Marketers: Stop Selling AI as Magic. Sell What It Actually Does
AI hype sells. Claims about "reasoning," "general intelligence," and machines that "think" boost headlines and budgets. But most systems in market today are powerful pattern-matchers, not minds. Treat them that way and your messaging gets sharper-and safer.
Terminological inflation serves corporate interests remarkably well.
That inflation blurs real limits. A chatbot aces a test and the press declares a new era. An image model spots a cat and suddenly it "gets" vision. This isn't nitpicking. Language shapes expectations, which shape adoption, which shapes risk.
Why this matters for marketing
- Overclaiming invites churn, refunds, and screenshots on social.
- Regulators expect claim substantiation. If you say "knows," "thinks," or "reasons," you're implying reliability you must prove.
- Misaligned expectations create support debt. You pay for every hallucination you overpromised away.
Pattern-matching isn't cognition
John Searle's Chinese Room shows the gap: a system can manipulate symbols perfectly without any grasp of meaning. That's most large models. They predict the next token extremely well. That doesn't equal stable concepts, intent, or ground truth.
- Good at: classifying, ranking, summarizing, rewriting, recalling patterns.
- Weak at: causal inference, domain transfer, edge cases, consistent generalization without tight constraints.
Write AI product claims that hold up
- Describe behavior, not agency. Use "classifies," "summarizes," "suggests," "generates options"-not "thinks," "learns," "knows," or "understands."
- State scope. "Trained on X. Performs best on Y. Not intended for Z."
- Quantify performance with real tasks, not just benchmarks. "Reduces manual tagging time by 38% in pilot with 12K emails."
- Disclose failure modes. "May produce incorrect or outdated info. Human review required for compliance-sensitive tasks."
- Avoid anthropomorphic visuals and copy. No brains, no magic sparkles. Show workflow, inputs, outputs, guardrails.
Benchmarks aren't outcomes
A bar exam score is trivia if your product is a lead scorer. Tie claims to business metrics: qualified leads, CAC, conversion rate, resolution time, CSAT. If you can't link the model's behavior to a pipeline number, it's still a demo.
Pre-launch guardrails
- Red-team prompts for safety, bias, and jailbreaking. Document known gaps.
- Test on holdout data that reflects your real users. Don't cherry-pick benchmark wins.
- Add human-in-the-loop for decisions with legal or revenue impact.
- Log failures, set drift alerts, and schedule retraining windows.
Language to use (and avoid) in your copy
- Use: "Automates labeling for invoices," "Generates draft replies from your knowledge base," "Ranks prospects by similarity to closed-won accounts."
- Avoid: "Thinks like your best rep," "Knows your brand," "Understands your customers better than you do."
Pricing and packaging without hype
- Sell outcomes, not mystique. "Cut average handle time by 22%," not "AGI-level support."
- Offer usage-based tiers with clear caps and throttles. Uncapped promises backfire when token costs spike.
- Bundle with training and templates. Most wins come from workflow design, not the model alone.
Compliance and claims
- Keep documentation: datasets, tests, and known limitations. If pressed, you'll need receipts.
- Review FTC guidance on AI advertising claims. Substantiation isn't optional. Read it.
- For risk management practices, see the NIST AI RMF.
A simple checklist before you publish
- Have we stated scope, data sources, and limits?
- Are claims tied to measured outcomes from representative users?
- Did legal review anthropomorphic language and implied capabilities?
- Do we provide clear next steps if the model is wrong?
Bottom line
AI helps you scale pattern work. That's valuable. Sell clarity over fantasy and you'll win long-term: fewer refunds, stronger referrals, cleaner brand equity.
If you want structured training on practical AI for marketing-prompting, workflow design, and claim-safe messaging-start here: AI Certification for Marketing Specialists or browse courses by job.
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