someone it's about trying to go well i'm going to tell my story it will speak to a

13:49 different audience than than yours would and it's not right or wrong it's not black and white there's there's all this wonderful space in the middle for overlap but we're in a we're in a space where everyone can launch a business or a product or a brand anyone can create this idea of a side hustle or the retirement business or a product service-led business that they want to run at the weekend whatever it might be and it's because it's so easy to do it's so important to get it

What makes you special, not just amazing

14:19 right and if you're going to jump into the same pool of resources i.e an ai system you're going to get a really similar output to everyone else and ultimately no one launches a business to be average they launch it to be unique and interesting incredible and to to the to the point of ai and something i've spoken about quite quite a lot sounds like i'm really anti-ai with

14:45 this statement but it gets stuff wrong so are you willing to put all of your eggs in the basket of ai saying you should look like this you should make this choice you should do that and the the like humanity concern that i have with ai is that creativity is a muscle there are people that are exceptional at drawing the vast majority of those people are exceptional because they've trained their whole life in nurturing the skill between

15:11 their hand and the pencil and then that pencil to the paper i could pick up a pen and pencil and draw something fine but it wouldn't be great but i would argue that i'd probably practise that skill a bit more than the general majority using ai isn't it's not that it's good or bad but if we don't nurture our own creativity if we don't practise the skills that make us critical thinkers if we don't learn how that translates from our heads into screen paper product relationships whatever i do worry that we

15:41 are going to skip into this magnolia beige reality where everything is fine rather than beautiful exceptional incredible and and the joy of this i've always been into design more than art but art captures it perfectly it's there to be formed and created and honed over time and i i think that the introduction of ai into creative industries is

16:09 pushing us all to enjoy that magic the finesse the care that goes into real creativity ai's got its place i'm not sitting here hating on it it's it's a wonderful part of the process but there is this new magic space where people are really excited by relationships and humans and and ai is a tool serves a purpose but i'm still lost on it being the solution to a creative output

16:38 yeah yeah absolutely and i think that's it's so key you mentioned about how there gets you wrong and and there's a a number of misconceptions in terms of what is actually for people it's going on there i mean i find myself i know i i have a good idea how it's working but i still get frustrated when it gets it wrong and if you remind myself hold on ai is is it's it's it's it's it's not soorschinian i'm more interested in our snakeslla not in our apes feel but to me what you see is kind of Visitbrook was $1006.99 each two days you see at uber its wesley nonماx i want your answer i see it i imagine but myaguaway Ник suas terp Knockout No No pact Okay this one implement better against tech money It's machine intelligence.

17:03 And actually, it doesn't even understand the words that I give it. It doesn't even know what they mean. It turns those into code. It reads the code. Then it actually predicts what it thinks, what the code is, that they interrepresent the words back to me again. And so it's going to get it wrong because it's actually trying to produce what it believes to be the statistically best result for me. And now it's unlikely to ever be 100%.

17:31 If it's 85% is the best answer it can give me, it's going to give me 85%. And so that's something that I think a lot of people don't realise about AI is, well, it's almost fundamentally going to give you it wrong. And depending upon how it's set, or depending on how much randomness it's going to bring, you might want randomness. You might go, yeah, I want it to be super random because I want it to interact.

17:57 Inspire me and help me to do something. The other point you made, which is really interesting, and it's been a bit of a theme so far, really, is the cognitive, the creative aspect of saying,

Why AI gets things wrong

18:08 well, actually, there is an opportunity, not just a need. Some people will say, if you don't do this, you're going to fall behind. There's also an opportunity, really, in terms of developing your skills to be able to utilise AI in a constructive way. So, for example, I'm using at the moment for coding. Now, I've done some coding. I've never been a programmer, but I know enough to be able to work with AI to help me create code.

