I Got Busy, Trusted AI, and It Shot Me in the Ass

If you're a solo marketer right now, you'll probably recognize yourself in this story.

I'm the only marketer at a tech company. That means I own content marketing, digital strategy, paid lead generation, the website, and everything else that falls under "marketing" these days, which is a list that keeps getting longer. So of course I leaned on AI. I'm one person with a team-sized workload, and I needed a way to get it all done.

How It Started

At first, I just dabbled. I tiptoed in, tried a few tools, tested a few prompts, and got a feel for what AI could do.

Then work got busier, and something shifted. I started trusting AI a little more and trusting myself a little less. Each shortcut felt reasonable at the time, so I didn't notice how much of my own judgment I was handing over until it was too late.

The Hard Part to Admit

I made a mistake. I leaned on AI more than I should have, and it put my job in jeopardy.

That hurts to write. But I'd rather say it out loud than pretend it didn't happen, because I don't think I'm the only one this has happened to, or will happen to.

I'll never lean on AI the way I did before. That doesn't mean I'm walking away from it. It means I've learned where the line is, and I learned it the hard way.

We're All Toddlers Here

If you're wrestling with this technology and worried you might push it a step too far, here's what I'd tell you: that's how we all learn.

When it comes to AI, we're all toddlers. We take a few steps, we fall, we get back up, and each time we stand a little sturdier. Nobody has this figured out yet, and anyone who says otherwise is probably still on their first few steps.

As we go further into this, we can't forget what makes us human. We make mistakes, and we're also the ones who bring the judgment, taste, and accountability that no tool can.

A Note to My Fellow Marketers

Our jobs haven't gotten any smaller. Now there's a whole new channel to think about: how our brands show up in LLMs and how we market through them. It's a lot.

So here's my advice. Don't be afraid of these tools. Use them and let them multiply what you can do. But slow down, just a little. Review the output. Trust your gut. Stay in the driver's seat.

That way you get the power of AI without stripping out the part of marketing that made you love it in the first place: the thinking, the creativity, and the human touch.

I learned that lesson the hard way. Hopefully you won't have to.