Imagine this:

You turn up at the office Christmas party and Tina’s brought a robot as her plus-one.

It wheels in, tells slightly off-timed jokes, laughs at its own punchlines… and nine seconds after arriving, the bar manager is trying to unplug it.

That’s the novelty effect in a nutshell.

Still quite shiny and slightly unnerving. And weirdly glad to be included even though it doesn’t quite know why it’s there.

To me, that’s what AI feels like right now in copy and content, especially as we roll into the season where people start thinking about “new year, new push”.

Because let’s face it, AI is everywhere. The prediction this time last year was that it’d accelerate everything.

But one year later, I’m mostly hearing marketers who use AI say, “We’re using AI for content” rather than explain what it’s actually improving.

​

The psychology: novelty vs value

The novelty effect psychological bias is where new experiences temporarily boost attention and performance simply because they’re new, not because they’re better.

You’ve likely seen it with gadgets: shiny until you realise you’re using 10% of the features and 100% of the effort.

AI for copy and content has that vibe.

It feels powerful, but does that mean it’s actually helping?

Just last month, Gartner reported it found in its survey that:

• 65% of CMOs believe advances in AI will dramatically change their role within the next two years and
• 82% of business leaders say their company’s identity must shift accordingly
• BUT only 5% of marketing leaders who use GenAI as a tool are seeing significant gains on business outcomes

This tells me that the promise of AI is transformative, but the reality is uneven at best.

Shiny tools get attention.

Sustained value still depends on clear strategy, human judgment and expertise, especially when your audience treats ambiguity like risk.

‍

Finance and its relationship with AI

Everyone seems to have an opinion.

Some founders in fintech are early adopters. They’ve got AI writing blogs before breakfast and whitepapers while they’re still in pyjamas.

Others squint at the screen like they’re trying to read hieroglyphics, clutching their latte and say:

“Isn’t AI just… regurgitating what already exists?”

From my experience, I see the latter more in finance than in other spaces.

Because financial audiences are trained to value accuracy, risk mitigation and proven logic. They’re often comfortable with data but suspicious of anything that doesn’t come with a clear audit trail.

Which brings us to the ambiguity around AI output. If your content is being generated by a black-box algorithm, many institutional buyers are going to ask:

“Was this accurate?”

“What data was it trained on?”

“Are there hallucinations?”

“Is this compliant?”

Suddenly, the shiny effect wears off. What remains is this: AI is only as good as the guardrails you put around it.

​

When AI helps and when it hurts

So, when is AI good?

Good:

• Speeding up the admin, so you’ve got more time to think, shape and decide.
• Idea stimulation to get past the blank page.
• Topic expansion or summarisation, if you need a quick lay of the land.

​

Bad (without oversight):

• Original copy, also without expert review.
• Copy that isn’t vetted for accuracy, tone or compliance.
• Defaulting to AI because you “can” rather than because it solves a real problem.

There’s a risk that heavy AI use dulls our own creative muscles, kind of like always using a calculator and forgetting how to add.

When it comes to financial copy, nuance is everything. A slightly off phrase can change meaning, or worse, lead someone to misunderstand risk and that’s not a trivial issue in finance.

Remember, this audience thinks in headlines and disclaimers for a reason. Your readers are wired to question nuance. They want clarity. They want confidence.

No amount of AI sparkle replaces strategic thinking.

​

Final thought

In my view, AI isn’t going to replace marketers.

But the marketers and founders who understand human decision-making, narrative, clarity and strategy will replace those who blindly paste AI text into their blogs and hope for miracles.

Not by spending more.

Not by having “the latest tool.”

Thinking more strategically and leaning on expertise, insight and psychology is what will provide the competitive edge.

‍

‍