18:36 And the great thing is I can create the code to build me tools, and I can use those tools, but I don't have to then go back and use AI for those tools. So there's this one side of it people will say, yeah, just use all these. We've got AI in everything now, you know, the software, Canva, not this in Canva, but there's all these different things that have got, you know, generative AI in them. Previously, they still had AI because that's how they did background removals

19:02 and things like that. But it's just interesting to see that there's this push to have AI in everything. But actually, we don't necessarily want AI in everything. We want the opportunity to be able to go, how do I use AI to get me to the next point? Or not at all. So this is the thing. It might be there's something I want to do, and I could use AI. And I go, but actually,

19:27 I quite like doing it. I quite like, you know, I find, oh, yeah, I quite like, you know, and maybe, you know, some people might argue and go, yeah, is that a good use of your time? Well, if it's something you enjoy doing, and it's actually going to aid in your cognitive development, which is, which is not just important in terms of using a technology, but actually, as we grow older, there's obviously things, risks to our cognitive development. So the more we can keep ourselves sharp. I mean, my mum, she passed the end of December 24th,

19:54 and she said, you know, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. And right up to that point, she was doing Sudoku and puzzles. She was determined. You know, she was like, I'm going to keep my marbles. I may not be, I may not be a PC term to say, I don't know, say keep your marbles. But that was her term. She would say, yeah, I want to keep my marbles. I want to be sharp. You know, her greatest fear was losing that cognitive ability. I am concerned about it.

20:19 And I think it's a really important one. If you hand off your thinking, like, what is our purpose? That sounds like a really grand gesture. But if you're not going to do the thinking, like, what's the point? Like, I'm driven by purpose. I love the work I do because I'm really passionate about the clients that I work with and the outputs that I create and the knock-on effect that that can have. But if you don't have purpose in your life, like, kind of what's the point?

20:47 And for me, thinking and coming up with new ideas and creating, like, I literally get to invent future brands that have never existed before. I get to work with founders that have, you know, have ideas that I couldn't possibly have imagined and help them figure out what they're doing and tell their story and navigate what's next. And I still sketch. When I'm doing visual identity work, I'm still sketching.

21:14 Admittedly, I use an iPad with Procreate and a graphics pen. But I'm still there drawing. And I could go into Pinterest or AI tools and go, give me 20 different options for this concept and this idea. But that's not where the magic is and that's not what makes me better at my craft because I'm the one going through the strategy work to understand the thing that makes them special and what that means for their audience.

Creativity as a muscle and cognitive health

21:39 And then I come out with a, these are the things that we need to talk to visually and this is the tone of the project and this is how this all needs to come together. And if I skip that step and instantly hand it off to AI, the next time that comes around, how do I have the skill set to know what is the right thing for my client? Because I've handed off that decision-making process to a tool. And I'm not saying you couldn't do it, but I feel deeply connected

22:06 to understanding that process from end to end and curating it. And I think that if you skip that step and you start to rely on AI to output all of those decisions, I worry for where that would take me as an individual because I would not be having my creative need met and we've all got different needs. One of mine is to be creative and fix things and solve problems. If I wasn't being a designer, I'd be fixing motorbikes or building cars

22:35 or like something where I'm hands-on. So it doesn't matter whether AI exists in my world. I have the need to be involved in that creative process, in that problem solving. And like I say, right now I still sketch. I've got like post-it notes and I had project calls this morning. I've literally got sketches in notebooks on my desk. I'm just playing around with them and I'm like, oh, that might be an interesting idea or that could play into this thing. And if I handed that over, I just think my work would lose

23:05 not necessarily credibility but authenticity because I would be churning for the sake of it and that's not what I think people are drawn to. And we were saying earlier about how people can read when something is created by AI or not. I don't have AI in my mind. It's not a creative process of coming up with ideas. It's very much synthesising data. And I think it shows and I'm really proud of that.

23:33 And I'm not here to throw shade at the studios that are using AI from every part of their process, but it features in mine rather than is the process. And I think that's a really interesting space to sit in. I'm really proud of that. And I also think with things currently shifting where there's a lot of AI backlash, it's serving me quite well. So I kind of feel like right now at least I'm going to continue in this vein. Yeah, that's great.

24:04 I think it's so interesting that in terms of when you talk about the creativity piece as well that not only is, as you say, it's important for us to be able to be part of that creative piece and ideally we should be predominantly we're using it to. And I found I've used it hours and hours and hours. Hours and hours and hours over the last few years of AI. And I've used it sometimes for inspiration.

