The Value of Authenticity in the Age of AI
While our competitors are pumping out endless AI-generated blog posts about industry trends and best practices, we have ready access to the low-hanging fruit they're missing. We can be the welcome human alternative in an increasingly automated and alienated world.
I get several in my inbox every day - those emails that open with "I hope this email finds you well," or some fake-friendly variation thereof. I automatically know the rest of the message is going to be scrubbed clean of personality, and after the first lines or two, I wonder why someone... anyone... would think an opening like that would be an effective approach.
Of course, I right-click those emails right into the junk folder without further ado.
In 2026, we're drowning in words that look artificial and feel empty. The internet is an endless buffet of content that looks palatable on the outside but tastes like cardboard. We scroll through blog posts, social captions, and newsletters that are immaculately polished, yet somehow manage to say absolutely nothing.
And potential customers? They can smell it from a mile away.
The Great AI Slop Avalanche
I love technology. I've built my entire business around it. My company creates beautiful websites that leverage the latest tools, frameworks, and yes, even AI assistance when it makes sense. But somewhere between "helpful tool" and "replace all human effort," we seem to have collectively driven off a cliff.
The internet is stuffed with what is now called "AI slop"—AI-generated content pumped out in bulk, written for algorithms rather than actual people, filling space rather than offering value. It’s like digital packing peanuts: they serve a purpose, but mostly, they’re just more junk to sift through. Smart people are starting to develop a sixth sense for this stuff. They know within seconds whether they're reading something a human should care about or they’re being subjected to yet another "10 Tips for Better Widget Management" article. And in that moment of recognition, they bounce—not just from that page, but from your brand altogether.
The Connection Paradox
In the age of AI, the very technology that was supposed to help us connect with more people is making genuine connections nearly impossible. We can generate a year's worth of blog content in an afternoon, but we've forgotten how to write a single paragraph that makes someone feel seen or heard. We can A/B test subject lines until we achieve a 40% open rate, but we've lost the ability to write emails people actually want to open and website content that makes them lean in and say, “Tell me more.”
The tools have improved. And yet, we’re losing our edge.
Four Pillars of Human Connection
After years of recognizing what actually works—not what's supposed to work, not what the young, self-proclaimed marketing gurus and “influencers” smugly proclaim will work, but what genuinely moves the needle—I’ve noticed four elements that resonate most of the time:
Honesty means admitting what you don't know. It means telling the truth about your capabilities, your limitations, and your mistakes. One of our clients, a small architecture firm, posted about a project that went wrong—not a disaster, just a design that the client ultimately didn't love, and how they worked through it. The post was funny and genuinely entertaining, and it generated more engagement and inquiries than any of their portfolio entries. People don't want perfect. They want real. They want to know you'll handle the inevitable problems with integrity, creativity, and persistence... maybe even a dash of humor.
Integrity is doing what you say you'll do, consistently and reliably. It's the backbone of everything else. You can't fake it, you can't automate it, and you can't scale it without building it into your actual operations. It's returning phone calls when you said you would. It's delivering projects on time. It's admitting when you need more time rather than overpromising. It’s the stuff AI can't replicate because it's really about character, not content.
Gratitude is the most underrated business strategy on the planet, in my humble opinion. Not the fake kind ("We're blessed to announce..."), but actual appreciation for the people who choose to work with you. Write thank-you notes. Send Christmas cards. Remember details about people's lives. Care about them beyond their transaction value.
Relevance—and this is crucial—means understanding what matters to your specific audience right now, in their actual lives, not what some generalized persona says should matter to them. It's the difference between "5 Ways to Improve Your Morning Routine" and "How to Get to Work on Time When Your Toddler Has Hidden the Car Keys."
What This Actually Looks Like
If you run a plumbing company, maybe your blog shouldn't be "The Importance of Regular Drain Maintenance." Everyone's written that. It's true, it's useful, and it's utterly forgettable. Instead, write about the time you got a panicked call at 11 PM from a young couple whose basement was flooding, and how you walked them through shutting off their water over the phone while you drove over. Write a lighthearted account of why you started carrying extra towels in your truck after one particularly memorable disaster. Write about the satisfaction of solving a problem that seemed unsolvable.
If you're a financial advisor, don't publish "7 Tips for Retirement Planning." Write about the conversation you had with a client who was afraid they'd waited too long to start saving. Write about how you helped them find appreciation for where they were rather than anxiety about where they weren't. Write about your own money worries and how you manage them.
If you sell handmade jewelry, don't just post product photos with "New collection dropping Friday!" Tell us about the one-of-a-kind piece that took you a year and three tries to get right. Tell us about where you work, what you listen to while you create, and why you started making beautiful things in the first place.
This isn’t about "vulnerability marketing" or some trick to appear more human. It’s about genuinely showing up as yourself—quirks, opinions, stories, and all—in everything you write for your business.
The Scary Part
Many will face this approach with abject terror. It's much easier to hide behind corporate speak and AI-generated content. So much safer to say nothing interesting, nothing controversial, nothing that reveals who you really are. Showing your real self in business means risking rejection. Some people won’t like you, won’t hire you, won’t buy from you. That’s scary—especially when you want to appeal to as many people as possible.
