Photo credit: Solen Fayissa/Unsplash

By Matt Hassell

For the past few years, most conversations around AI in marketing have centred on what it can create. Headlines, voiceovers, concept art, influencer clones, etc. We’ve been caught up in how AI shows up in the work, who it will replace and whether its “just a tool” (it’s not, BTW). But maybe these are not the questions we should be asking.

Instead of obsessing over what AI looks like in a campaign, we should be paying attention to how consumers are using it in their day-to-day lives. Because, while the industry has been busy with experiments, critiques and op-eds (like this one!), real people have already changed how they make decisions.

People use LLMs like ChatGPT to plan weekends, write bios and dating profiles, decode fine print, compare pricing and get recommendations. They’ve folded AI into their daily routines. Not just to consume, but to choose. To navigate. To optimize. And they didn’t wait for a branded experience. They started prompting.

That quiet shift has changed more than behaviour. It’s changed the relationship between consumers and brands. People no longer sit waiting to be convinced. They expect brands to be useful, relevant and available inside the tools they’re exploring.

This is the rise of near interfaceless branding. Decisions are being made without ever landing on your homepage, seeing your logo or clicking your ad. If someone asks, “What’s the best stroller for city sidewalks?” or “Five best restaurants in Vancouver to impress clients” and your brand isn’t part of that AI-driven response, you don’t exist in the moment that matters.

The real challenge for marketers is no longer solely awareness. It’s accessibility. Not in terms of UX, but in terms of promptability. Not “Can they find us?” but “Can we be summoned?” This is where the opportunity lives.

Agencies need to encourage brands to make the leap from reactive to intelligent. We’re talking about early stage LLM optimization by structuring brand language to be easily surfaced by AI platforms, not just by Google. Branded APIs that let AI systems serve your brand as a recommendation, as well as intelligent offers and utility-first experiences. So when someone asks their AI assistant what’s next, your brand is the one that helps, not the one that advertises.

This is not theoretical. It’s already happening.

If you’re a hospitality brand, you should be asking if your experience shows up when someone prompts, “Plan a long weekend in Montreal with two kids and a budget.” If you’re in retail, ask whether your product descriptions are promptable. If you’re in insurance or finance, can your explainer content be digested and returned in a sentence by an AI assistant?

This is what modern brand building looks like. Not just visual identity, but cognitive presence. Not just storytelling, but structured relevance. Not just message delivery, but decision support.

The consumer has changed. The way they interact with brands has changed. And the interface for those interactions is changing dramatically. That doesn’t mean brand emotion and storytelling go away. Far from it. In fact, it may be more important than ever. It means they now need to live inside systems, not just screens.

If you want to be chosen, you have to be useful. If you want to be loved, you still have to connect. The brands that will lead are the ones that can do both, build intelligence and inspire feeling.

That’s the brief now.

Let’s build for it.

Matt Hassell is the founder and CCO of Ultralight Creative, which launched in 2022. Over a 20-year career, Hassell has held senior creative leadership roles at Forsman & Bodenfors Canada, OgilvyOne and KBS+ Toronto and led major campaigns that earned recognition from Cannes Lions, Clios, One Show, Effies, Webbys and more.