24:31 But I don't have any basis other than my own personal kind of experience. But I'm always more inspired when I hear other people speak or their ideas. And that's just been my experience of going. Yeah, I might discover some things and I on. Oh, yeah, maybe. Okay. I'll have to think about that. But just on Friday, I was in a training event and somebody was talking. I was like, oh. Oh. That's right.

24:56 That's really interesting. I just look at that. Yeah. Okay. So I don't know even if maybe it's partly the way we're wired, but actually working with other people is something that actually generates more creativity. And as you say, if we can use AI to help us get a job done, great. But as long as we're not taking away the creative piece. And an example of that is I've got this LED panel.

25:21 And that currently says better with humans. But I can change it to be tech that cares. And so I can now that was a project because I had a neon sign there before. And I saw I was at an event and I had this massive LED display and thought, oh, maybe I could make a small one. So this became a project where I used AI to help me spec it out to help me for the code.

25:50 And I physically built it. And then. You know, the actual graphics that were being created weren't very good. And the tools I could find online for converting PNGs. Okay. So I used AI to create a tool to help me create composite images so that I could create use the logo and add some text. I don't know one example. I've not programmed it in here, but I can also it also changes the colours of the lights

26:15 and in the shelf above because those are linked together. But it's how I can be creative because I could have built it. And I could have built it without AI previously. But actually, I probably ended up with maybe a better result because I could use something that kind of empowers, you know, like it's an extra tool for me to use rather than it being something that is saying, like, give me everything. And people said to me, oh, how did you do that? And now I have something that I could package to people and say, here you go.

26:43 Here's something that you can do because I've got, you know, a whole internet connection. And I can do that. So. I've got, you know, a whole interface, web interface I can use to update it. But it's that. I love that output of being creative. There's the charity shop. There's a Meccano set. Twice I looked at the charity shop. There's Meccano. It was there again. I might have to buy it. It's just sometimes I just feel like I just want to build something, build something in

27:08 Lego or build it in Meccano or or just do some an electronic project. I used to love doing electronics. So so building, getting my soldering iron out and putting something together, fixing something, I think is something that is intrinsic. And we can use AI to help us, but also it can hinder us. As we said earlier, when it gets it wrong, it has got it wrong. It's taken me down a rabbit hole. And then and so sometimes I have got caught out.

27:33 I've gone back and I've gone, let me just not talk to AI. Let me just think about this and I'll solve the problem. And now I felt a bit stupid because I've spent all these hours down a rabbit hole when actually I really had the answer. So I think that's also an important aspect is. The we need to be exercising that muscle of. Do I already know? Do I already have the answer to it? Because there's a danger of, yeah, we want to be creative.

28:01 We want to do the creative things, but we're farming off too much of that initial kind of thought process into AI because it's being made convenient for us. We can just press a button and and open an app and just talk to it and we and we get the results.

Building the LED sign project

28:19 But as we've already said, it's not a trusted source. It's not a trusted source of creativity. It's not something that is you said, what if? How can I how can I work with somebody if I'm sending them an AI tool? I'm saying right end to end. You can subscribe to my tool and do this for you. Okay, fine. But if I'm sending if I'm offering them a service that involves. That then is has multiple aspects to it.

28:46 And partly that is there's an expectation. There's a human in the loop. There's a human doing some parts of this. Then they're going to want to fill that at the end of it. They're not going to feel like this is kind of cold output that is doesn't doesn't feel quite right. And that actually brings me on to what's what be quite interesting when we we talked about AI getting it wrong. We've also talked about what you said about you want to be able to deliver what your client wants.

29:15 And one of the things that was curious about in terms of how does somebody know that they need support with their brand? How do you know when your brand is not working? I mean, it might sound obvious to some people, but I think we'd love to hear your perspective of how would you kind of recognise that maybe there's work to be done. I think it's always obvious to someone else before it's obvious to you. As in, I think that I think it's easier to see when there's a disconnect.

29:44 From an external perspective. Sometimes we're if you're a founder, as an example, we're too close to our own brands. And often there's a personal element where we're attached to a decision that we made early on in the business, whether that's identity and visuals or the systems and processes or functions, service, whatever. And sometimes it's easier to know when you're sort of at odds with your clients or reality.