But here's the reality: the people who don't connect with your authentic voice probably weren't going to be great clients anyway. They would have likely been high-maintenance, misaligned, and ultimately unsatisfying to work with. Meanwhile, the people who do resonate with you—they become advocates. They refer friends. They stick with you through price increases and busy seasons. They send you Christmas cards.
You don't need everyone. You need your people.
The Competitive Advantage You Shouldn't Ignore
While our competitors are pumping out endless AI-generated blog posts about industry trends and best practices, we have ready access to the low-hanging fruit they're missing. We can be the fresh human alternative in an increasingly automated and alienated world.
This isn't about rejecting technology; I'm not suggesting you ditch your CRM or write everything in longhand. It's about recognizing that the thing you bring to the table that no AI can replicate is your specific, idiosyncratic, and completely unreproducible humanity: your weird sense of humor, your particular obsession, your colorful way of explaining complex topics. The stories only you can tell because only you lived them. It's your taste, your judgment, your values, your voice. Don’t look at these things as weaknesses to be fixed with technology. Mold and refine them into your secret weapon!
Now, my words might seem hypocritical, given that I use AI tools extensively in my work. I started using them to upscale and enhance graphics and photography, but I also use them now for research, for initial drafts that I then rewrite, and for technical tasks that benefit from automation (though getting useful automated output from AI is often like pulling teeth). But I'm very careful about the line between "tool that helps me be more myself" and "replacement for having nothing to say in the first place."
The question isn't "Should I use AI?" The question is "Does this piece of content sound like something I would say to a friend or potential client over coffee?" If the answer to the latter is no, consider a more authentic approach. It doesn't matter how well it's optimized, how perfectly it hits SEO targets, or how efficiently it was produced. If it doesn't sound like you, if it doesn't contain something true, if it doesn't offer real value to real humans, it'll surely be seen as just more AI slop.
And we've got enough of that already, with LOTS more on the way.
The Action Items (That Aren't AI-Generated)
So what do you actually do with all this philosophy?
Start small. Write one blog post, one email, one social media caption this week that's genuinely you. Tell a real story. Admit something you don't know. Share what you're excited about or frustrated by or puzzling over. Use actual words you'd use in conversation. Break the rules of whatever business writing guide you've been following. Then watch what happens. Not just in metrics—though those matter—but in the responses you get—the emails from people who say "I felt like you were talking directly to me," the clients who mention your blog post in a phone call, or the colleagues who share your content because it actually said something worth sharing.
Delete the AI-generated content that's sitting in your drafts folder. You know the stuff I'm talking about—perfectly adequate, completely forgettable, taking up space in your content calendar because you felt obligated to publish something. Invest that time instead in creating one piece of content that matters. That says something true. That helps someone in a specific, tangible way. That could not have been written by anyone else because it comes from your specific experience and perspective.
Quality over quantity isn’t just good advice anymore; it’s how you lift up out of the white noise and into the vista where you can see and be seen.
The Long Game
Now, this approach may not produce immediate results (as many trendy content quantity strategies promise to). You probably won't double your traffic in 30 days. You probably won't go viral with an expertly crafted blog article. You might not even see measurable changes for months.
But slowly, steadily, you'll build something that matters more than traffic: trust. People will become more familiar with your name and brand. They'll look forward to your emails rather than automatically deleting them. They'll seek out your perspective because they've learned you tell the truth as you see it, not just what sounds good. And when they're ready to hire someone in your field? You'll be the first person they think of. Not because you showed up 17 times in their search results, but because you showed up as a human being they felt they knew.
That's not scalable. That's not automatable. That's not AI-generatable.
And that's the entire point.
Where We Go From Here
The Age of AI isn't ending—it’s just beginning. The tools will get better, the content generation will get easier, and the slop will get deeper. I strongly believe this means the value of genuine human connection, of authentic voice, of real expertise paired with actual care, will only increase.
You can do what everyone else does: join in with the white noise, pumping out more content faster, optimizing for algorithms over humans, hoping to win through sheer volume. Or you can be the human voice out in front of the mechanized chorus. You can build a business on actual relationships rather than engagement metrics.
I know which one sounds harder. I also know which one works.
Your customers and would-be customers are wading through the AI slop looking for something authentic and genuine. Give them what they’re looking for. Be grateful for every person who trusts you with their business. Be relevant to actual human problems in all their messy specificity. Be completely and unapologetically... you.
It will matter.
Work With Experts
As a writer, one of the compliments I'm most proud of receiving on various occasions over the years is, "you've written exactly what we've all felt, but couldn't find the words to express."
At Lost Highway Media, we believe design and writing can and should work together to create messaging that is exponentially stronger than the sum of its parts. We love words and pictures and the stories they can tell together, and we work with them extensively from day to day. That is one of the most powerful (and unique) value propositions we offer for effective web design.
Need a more persuasive, compelling, and authentic online presence? Let's talk—give us a call at (214) 354-1861.