I use AI in my marketing work almost every day.
Not because I need it to tell me what marketing is. I have experience and qualifications in this space, and I trust that judgement. I use AI because it is fast, and when you are producing content consistently, speed matters.
But speed without judgement is how generic, ‘sloppy’ marketing can get published at scale.
AI is just amplification.
The biggest misconception about AI in marketing is that it can be strategic.
AI amplifies whatever you bring to it so if the strategy and idea is vague, the output will be too. If the insight isn’t thought through, the content will feel meaningless.
I always start with a specific idea and not just a blank prompt. The key is to provide feedback and refine as you go, adding information and ideas when needed.
Where AI actually adds value
In practice, I use AI as my assistant and not my author. I bring the strategy, the point of view, the tone, and the “why this matters”. AI helps me move faster by structuring my ideas and exploring different ways to frame my point or just refine my writing.
I basically dump a disorganised blurb of information, and AI organising it all for me. Then I read through and adjust where it hasn’t quite hit the mark until it sounds right.
Confidence is not accuracy
One of the most dangerous things about AI is how convincing it can sound while being completely wrong.
AI is not drawing its answers from peer reviewed journals, validated research databases, or curated bodies of evidence. It is trained on a vast mix of licensed data, human-created content, and publicly available material. That means it prioritises plausibility, based on volume and patterns, not academic rigour.
I have seen it invent statistics, misquote sources, and confidently assert things that simply do not stand up when checked. An example of this was when I was preparing some staff bios and AI made up a university degree that the person didn’t have and inserted it into their profile. It took what was plausible for the role and filled the gap.
You have to verify anything that is presented as fact – every time.
AI does not understand feedback. It complies with it.
Another uncomfortable truth is that AI does not take feedback the way people do.
You can ask for something to be clearer, shorter, or more on-brand, and it will respond. But that does not mean it has improved. Often it has just changed shape.
This is why experience still matters. If you cannot be specific about how to make it “better” then AI won’t be able to fix it.
Often it will even blatantly ignore your requests. I have been using AI on content and asked for very specific edits, it then spits out slightly changed content but hasn’t complied with my requests. I give that feedback. It apologises profusely and tells me it won’t happen again and then goes on to make the exact same mistake again straight away, I then tell it, it apologises and the loop continues. I have not found a way to stop this from happening, but being aware that it does is important.
Tone is where trust is won or lost
One of the fastest ways to lose trust in marketing is to sound like you are trying too hard, or worse, like you are not quite yourself. Getting the tone right builds credibility and is usually more interesting for the reader.
This is where AI often struggles the most.
A big example of this is that much of the content AI generates also defaults to American spelling and American phrasing, with a level of confidence and “cheesiness” that does not always translate well in Australia.
I spend a lot of time pulling language back into British English, stripping out buzzwords, and rewriting sentences so they sound like a real person rather than a cliché. Ask anyone in my office and they will tell you this has been, and continues to be, a bugbear of mine. I can often be heard saying, “How can AI still not know that we use British English, and not American English, in Australia?”
The bigger lesson I have learned is that AI will never sound like your brand unless you tell it who you are.
If you do not explicitly define how you speak and what you stand for, AI defaults to the safest, most generic tone it can find. Now, I am deliberate about how I want the writing to sound, and provide feedback along the way if it drifts away from the original brief (which it very often does).
The real advantage is not automation. It is discernment.
AI has definitely made me faster, but I am not worried about it replacing our jobs any time soon. What I see instead is a powerful tool that still needs to be tightly directed. Left alone, it cannot be relied on to do the thinking for you. Used well, it supports your ideas and can make execution faster.
AI is a powerful tool, but it does not know what matters, what is true, or what aligns with your brand unless you tell it.
Used well, it amplifies good thinking.
Used poorly, it amplifies noise.
If you’re new to AI, here’s some tips I learned the hard way
If you are just starting to use AI, the biggest mistake you can make is expecting it to do the thinking for you because it can’t. What it will do is amplify whatever you give it.
A few lessons that will save you time and frustration early on:
- Bring the thinking first. Start with a clear idea, question, or tension because AI works best when it is shaping something, not inventing it.
- Question everything it gives you. Treat AI output as a draft, not an answer. AI does not draw from peer-reviewed research or validated sources, and it will fill gaps incorrectly, but confidently.
- Be explicit about tone and standards. Tell AI how you speak, what you stand for, and what to avoid. If you do not, it will default to generic and meaningless language.
- Expect to edit more than you think. The first draft is rarely the final one and will often need a lot of feedback to get right.
- Use AI to support your judgement, not replace it. Structure, clarity, and speed are where it shines. Decision-making is not.
And for my final piece of advice, I always say “please” and “thank you” when using AI because when it does take over the world, I want it to remember how nice I was to it!
Written by Dee McNamara, Marketing Manager – AP Group
AP Group are the leading pharmacy experts in Australia, helping hundreds of pharmacists into ownership every year – our team can help with sourcing finance for your purchase, as well as providing the right legal advice to help you navigate the process.
We connect existing pharmacy owners with over 5000 ready and eager investors via our cutting-edge online Data Room. Our Data Room keeps confidential listing data secure and allows buyers to make informed decisions on each of our pharmacies for sale.
About the Author:
A national level surfboat rower (you’ll want to Google what that is), Dee has an adventurous spirit and zest for life that’s contagious to those around her. When she’s not rowing a boat into 6 foot swells, she’s riding the brand and marketing wave, successfully implementing marketing strategies for more than 15 years.
To put it simply, Dee knows marketing. She takes a one-size-does-not-fit-all approach, having learnt leading marketing practices from not just Australia, but around the world. Before joining AP Group, Dee worked as the creative director at a leading marketing agency, filling her marketing portfolio with a range of industries — from sports to tourism to fashion.
As for credibility, Dees got it. She’s been published in Marketing Magazine (2017) and graduated a Master of Marketing with Distinction.