30:11 And I don't mean that in a negative way. And I don't mean that as a complaint or a problem. But you might find that your business is taking down a route that you're not enjoying. It might be that you are solving problems for people, but you don't you're not inspired by the output. And typically at some point in business, any founder will meet a crossroads where they're like, do I go down this route or this route?

30:38 And sometimes you make a business decision that moves you forward. But to take that step, you have to leave an old identity behind. And it might be that you're you're scaling and you're growing a team. So your old brand ignore. So separate brand from visual identity for a second. Your your brand might not be doing the work that you needed to to move you forward, to grow this team, to build that business. The problem is most founders want to stay as they are because all of the work that they've done up until now has got them to this point.

31:08 But to get over the next hurdle, they need to make a decision. Something needs to change. Something needs to shift in their business. And sometimes it's brand. Now, if you're unwilling to let go of the brand that got you here because you go, well, I've done all of this stuff. You're not going to be able to step into that new brand, that new identity, that new persona as an organisation, because you're sitting there holding on to something that has sort of run its course and is keeping you stuck.

31:34 And that might be struggling with business decisions that might be going into meetings with investors or board members. And you're not proud of your deck or having the website talking about you in the way that you know that you can deliver your product or services. And you'll start to find yourself second guessing and questioning and wondering why things are a certain way. What could be done differently? What could happen?

32:01 And I think that once you start to reach a point where you're not sure you're in the right place and it could be holding you back, if you're then able to project the potential, that's where the magic comes for someone to go, I could be like this. This could happen. We could be this business. That's where brand is an important conversation. And that's where you either involve your team or external support or agencies, studios, whatever, to guide you on that journey.

32:27 Because typically it's harder to do your own stuff. And I say this personally as someone that works in branding. I have people that come in and help me with copy, comms, positioning where my business has changed over the years. And it would be easy to go, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do this. But how do you know that's the right decision? How do you know that's the right choice? And ultimately, that's the point at which you go, I'm feeling stuck. I need to talk to people.

32:52 And then that's when you get it reflected back to you that maybe this needs to change and maybe this is holding you back. But it starts with questioning in its simplest form. You start to question why this looks this way. Why haven't we done this? And if you're able to then translate that into what is this stopping me doing? That's when you start to be able to justify an investment in your brand. Because if your brand is holding you back and you're in a room with people spending £50,000 on your product,

33:22 and you're sitting there going, I don't think my brand is up to scratch. Well, how many projects and how many clients and how many opportunities could you secure by getting your branding right? And that's where you're able to start monetising the cost of your brand and where it's holding you from scaling your business.

How to know when your brand isn't working

33:40 And you don't always need a rebrand. You don't always need a new identity. But checking in and making sure that you're where you're supposed to be is such a powerful tool to be able to step forward confidently. And ultimately, brand confidence is the most important and valuable thing that you can bring to a meeting. You show up knowing who you are, what you're about, what you're selling, why your audience need it.

34:05 And if you're able to show up to a conversation with your audience and answer their problems and their needs, articulating them better than even they can, that's when you know your brand's in a strong place. And if you're not able to do that, that's when you start to go, I don't want to go to networking events. I don't want to go into this investor meeting. Because you start second guessing and you start doubting who you are as a business. And that's where branding is so important. Yeah, thank you for sharing that. I think that's really helpful to have that insight.

34:33 And it's interesting. At the start, you were like, let's separate the branding from the visual identity. And that seems like that's a common trap that people can fall into. And I think it's a common trap if you're using AI for branding. Because AI is basically reliant upon the data it's trained on. It's going to have more data around visual identity than it is going to be around actually importance of brand identity. This idea that.

35:03 How you deliver things, how you do your communications is even more powerful in terms of how people know your brand. You think of the Apples and the Googles. You don't really think about, yes, Apple's got an Apple. But when you think about actually, you think more about how they do things rather than their visual identity. But so often, particularly small businesses, it becomes about this thing about how does it look, which may not necessarily match how we deliver.

