Generative AI is reshaping the digital landscape, posing challenges to companies whether they’re building AI technologies or integrating it into their business. The race is on to use this technology to revolutionise creativity at scale. Early movers gain advantages but tech companies must eventually make it available to all to repay investments and turn profits. As the ability to “create” at scale becomes easier, and AI agents gain the ability to act autonomously for us, we face several complex challenges:
- How do you stand out when everyone has access to generating the same high-quality outcomes?
- Do we risk being overwhelmed by huge volumes of generic “content”?
- Will we be generating content from foundational models influenced by unavoidable bias, with features and details driven by mass demand rather than uniqueness?
Generative AI has a tendency to flatten differences. Accessible by all, powered by shared training data, similar prompts, and similar goals, even the most innovative outputs risk blending into a sea of sameness.
Branding principles in this new era
Great brands don’t just create awareness or generate mindless content – but create moments with meaning.
In a world where products can be replicated in weeks and features copied overnight, it’s a distinct brand story, design language, and emotional resonance that provide the real defence. Brand transforms functional tools into cultural signals and platforms into places people actively choose to spend time.
The brands set to achieve this in an AI-mediated world are not those chasing quick wins, trialling ad-hoc tools, or scattering experiments across different teams, but those embedding AI into their business models, workflows, and ecosystems by design.
Building distinctive brand experiences in the age of AI requires new rules of play, and a shift in how we think about design, not just as craft (AI will be doing much of that), but as a process, where design thinking and workflows create rich data and fine-tuned AI tools to assist with brand building by design.
At Design Bridge and Partners, we have been advising our clients on 4 simple steps, following the trusty Double Diamond:
- Discover what matters
Focus on real human problems – where AI should, not just could, be used. The goal is to find the meaningful intersections of technology, user need and business value not rush to integrate tech without aligning to strategy. - Define your stance
Decide the role AI will play in your brand experience, and whether you’re ethically comfortable with that. AI isn’t neutral. Every decision reflects the brand’s values. Now is the moment to clarify boundaries, behaviour and what you stand for. - Develop your Brand Design Data
This is the heavy lift – translating brand strategy and identity systems into structured, scalable formats that foundational models can be trained on. Codify every aspect that makes a brand unique so that it is legible to AI from visual elements to tone of voice or sonic cues and behavioural nuance. - Deliver with coherence
Even the best tech fails if it’s clunky to use. UX and UI are often afterthoughts in generative systems, but essential to universal adoption. Every micro-interaction, from a chatbot tone to the look of a notification, is a brand moment. Get them wrong, and trust erodes.
As brands navigate the fastest-evolving digital environments, it’s crucial to look beyond the glossy touchpoints and focus on the smallest interactions where trust is made or broken. As AI weaves deeper into daily life, it’s these micro-interactions that become brand moments that can smooth adoption or create friction. The opportunity lies in removing barriers for seamless experiences while embedding unmistakable brand signals. These cues go beyond words or visuals: sonic elements, haptics, and design fidelity across both high-impact and everyday assets must all work coherently for a brand to stand out in an AI-mediated world.
In a world where algorithms mediate more and more of our experiences, the brands that win will be those that sweat the details, making sure the everyday, often overlooked encounters feel just as distinctive and intentional as the headline experiences.
Brand design data
It’s no longer enough to think of your brand as existing in static guidelines, rigid playbooks, or even digital brand portals. Brand must now become code. Something structured yet dynamic, interpretable by machine learning, and still stewarded by humans who course-correct through a potential sea of sameness.
Brand Design Data is the structured translation of your brand’s strategy, tone, and identity into a format that AI can learn from. It’s not just guidance for humans, but a foundation for AI systems to interpret, replicate, and evolve your brand without diluting what makes it distinct.
If we want AI to scale brand experiences that are coherent, compelling, and on-brand, we first need to feed it brand intelligence it can actually work with and train it on tasks that will genuinely benefit the organisation and the brand.
Not just a human in the loop. Is it the right human?
This Brand Design Data will always require active human guidance at every stage, especially when interpreted by AI systems. The AI community often talks about the importance of having a ‘human in the loop’ but the most pressing question is: are they the right humans?
At present, loops are led by engineers working from guidelines and documentation that were written for humans, not data structured for AI training. And the humans doing the training are not branding professionals. What’s missing is the direct involvement of brand designers, strategists, and marketers, the people who define the brand principles. If they were embedded into the loop, AI could learn not just from functional rules but from the subtleties of brand expression itself, ensuring outputs feel coherent, distinctive, and resonant.
Only when those who define the brand shape how machines interpret the data can we move from feeding AI functional rules to teaching it the emotional and cultural depth of a brand. Guardrails must evolve, feedback loops need constant calibration and brand stewardship becomes an ongoing act, not a set-and-forget system.
Distinction by design
AI is changing the speed and scale at which we work, but it should not define what you stand for or how you stand out. That still comes down to the people evolving your brand.
In the coming years, the companies that stand out won’t be the ones creating the most content. They’ll be the ones building the clearest and most meaningful signals, ensuring those signals are strong enough to be memorable and survive a sea of sameness.
Brand has always been the container for meaning. In the age of AI, it’s still your competitive edge. Brand remains what makes your organisation distinct.
Tom Gilbert
Tom Gilbert is Group Executive Creative Director at Design Bridge and Partners. With over 20 years of experience in leading multi-disciplinary teams to create brand identity systems and engaging brand experiences, Tom thrives on using design-thinking to tackle complex business challenges and seize new opportunities, driven by a passion for influencing culture for the greater good.
