AI, without the hype

Every agency here uses AI in some capacity, but none of them described it as radical in the way headlines suggest. The pattern we found in their insights: AI helps with specific, repeatable tasks; it makes certain work faster; it doesn’t replace the creative, strategic thinking that matters most. They shared where AI actually delivers value versus where it creates more problems than it solves.

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Eliminating drudgery

Some agency clients have massive content libraries. Categorizing, tagging, and optimizing thousands of blog posts and documents manually can be brutal. AI can speed up these repetitive tasks when the humans involved have a content management strategy.

Who’s in control here?

Going all in on AI doesn’t mean giving up the human touch. From content to code, this agency is experimenting to see what AI can do, but the team sees the output as raw material that requires human intelligence to become finished products.

Chatbots won’t shop

In one version of the future, consumers will tell chatbots what they want, and algorithms will handle the rest. Wrong, says one founder. Why? Shopping is entertainment. It’s sport. People want to read reviews, explore options, compare prices, and change their minds. They want to play.

Turbocharge developers

AI coding assistants don’t write production code on their own, but they make good developers better. One agency introduced tools like Claude Code and Cursor. The result: developers solve problems and write cleaner code in the same timeframe. Tools amplify skills.

The tool of the moment

How many AI tools does an agency need? Maybe as many tools as there are tasks. From mundane jobs like meeting note-taking to generating images, there’s probably an AI app for that. Agencies like this one are finding out what works for them.

Talking AI with clients

Some clients fear missing out on the opportunities AI promises. Others fear AI itself. How clients think about AI might depend on how agencies explain what they’re doing with the technology. When it comes to AI and client work, honesty may be the best policy.

Do more, not faster

One agency says AI is helping them do more in the same amount of time. Sounds faster, right? Nope. Understanding and solving big problems takes just as long, but the solutions are better, delivered with richer features and greater resilience.

What they’re building

Most agencies are still figuring out how to use AI, while one agency is already building AI-powered products for clients, like custom personalization engines and an AI-powered categorization system. Adding AI that solves operational problems to client sites is next.