35:31 And I think that's a challenge. Yeah. It's a challenge if we, like you said, if you're not having a conversation with people and saying, okay, what do you think I do? Or when I say this to you, what does that mean to you? With what you've seen on my social media, what is it? What am I all about? What is this company all about? If those things don't match up, and I think often that is the case, and this is the challenge of, it's classic, isn't it?

35:58 I mean, a small business, I've got an idea, right? Like you said earlier, I've got an idea. This is great. I can do this. I can use AI, get myself a logo. Oh, I can get, yeah, great. I've got this nice logo. It kind of fits. It fits to be like this idea of going around somebody's house. And I had this with my first wife where we looked around a house that's a recommendation for a builder that we were going to use.

36:24 And we were like, yeah, it's great. And then somebody else says, how do you know? What do you mean? He goes, well, you're seeing the finished thing. You have no idea what's behind it. You have no idea what's behind those walls or what's holding them up or anything else and that sort of thing. So there is that danger that we can walk into a space, use a tool. Again, it's not about saying AI cannot do these things. But if we don't give it sufficient context, if we don't come at it actually with a view of what our brand identity is outside of our visual identity.

37:00 Yeah, it could create something that's coherent in terms of visually. But then what do you do? You go out and then people go, yeah, okay, great. It's not working for me. And all the things that you said where you're finding it's actually things are not quite right. You're second guessing because actually with what you're speaking about isn't actually lined up with the visual identity. I also think it depends on where you're at in your journey as a business organisation or individual.

37:29 If you're starting out and you're doing something at home for yourself in the evenings and you're seeing if there's a side business that's got some legs. Go onto Fiverr and get a cheap logo. Go and get a web template. Go and use AI to build version one of what you're thinking. If that's your first step into going, I want to try out what this business could look like.

37:54 It's a perfect tool. But it has a ceiling. It's about knowing where that's going to go. Where it's going to take you. And then going, right, this is working. I've quit my job. We're doing really well. I'm hiring an assistant or we've got team members that are doing X, Y, and Z. I now need something that feels more honest and accurately me. And I'm not going to get that without giving some of what we're trying to build into coming up with all of these ideas.

38:22 Giving a part of our DNA to a studio creative freelancer. That can articulate us ready to share it with the outside world. So it's not that AI isn't a useful part of that process. But I think it's knowing where to use it in the place that you are as a business at the time. Because I want to be really clear.

38:47 Like I'm not here hating on it. But there are some ethical concerns. There are some moral concerns. And there are some creative concerns. And it's about staying within the realm of that. It's about staying within the realms of as a human I want to be using it appropriately and in the right places to do good work. I don't want to be reliant on it. And I also don't want to take over the world with data centres absolutely ruining landscapes because, well, we have to have the latest tool.

39:16 And to your point earlier, we're being told we need this. It's like did anyone ask for it? Was anyone struggling to be productive and creative? Yes, we're speeding things up. But to what end? And without trying to grow the conversation into a bigger and more worrying subject, it serves the stakeholders and the investors in AI to tell us that we need it. And it opens a bigger question of do we need this? Is this useful? Is this harmful?

39:47 And as a tool, I still think it has a brilliant functional capacity that we can all utilise and learn from. But as a replacement for speaking to our audience, asking for advice, learning and growing, I just don't think it's there. And the best thing you can do for your business is speak to your audience. Don't assume. Don't hypothesise. Have a conversation. Have a survey.

40:13 Meet them in person. Because AI is speculating. And to talk to Rory Sutherland's point that he made recently at South by Southwest, everything that feeds the large language model tools is data. And data comes from things that have already happened. Brand growth happens in the space where things haven't happened yet. And if we're going to create something magical and different and unique, it doesn't come from looking behind us.

40:41 That can be an influence. But it shouldn't be the output. And I believe very strongly that we are the most creative part of that process. And like you, creating the sign behind you. Brilliant. But what that did is it unlocked the creativity in you to go and do it. It just facilitated it because it's a tool.

