AI in Business | Part 2: External Marketing & Trust

In Part 2, our hosts Daniel McGowan (Head of Digital Marketing) and Rashan Senanayake (Head of Design) zoom in on the most visible and controversial use of AI right now: external marketing. They unpack why AI can look like an instant win on the surface, especially when it promises faster content, cheaper results, and easy campaign setup. But they also explore why the downsides are often more subtle and more damaging, particularly when AI starts shaping brand perception, creative quality, and customer trust. Daniel shares how many marketers are using AI in practical ways, like drafting, summarising, and accelerating reporting and pattern recognition, but warns against outsourcing strategy, because it leads to generic decisions and “same as everyone else” marketing. Rashan pushes the conversation with a sharp question every business owner should consider: if you had three marketers in front of you, one who refuses AI, one who is fully AI-driven, and one who uses a mix, who would you trust with your brand? The episode also digs into the rise of opaque, black-box campaign tools like Meta and Google’s AI-driven advertising features. Daniel explains how these tools can optimise for the wrong outcome, delivering cheaper clicks without delivering real business results, while offering limited insight into why performance is changing. From broken brand assets in AI-generated ads to the growing consumer skepticism around AI creative, Part 2 is a practical guide to using AI carefully in marketing without sacrificing quality, clarity, or trust. If you want to use AI in marketing without damaging your brand, this episode is for you.