As “AI sameness” creeps into campaigns and debate intensifies over whether generative AI is enhancing creativity or doing the opposite, SAS’ AI strategy lead warns that overuse is stunting marketers’ creativity and growth.
Marinela Profi, global genAI & agentic AI strategy lead at analytics company SAS has cautioned that marketers risk weakening their own creative development if they become too reliant on generative AI.
The warning comes as Australian marketers and agencies flag what is being dubbed “AI sameness”, where campaign copy, taglines and messaging structures are converging, with repeated phrases and predictable patterns becoming more common.
Speaking to B&T during SAS Innovate in Dallas, Profi said “the problem lies not in the technology itself, but in how it is being applied”.
“AI will not kill creativity, but lazy use of AI will kill creativity and it will be part of that sameness,” she said.
She attributed the problem to what she described as a widespread “AI literacy gap,” arguing that many marketers are using generative tools without fully understanding how they function.
“A lot of people are approaching AI because they can, because it’s free, it’s accessible, it has no barriers to entry,” Profi said. “But they still don’t understand fully how a large language model like ChatGPT or Claude actually works.”
According to her, this lack of understanding is contributing to homogenised outputs, particularly when teams rely on similar prompting approaches.
“The cause of it is the lazy use of artificial intelligence,” she said. “Becoming too reliant on AI is stunting creativity.”
However, Profi also stressed that AI is not inherently diminishing creativity. Instead, she said the risk comes when marketers begin relying on it too early in the ideation process.
“AI is really great at being an idea generator, it gives you ideas that you didn’t even think about,” she said. “But I would almost try to do it without AI first, then with AI later.”
She warned that excessive dependence on AI could reduce marketers’ confidence in their own judgement and voice over time.
“The more you trust AI, the less you will end up trusting yourself,” she said.
A central concern, she added, is that AI may unintentionally reduce the kinds of creative struggle that lead to growth.
“Every time we fail, every time we mess up something, that is an opportunity for growth,” Profi said. “If we start going to AI first, that will prevent us from growing as well.”
She also cautioned against what she sees as a growing behavioural shift: delegating thinking itself to AI systems.
“We may start asking AI to think for us, and we may get to a point where the more we ask AI to think for us, the less we remember how our voice sounds like.”
Profi said marketers are already building useful AI agents for tasks like competitive analysis and content ideation, including systems that track trending search topics and suggest weekly thought leadership directions.
Despite these advances, she argued that human perspective remains irreplaceable in marketing.
“It may be really good at mimicking your style… but will never be able to mimic your perspective,” she said.
She also rejected the idea that AI should fully take over marketing functions, warning against over-automation.
“Don’t let your roots become machine driven,” she said, using a metaphor to describe the risk of losing foundational creative thinking.
“Never forget that your perspective is the most important thing that you have.”