Visual identity versus real brand identity

41:01 But the creativity was there in you to do it. And that's no different from going, well, the crayons that I gave my son when he was one allowed him to do his first crazy artwork on a piece of paper. Like it's a different location in time. But it's a tool to create something. And that's the magic of it. And I think if you are able to harness that. And enjoy it as part of that creative process. Great.

41:26 But that's where I think the magic in it is. It shouldn't be a replacement. It shouldn't be an unload for us to lean into to outsource our thinking. But it's still not going to go anywhere. There's too much money in it. There's too much opportunity there for it to disappear. And rather than acting scared of it or spending 50,000 pounds a week in tokens.

41:51 See where it fits in your process and use it appropriately. And that's what AI is. It's there for your process to feed into what you're doing. And add something in a creative way for your life and your business. Yeah, absolutely. And I think this element of, I love what you said there about thinking forward. That your brand is a future thing.

42:16 And I think that's a really important way that we look at AI. To say, well, it is. We are looking at historical data. Whether it's creation or whether it's innovation. At the moment, AI will hit a ceiling in terms of the data centres. They are not going to be sustainable unless there's innovation that makes them sustainable.

42:43 So there's this kind of crazy situation where AI is needed to support that innovation. But it is something that doesn't exist. So AI can't give the answer because it's like, how is it going to know? Because it can't know because it doesn't exist. So people are going to have to come together and utilise the tools they have to innovate. To find some way, if they want to be able to continue the growth of AI.

43:09 Because otherwise it will hit a ceiling. As you say, we don't know. And this is the, anyone that is absolute about what's going to happen with AI. It is. They could be right. But I would say it's unlikely because nobody really understands. Nobody knows how far it's going to go. Nobody knows if we're in this hype phase. We could end up in a continuous hype phase.

43:34 We don't know because we're in this uncharted territory. Which is why it's so interesting to have these conversations with you. And I think, and it's been great. I was thinking just now, I was thinking, oh yeah, we could talk about so much more. I was thinking. Actually. You know, I think you really rounded it off really well in terms of how we couldn't, can't use AI. And there is that we've got to make our own choices. And as you said, if it's something we can use, that is going to enable us to take the first step in something that we wouldn't take otherwise.

44:05 And then we can then build that in the future. I've used it for speccing for going, okay, I want something and speccing something for a designer or speccing something for to put on Upwork or Fiverr to get me the result I want. Because to be fair in the, in the past, my specs were pretty bad because it's not something that I do. I'd give a better description. Now I can give, of course the irony is I now get AI generated proposals back.

44:31 Most of which are pretty poor. So, so if I, and so there is a downside. A lot of those ones, if it seemed, if it's right, really quick, I'm like, that was really too quick for you to put some thought into this. And it isn't to say there's anything wrong with using AI for that, but at least make sure you've read it. And you've gone back and read my spec and just make sure they match up. Because if you haven't actually given me what I asked for in that, in that, so in the original request, and it's going to be more detrimental for you than it is positive.

45:01 It'll also make you question whether they're going to put the quality and energy into the output that you've asked them for. And this is the thing like, and I'm conscious of time, so I won't go on this too much. But if as a designer. I do something really quickly. Should I pay more or less for that? And the argument is I, I, sorry, I should be paid more for that because I've achieved something. I've answered a need really quickly.

45:26 And the, the, the problem can be solved in a shorter amount of time. Therefore it's more valuable to a business for argument's sake. But then we use AI. So it's been handed off to an AI tool that does it in seconds. So should that be more expensive because it's been done really quickly? Or do you go, well, actually I'm going to spend 10,000 on this. So that's more expensive because I've spent more time on it. And it opens up a really interesting debate about time versus value.

45:54 Because if it's the right answer and AI has created that, that output and it's perfect, then that's really valuable. So if I've done that through a prompt, should I get the, should I be paid more as a, as a creative studio giving that output? Or is it because I've just able to put a prompt in and it's only done in 10 minutes and I've got the rest of the afternoon off? Should I be paid less? And that again is a really interesting topic. And the thing for me about AI is there's so many interesting thoughts and ideas and opportunities that come from it, good and bad.

