More content isn't automatically better marketing.

Welcome to part two of me thinking way too much about marketing.

One thing I keep asking:

What is actually working, and what is just hype?

Right now, experience-based marketing keeps standing out.

Netflix trapped a man inside a billboard. Rare Beauty made a billboard you could scratch and sniff. KitKat turned "Have a Break" into an actual place to take one. Primark parked an "Anti-Skims" van outside Skims.

Basically, marketing that makes you stop and go:

Wait… what?

But at the same time, everyone is saying AI, AI, AI.

Larry the Sociologist made a point I keep thinking about: AI isn't just technology. AI is also being marketed to us.

We keep hearing AI is inevitable. Businesses need to invest. Move faster or get left behind.

But as marketers, shouldn't we also ask:

How much is reality, and how much is the sales pitch?

AI companies need businesses to invest in AI. Of course they want us excited about it.

And yes, I use AI.

This post was organised with AI. Otherwise you'd probably be reading another 17 examples of experiential marketing.

But my research brain existed long before AI.

I have an Art History degree, where I spent years looking at how images, culture and trends influence what gets our attention. Think Manet's Olympia. Part of its impact came from challenging what audiences expected to see.

I also studied psychology for a semester, which got me interested in groupthink, social influence and why people behave the way they do.

Then I took that brain into marketing: researching creators for Husqvarna and running TikTok creator outreach for Old Spice, across markets.

I have ADHD, so AI genuinely helps me research, write and organise the approximately 100,000 thoughts happening in my head.

But marketing is still about making people stop, think and care.

Not making 1,000,000 AI ads just because we can.

More content isn't automatically better marketing.