This is a guest post from Nishka Sinha, Co-founder & CMO of Dresma, a Silicon Valley-based start-up. Dresma offers an all-in-one AI-powered platform Dresma and the DoMyShoot mobile app, a self-use solution for online sellers to custom generate professional eCommerce images instantly at unprecedented scale & low cost.

In today’s hyper-competitive digital marketplace, brands are in a constant battle to stand out and effectively scale their operations. The rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has given us all a powerful toolkit, promising to automate processes, deliver personalized customer experiences, and provide invaluable, data-driven insights at an unprecedented scale.

However, sellers must understand that on its own, AI is not a magic bullet for growth. While AI-powered tools can unlock significant efficiencies, the real competitive advantage emerges when these technologies are strategically paired with human expertise. It’s the thoughtful combination of machine intelligence and human oversight that truly works wonders, transforming potential into palpable results and driving your brand’s success.

In this blog, we explore how combining AI capabilities with the human brain (creativity, empathy, oversight) can help your brand thrive in 2025.

AI in Branding

As artificial intelligence has entered our lives, it has freed up human teams, letting them focus on creative tasks. It is streamlining branding by automating repetitive tasks, creating content, and observing human behavior at scale.

Here are a few real-life instances where we can relate AI to branding:

Customer segmentation and targeting

AI creates dynamic audience segments by analyzing customer data like: their browsing habits, buying patterns, and engagement patterns.

Let’s take for example an eCommerce brand that uses AI technology to configure high-end customers who are likely to repurchase within a month. They can target them with highly personalized email campaigns at just the right time.

Chatbots and virtual assistants

The best part of AI is that they are active 24/7. AI-powered chatbots can be of assistance to customers 24/7 (handling their queries, and complaints, and even recommending products).

For example: a SaaS brand can an AI chatbot to resolve its customers’ queries by fetching solutions from the help docs or support knowledge base which in turn results in a smooth customer journey.

Predictive analytics for marketing

AI models can predict trends, customer behavior, and campaign outcomes.

For example, a fashion retailer can easily plan for the upcoming season and plan their inventory in advance by using predictive analytics to look for which product will be trending in the coming season.

AI-generated design and content recommendations

AI needs only an understanding of your past performance to help your brand with everything from visual branding to content creation (it’ll suggest color palettes and copy variations).

For instance, AI can analyze your top-performing IG posts and then help you generate similar creatives that are specially customized to different audience segments or platforms.

Our Tip: How to train AI to follow your brand voice and tone

One of the biggest challenges faced while using AI in branding is the usage or development of generic content (off-brand content). To avoid this peril, you need to make sure that AI tools that are being used by your brand, are fully trained according to the brand guidelines. This is inclusive of: brand tone of voice, key messaging pillars, visual style, and audience preferences.

For instance: Creating a brand style guide for AI content creation tools will help AI understand your brand language better (be it, playful, professional, or empathetic). Fine-tuning models (with your own branded content) are provided by many AI platforms to generate outputs that align with your brand identity.

According to a report by McKinsey & Company, brands who are investing in AI are seeking sales ROI uplift of 10% to 20%.

Human Oversight Where AI Falls Short

Despite its capabilities, AI has limitations. It lacks emotional intelligence, contextual awareness, and ethical judgment. Here are a few reasons human input remains irreplaceable:

Everything has its limits, and so does AI! We are very well aware of its lack of emotional intelligence, contextual awareness, and ethical judgment.

• Emotional resonance: If you want to ingrain the authenticity of your brand – all AI can do is write but not feel.
• Cultural nuance: AI cannot understand local customs, humor, and sensitivities.
• Crisis response: You cannot rely upon AI when it comes to understanding sentiments and sensitive issues.
• Voice consistency over time: Humans bring solidarity and a flow to your narrative, particularly as campaigns progress and contexts shift. AI can impersonate your brand voice but it struggles to maintain a harmonious brand voice.
• Strategic vision and intuition: AI can never lead but only execute. It is a tough task or rather impossible task for AI to predict market shifts, interpret cultural movements, or craft bold brand positioning rooted in gut instinct.
• Original creativity and innovation: AI lacks creativity and introducing something new for AI is impossible. AI is perfect when it comes to remixing what is already out there. Groundbreaking ideas still start with human imagination.
• Complex brand storytelling: AI can easily draft content but when it comes to complex storytelling that can be modified across platforms and can emotionally engage the audience, humans still do their best.
• Relationship-building and empathy: In the end, branding is all about creating a connection with your audience. Be it: a support reply, a campaign, or a crazy founder story, humans tend to bring the story to life and build honest relationships based on empathy and trust.