46:28 But I think it should be spoken about. I think people should be sitting around having a coffee and chatting about it, joining a podcast and having that conversation. Because the way that we decide where it sits in our, in our lives, we, we have to make those choices as people. As humans. And I think that if we rely on AI for all our answers and we go, AI, is this right? Should we be using AI?

46:53 We're handing off that thinking. And that's, that's the murky future that I want to avoid. Hmm. Yeah. It's interesting you talk about it. I mean, it's a whole other conversation about the whole value-add pricing and that side of things. And I've heard some people talk about that with AI, it could end up being, it's a time-consuming thing. It's a token based. So it becomes like almost like knowledge tokens.

47:19 So actually people pass on the cost. So there's a one part of like, you know, the value provided. And the other part is that the, is the cost to using the AI to do that. But, but it, but ultimately I do, I do believe that if, if you can give someone, if you can provide somebody something that is what it is that they need, not just what they want, but what it is that they need. Yeah.

47:44 It's the result that takes them a next step further and achieves what it is for them, what they, they, they're looking for. Then that's, that's huge value. And that's the, that's the challenge, isn't it? It's not, it's sometimes people don't see that. Some people will say, well, if I, you know, I've had it before, you know, where people will say, well, if that's only going to take you 10 minutes, you're thinking, yeah, but those 10 minutes took me 10 years, you know, to be able to do that and do that thing in 10 minutes to give you the result.

48:11 Took me, that was a 10 year journey for me to get. To get here. And that's it. Yeah. And as you said, there's a challenge with AI to say, well, just because AI has compressed all this knowledge doesn't make it any less valuable. It's an interesting debate. I, I still sit on the side of creativity is an earned exercise. I think you work hard to be creative and you work hard to give a creative output.

48:37 So I, I don't attribute as much value to AI output. But not because it's less valuable. I just, something feels off. There's a disconnect between me and the output. Yeah. Because I don't think it's real. Humans haven't fed that directly. And if anything, AI has grabbed that information and learned from sources that it didn't pay for, for me to take that information.

49:04 And again, that's where I feel a bit, bit conflicted. But it's not a small topic. It's not, it's not a one. It's not a one, one episode conversation for sure. No, no. I think, well, I think we should definitely, uh, yeah. We should definitely have you, have you back and kind of continue that conversation. Because I think to really hear some of those perspectives from a creative, somebody that's working in the brand space, I think is really important.

49:30 And this is the point of the podcast is, is let's have the conversations because hopefully it will reach some people. Then they'll go actually. Yeah. That's a good conversation to have. You've mentioned it a few times, but the, the key thing is we have a choice, right? We are, we are part of the conversation. We're part of the journey of what AI becomes of what any technology becomes or what the world becomes. We're not, we, yeah, we can be bystanders, but if we're bystanders, we can't really complain about what we end up with.

49:59 But actually we can probably be participants in, in actually shaping those, uh, you know, those things that to come. So, yeah. Thank you so much, Adam, for joining me in the heat. We're both of us are melting. And, uh, for those watching, listening, we said, you know, we'll, we'll see how far we get before we melt. And this has been the longest episode so far. So enjoy the conversations, but, uh, yeah, we'll have to kind of continue those. Yeah, absolutely.

50:24 Thank you very much for having me. I've enjoyed the chat. It's a, it's a lovely topic. I love chatting about brand. Um, so yeah, sorry. It's, uh, it's the conversation has gone on, but I could chat about this for hours. So I really appreciate you giving me the chance to jump on. And let's have a chat and catch up again. It's been a, uh, it's been really awesome. Thanks Shaun. Yeah. And just finally, before we go, what, how can people get in contact with you if they want to learn more about things you've talked about or if they want support with their branding? What are some?

Where to find Adam

50:52 I share most of my thinking and ideas on LinkedIn, just under Adam Jennings. I've got a nice black and white photo of me. Uh, I'm on Instagram also as Adam Jennings. And then my website for the studio is www.madebycontour.com. Yeah. You can see what I'm up to there. Amazing. Thank you, Adam. And yeah, all the links will be also, um, on YouTube and on the podcast platforms as well. So yeah, go and find Adam and have some more interesting conversations. Thanks Shaun. Thank you Adam. Cheers.