David Wighton wrote a piece in The Times recently, asking a question that’s not going away: what happens to brands when AI starts making our choices for us?
https://www.thetimes.com/business/companies-markets/article/how-brands-adapt-ai-shopping-0pjt53mvk
For years, the giants—Coke, Nike, Apple, all of them—have played a familiar game. They spend mountains of cash convincing us to pick their stuff. Advertising hasn’t just told us about products; it has built trust, nostalgia, even a kind of emotional safety net. These brands have carved out massive “brand moats” to keep their market strong.
But AI threatens to change all of this.
Advertising works because us humans are a mess of emotions and irrational impulses. We don’t just buy snakcs because we want something sweet - we buy them because they feel familiar, or cool, or comforting. Companies spend billions to make sure we feel just the right way.
Then social media came along. Suddenly, a friend’s opinion or some influencer’s review mattered more than shiny TV commercials. Advertising power began slipping away,,,
Now add AI into this mix and things could get even stranger....
The more people use AI agents the less important celebrity endorsements are likely to become, because AI ATM focuses on value and performance, it likely won't be swayed by celebrity.
I've used AI myself to search for a new bike rack recently, Thule actually came off worse than a competitor 70% of the price, only just, but the AI wasn't swayed by the Thule brand.
NB Thule came second, and I was warned off a lot of shite too, but brand name didn't sway the AI.
A downturn for luxury goods?
Luxury goods tend to thrive off brands - not jets and yachts and high end cars so much, but handbags and clothes and jewlery where image and brand and celebrity endorsement can easily hype the price.
But if an AI is just crunching numbers and weighing stats, those symbols don’t hold the same power.
So we're in a weird situation where advertising companies could be looking at needing to win over algorithms rather than people's emotions....
The brave new world of algorithmic consumerism....
The rich are not going to just give up on their always irrational status purchases, but for the everyday purchases, AI could push us into being super rational shoppers, in the lower to mid range of purchasing brand loyalty may just become a thing of the past.
To be honest I think this is a massive upside of AI.... for now...
Until it learns emotions.
Hopefully I'll be dead before that happens!