Power AI With Human Creativity

Humans can focus on strategy, creativity, and decision-making while AI handles all the data-heavy tasks. To prove my point, below I am providing you with a few examples of this synergy:

a. Creating Content And Reviewing It

Using AI for blog/landing page outlines, headlines, or drafts is one thing but inserting brand voice in that content can be achieved via human editors. For instance, you can use AI to write on the topic “Trending summer wears for 2025” but human editor ensures that brand-specific content, case studies, or product plugs are not missing in that content.

b. Design at Scale

AI tools like Dresma can help you in generating an array of designs while their expert team of editors make sure that the final output aligns with the brand identity. This platform provides AI backgrounds, bespoke brand marketing content, and other major product listings needs. For instance, Bazillion Dreams, a US-based brand is using Dresma to generate thematic product visuals, while the Dresma’s team of experts ensures that the brand aesthetics are maintained.

c. Personalization

AI recommendations regarding any product or content are based on data. Later on, marketers improve these recommendations according to the audience segments. For instance, let’s take an online skincare brand: AI identifies that a returning customer is browsing anti-ageing serums and auto-recommend bestsellers to him. Here is when the marketer enters and offers a bundle that’s best for their age group or skin type, this adds up more emotional nuance that AI missed.

One great example of what we mentioned above comes from Sephora. Sephora has combined AI technology in their tool “Virtual Artist” to allow the customer to virtually try makeup on, with chatbot consultations on its mobile app. These features have enhanced and personalized the consumer experience.

However, Sephora hasn’t replaced their human support with AI, in-store beauty advisors, and video consultations remain mandatory for creating a personalized experience for their customers.

Mistakes That Brands Make With AI

1. Over-reliance on automation

Irrelevant experiences that are bland and robotic happen due to heavily relying on AI tools without any human intervention. Be it, auto-generated emails or chatbot responses, for the audience, if the response is way too generic and has no thought behind the interaction then it is a poor experience.

Example: A customer support chatbot that is completely AI-driven, if it is unable to understand subtle queries and keeps providing answers that are pre-recorded can irritate the customer rather than help them.

2. Not fact-checking AI-generated content

You can get your content developed by using AI, but it is not always accurate. Never use content without fact-checking as it can risk spreading misinformation and pushing misleading information.

Example: A blog that is AI-generated might have outdated information and claims with no sources which can damage brand credibility.

3. Using short or vague prompts and expecting great results

AI performs according to the prompt we provide it with. Brands mostly expect high-quality output from a really small input. This leads to very generic and off-brand results.

Solution: Invest more time in generating clear, and brand-specific prompts.

4. Ignoring bias in AI models

AI gets its information from historical data that might carry hidden unfairness. A regular human ethical review will save a brand from reinforcing stereotypes and excluding certain demographics.

Example: A footwear brand that uses an AI model that only recommends products based on slim feet or Western beauty standards.

5. Lack of brand-voice alignment

Creating content for your brand that is not by the brand guidelines can mislead or be very generic. AI-generated content without proper brand knowledge feels off-brand.

Solution: Before starting with the generation of content you should first build AI prompt libraries that are inclusive of brand voice, key messaging, and vocabulary.

6. Not adding human judgment or creativity

Strategic thinking heavily depends on the human brain and not AI. Though AI is a great assistant. If your brand completely relies on publishing AI-generated campaign content that lacks a creative angle or a storyline, then you might lose your unique edge.

7. Lack of transparency

If you are not honest with your customer then your brand can’t retain them. Customers need honesty.  A pretentious conversation between AI and customers might be harmful to your brand if they don’t know that it is the AI they are talking to.

Best practice: Make it clear when a chatbot is in use, and always offer a human fallback option.

Integrating AI with Human Intelligence

A successful combination of AI with human intelligence is not always about choosing one over the other, it is about creating harmony between the two.

Humans bring strategy, creativity, and empathy and AI optimizes and automates the process. If you are a brand looking to scale smartly, then here is how you can integrate the two effectively:

Start small

You should start using AI for customer support, customer segmentation, or A/B testing for landing pages. This gives the team a scope to experiment, gather insights, and build comfort before scaling.

Involve cross-functional teams

AI shouldn’t be introduced in just one department but spread across the organization. This “siloed” approach hinders collaboration. A perfect collaboration between marketing, product, legal, and tech teams makes sure that AI tools are used in the right way and by the brand goals.

Continuously monitor performance

You should use analytics to implement feedback loops to know all about AI-driven activities. For example, understand whether AI-recommended products are increasing cart value or are the chatbot conversations increasing conversions.

Train your team

You should motivate your employees to work with AI and not be afraid of it. Try to schedule workshops so that your employees understand the AI tools better. All these efforts will lead you to have a well-informed workforce.

Define clear boundaries

You should set boundaries in a better way like what AI will handle and what your workforce will handle. For example, a human quality check is required in brand messaging, ethical considerations, or creative direction. This helps you avoid over-automation and still gain a lot by implementing AI in your workflow.

Bringing It All Together

Using AI in your workflow isn’t just a one-time setup, it’s more of a process of learning and adapting to the new technology. All this when done in the right way will modify the human capabilities and will surely enable your workforce to deliver smarter and more personalized brand experiences.

The Future is Hybrid

Technology is evolving every day and it will continue to do so. The most victorious brands will be those who believe and understand that AI cannot replace human intelligence and is just a force multiplier. The future is all about human-AI hybrid models, where creativity and empathy meet speed and data-driven decisions.

Conclusion

AI entered our world bringing a revolution that assists in building, managing, and scaling brands. Without humans, this revolution sounds soulless, biased, or tone-deaf. Brands should equally invest in implementing smart technology and hiring smart people too! As, with professional guidance and an eye for detail, you can easily upscale your brand. If you can strike a perfect balance then the future belongs to you!