As paradoxical as it may seem, creative agencies are leaning into AI to help humanize brands. From listening more deeply to customer sentiment to tailoring more personalized messaging and authentic experiences, using AI to make a brand feel more human is less about automation and more about amplification—by making the voice of the customer easier to hear and expanding brands’ understanding of how to better connect with audiences.
Here, 15 members of Forbes Agency Council explore strategic ways to leverage AI technology to demonstrate a highly personal customer focus. By using the tips below, agency professionals can help clients build relatable brands that look, sound, feel and act more like trusted resources with real presence at every touchpoint.
1. Listen More Deeply To Respond With Empathy
AI can humanize brands by enabling deeper listening. When used to understand tone, emotion and even intent in stakeholder interactions, it empowers teams to respond with empathy and authenticity. It’s less about replacing people and more about helping brands listen and act more like humans. The most human thing a brand can do with AI is use it not to speak louder but to listen better. – Taazima Kala, Hotwire
2. Mine Real Conversations For Emotional Cues
The smartest way to use AI to humanize your brand? Use it to listen harder. Mine real customer conversations—chat logs, reviews, social posts—to find emotional cues and unmet needs. Then craft messaging that actually speaks to people. AI doesn’t replace the human touch; it amplifies it when you know where to look. – Curtis Priest, Pixelcarve Inc.
3. Create Delight Through Predictive Personalization
AI can bring delight, a key part of a human brand experience. Delight happens when people feel a positive emotion from something unexpected, and AI helps make those moments happen consistently. By removing friction, remembering details and offering timely nudges, brands can create personal, emotionally resonant experiences that amplify human connection. – Steve Ohanians, Clear Digital
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4. Enable Empathy And Responsiveness At Scale
AI can humanize brand engagement by enabling empathy, personalization and responsiveness at scale. From detecting emotional cues in customer feedback to tailoring digital experiences, AI helps brands act with emotional intelligence—amplifying authenticity and trust, not replacing the human touch. – Manuel Machado, CCOMGROUP Inc.
5. Transform Data Into Experiences That Resonate
AI can humanize a brand by transforming data into personalized, authentic experiences that reflect a true understanding of the audience. Analyze customer behavior to craft content that resonates with individual needs and emotions. Then, utilize sentiment analysis to adjust tone, timing and delivery, ensuring every interaction feels genuine, empathetic and aligned with the human experience. – Elyse Flynn Meyer, Prism Global Marketing Solutions
6. Use AI As An Authenticity Filter
Use AI to spot AI-written content. Before posting, run each piece through a tool that flags bland or generic lines and any identified patterns of AI-written copy. Only ship pieces after they pass the filter or are revised by a human author who adds concrete details. AI guards the gate. Humans add the voice. – Meeky Hwang, Ndevr, Inc
7. Enhance The Voice Of The Customer
Use AI to listen better to the voice of your customer, not just to speak faster. When brands leverage AI to analyze real customer language, identify unmet needs and shape more empathetic messaging, they create content that feels personal and relevant. The key is using technology to deepen human understanding, not replace it. – Mary Ann O’Brien, OBI Creative
8. Make People Feel Seen With Personalized Interactions
AI can humanize a brand by enabling deeper personalization at scale; using data to tailor tone, timing and messaging to each customer’s preferences. The key is to make the person having the interaction feel seen, not sold to. Smart brands use AI insights to empower real human connection, letting empathy guide automation, not replace it. When AI helps brands listen better, every message feels more human. – Tony Pec, Y Not You Media
9. Use AI Insights To Strengthen Strategy And Comms
At Durée & Company, AI is used to strengthen strategy, not replace creativity. We use it to analyze audience behavior, optimize timing and uncover insights that inform more personal, meaningful communication. By guiding strategy through data, AI allows our team to focus on authentic connections and brand storytelling. – Durée Ross, Durée & Company, Inc.
10. Automate Routine Tasks To Focus On Relationships
By utilizing AI to automate time-consuming tasks such as monitoring competitor mentions, creating reports and sharing press clippings, brands can shift their time to do the work only humans can. Building meaningful relationships by engaging with media and customers authentically is something AI can’t do, and these are the actions that ultimately define a brand. – Ayelet Noff, SlicedBrand
11. Build An AI ‘Voice Persona’ From Real Stories
AI can humanize a brand by crafting an AI “voice persona” that captures authentic customer voices and stories. By analyzing real conversations, AI enables brands to infuse genuine emotion and lived experiences into their communications, boosting resonance with audiences. This approach aligns the brand with its community’s emotional core, ensuring every interaction reflects true human connection. – Anne St. Peter, Global Prairie
12. Express Empathy At Scale With Sentiment Analysis
AI can actually make brands feel more human when it’s used to express empathy at scale. By analyzing sentiment and context, AI helps brands listen better and respond in ways that feel personal, relevant and emotionally intelligent—turning data into genuine connection. – Paula Chiocchi, Outward Media, Inc.
13. Pair AI Insights With Real Human Storytelling
AI can help humanize a brand by personalizing communication at scale. When used thoughtfully, it can analyze audience behavior to tailor messages that feel more relevant and empathetic. The key is pairing AI insights with real human tone and storytelling—that’s what keeps the connection authentic. – Bryanne DeGoede, BLND Public Relations
14. Lean Into AI Analysis To Refine Human Messaging
Use AI to analyze customer conversations, market trends and competitive positioning—then have your team craft messaging that addresses what you’ve learned. AI surfaces the patterns; humans create the authentic connection. The technology tells you what your audience cares about; your people show that you actually listened. This empowers better analysis, listening and strategic thinking around changes. – Kathleen Lucente, Red Fan Communications
15. Employ AI As A Memory Layer
Consider employing AI as a memory layer. Allow it to recall every customer’s preferences and prior problems from chat, email and in-store visits so that responses can have continuity and personalization. Familiarity plus transparency will help make a brand feel truly human. – Gabriel Shaoolian, Digital Silk
