DIGITAL LIFE

Why AI won't turn mediocre people into geniuses

For publicist Gal Barradas, there's a widespread belief that artificial intelligence will help mediocre people succeed. "It might help, but mediocre people will continue to be mediocre. Meanwhile, creative people will become more creative."

With 30 years of experience in marketing and communications, Gal Barradas(in the image below next to) has held management positions at agencies such as W/Brasil, AgênciaClick, F/Nazca, F.biz, and BETC. She has participated in major Brazilian advertising projects, such as the Skol campaign ("the beer that goes down smoothly"), and has a few Cannes Lions under her belt.

In 2018, she founded Gal Barradas Brand & Venture, focused on accelerating startups in different sectors through marketing and technology. She is currently responsible for the Growth strategy at Rio Bravo Investimentos, in addition to leading the Marketing, Sales, and Investor Relations departments.

A scholar of the relationship between marketing and technology, she launched the book "New Questions, Different Answers" in 2018 – a new edition is promised soon. "Throughout my career, I've experienced wonderful moments and participated in major market cases," said Gal in an interview with Época NEGÓCIOS. "Today, marketing is much more complex, but I don't mind. We can create so much more, and there are more ways to reach people. I find it all very entertaining." Check out the main excerpts from the conversation below.

ÉPOCA NEGÓCIOS: What have been the biggest impacts of technology on marketing in recent years?

GAL BARRADAS: I would venture to say that marketing and communication have been the areas most impacted by technology, because people have all become full-time communicators. We all write, photograph, film, publish, comment, and create meaning for brands. We speak well, we speak badly, we share, we recommend. I wrote a book about technology and marketing in 2018, and everything I said there still applies. These are structural issues, related to brand meaning and positioning. But many new things have emerged, which is why I'm preparing volume 2. One of the topics I'll cover, of course, is the impact of artificial intelligence on the segment.

ÉPOCA NEGÓCIOS: How do you assess the magnitude of this impact?

GAL BARRADAS: In the history of marketing, time has brought some turning points. The difference is that these days they happen more quickly. If we stop to think specifically about technology, marketing, and communication, there have been some very visible turning points. When companies began to understand that they could provide services through digital environments, with banks as pioneers. When Facebook became the world's largest social network in 2009, and soon after, it was discovered that it was possible to use the network as a means of selling not only one's image, but also products and services. And when e-commerce sales exploded in 2012.

Now we're experiencing another one of those moments, with the popularization of artificial intelligence tools. It's possible to do art direction, illustrations, and texts using generative AI. But there's a point of caution here. There's a widespread belief that artificial intelligence will help the mediocre succeed. It may even help, but the mediocre will remain mediocre. Meanwhile, creatives will become more creative because they know how to use the tool. When you have highly talented people, they learn to use artificial intelligence like a DJ composing a song. They use the most diverse forms of sound generation and manage to create something unique. So, when you have a well-designed command, art direction for an illustration, you'll create an extraordinary image. Only an artist can do that. Whether they did it with a pilot brush or using artificial intelligence tools doesn't matter. What matters is the end result. This concerns authority, creativity, and originality, and this will not be lost. It's a result that has references, tone, and style. All of this is human intelligence.

ÉPOCA NEGÓCIOS: When does it make sense to use artificial intelligence?

GAL BARRADAS: Every time it reduces the professional's workload and frees them to create, think, and plan. AI is not capable of developing a strategy. It analyzes what's available in the world and can provide, in a very rich way, data analysis, correlations, and even trends. When I say it's not capable of creating a strategy, it's because we are the ones living in the real world, who have the experience and ability to understand why it produced those results. We are capable of understanding the historical perspective that brought us here. Furthermore, we must also be able to make a historical projection forward, of how things will develop, taking into account global, local, social, and economic aspects. And including those that are happening now and are not available for artificial intelligence analysis.

ÉPOCA NEGÓCIOS: How can we preserve brand credibility when users notice and reject the use of AI in communications? 

GAL BARRADAS: To begin with, brands should mention when the content was generated by AI, because it's still very new; we're in a learning process, and people need to know. Now, if anyone says they know what the impact of artificial intelligence will be on the markets, they're lying. Nobody knows. For that to happen, before we get here, with artificial intelligence at everyone's fingertips, it would be necessary for human beings to have made a cognitive leap, not only in terms of education, but also in ethics, legislation, market regulation—these tools that make a society exist in an organized way. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. And human beings, by nature, use things for both good and evil. The tool was made available to everyone, without this having been discussed beforehand. So people will have to learn by using, suffering, creating.

ÉPOCA NEGÓCIOS: Some say that the use of hyper-realistic avatars, for example, takes away the authenticity and spontaneity of what was created...

GAL BARRADAS: I agree. I was watching campaigns made with AI the other day. Some are very poorly done, full of strange characters. This really drives customers away, who start to find everything very artificial. And the goal of artificial intelligence is not to be artificial. It's to be natural. So, when it's misused and doesn't achieve its true objectives, I criticize it too.

ÉPOCA NEGÓCIOS: What other marketing trends do leaders need to watch out for today?

GAL BARRADAS: It's very important for companies to see themselves as communities, so they can attract people through shared interests. They need to position themselves as groups of people, not as mere broadcasters of sales communications. Communities form around very defined ideas, with a very clear purpose. The brand must be available and open to listening and conversation. It needs to dedicate time to this, and provide some kind of reward for that person. "I heard what you said, so I improved this, I created this other thing." The person needs to feel recognized for being part of the community. This way, you create mechanisms of consideration, ideally, of consumer loyalty to the brand. And it's these mechanisms that lead people to make a transaction with that brand, product, or service. Nike does this very well, and so does Adidas. Awaken this sense of community, listen to what people have to say, co-create. And maintain this conversation constantly, every day. Tell stories, but also practice social listening.

ÉPOCA NEGÓCIOS: Communication today is fragmented across many channels. How should brands deal with this?

GAL BARRADAS: You need to be clear about your goals and how much time you have to achieve them. From there, you develop your strategy. In the past, when we didn't have all this media fragmentation, companies thought: I'll put this much on broadcast TV, this much on home media, this much on radio, this much in magazines. Today, there are many channel possibilities, so you need to be more precise in distribution. On the other hand, today we have the right tools for this, and the data to achieve this engagement. This way, we achieve deeper segmentation.

ÉPOCA NEGÓCIOS: And this is linked to hyper-personalization, right?

GAL BARRADAS: Today, the term we use most is massive super-segmentation. Because before, mass communication was broadcast. You had a message, put it on television, and spoke to everyone at the same time. Today, digital tools allow you to speak to thousands of people in a segmented way. But to do that, you need access to data. There's media data, which is anonymous. With it, you can speak by clusters, by groups. But the most important thing for brands is what we call first-party data, your customer database, which allows you to talk to them about products and services. Because they are the ones who form your community.

ÉPOCA NEGÓCIOS: How do you see the relationship between brands and influencers evolving?

GAL BARRADAS: Years ago, everything was very new; people didn't really know how it worked. But today, we know it very well, so there's no room for error. I see a lot of people using influencers for everything. I don't agree with that. Influencers are endorsement tools. You want to leverage that person's prestige with consumers to influence decisions toward your brand. If you have a new brand that no one knows about, this strategy won't work. Another important fact: for an influencer to deliver results, they must have some real connection to the company or share the same values. There's no point in hiring someone who has a large audience but has nothing in their content that relates to that brand. You can't buy that person's audience. You have to buy that person's truth. This is something that has been revealed over time, but by now everyone should know.

Reporter: Marisa Adán Gil, Epoca magazine, Brazil