Seriously?

Feeds are more crowded than ever before. Texts, images, videos – produced in seconds, polished to perfection. What used to require experience, intuition and time is now created at the touch of a button. And the audience? They’re noticing. Not always consciously, but they’re scrolling faster, clicking less often and being more sceptical. The paradox is that the more brands produce, the less they’re heard. Attention has always been a scarce commodity on social media. Now it’s becoming even scarcer.

Welcome to the age of content overload. More and more brands are embracing the ‘social-first’ approach. The logic seems straightforward: dog and cat owners are on Instagram and TikTok. So that’s exactly where marketing communications are focused. Add to that the temptingly easy content production made possible by AI – and the machine is already up and running.  

The problem is that presence does not imply relevance.

Anyone who simply maintains a presence, who follows trends just because everyone else is doing so, who comments on other people’s posts and calls it ‘community management’ – such people will simply disappear into the crowd. Because if all brands sound the same, look the same and react the same, then all brands are the same. And that is the very opposite of brand communication.

If you want others to talk about you, you need to know who you are. I see this time and again in practice: when you ask brands what their brand essence is and what sets them apart from the competition, there is often a silence. Yet this is precisely the fundamental prerequisite for everything that follows. Effective social media marketing and successful influencer collaborations – they don’t start with a briefing, but with your own identity. A story that truly fits the company, that appeals to the target audience and that generates a response. Anyone who wants to hold their own on the shelf without relying on price ultimately has only one choice: to tell a better story than the competition. And if you’re brave enough, you can even take a stand. (This can be recognised by the fact that not everyone likes it. See fact box.)

AI is not content. AI is a…