Kindling 38: Mistaken Identity Problems
A thought from me
Everyone you want as a client thinks an LLM can do your job. Unless your job’s only output is text, they’re probably wrong. But it doesn’t matter that they’re wrong, because now you have a Mistaken Identity Problem.
A Mistaken Identity Problem is what I call it when a shared cultural misunderstanding affects how people perceive you. In this case, people have mistaken your capabilities for that of a machine. They think the end results are the same. If a customer thinks they don’t need you, they won’t hire you. And no amount of “but they’re wrong!” messaging will change their minds.
All of your marketing needs to answer one question: why pay you instead of Claude? The AI might not be able to actually do your job, but that’s not relevant, because everybody thinks it can. Output alone is no longer your customers’ problem. You need to identify and speak to a new pain point.
Every information worker and every services business needs to adapt to survive the Mistaken Identity Problem. You have to articulate a new reason you exist — the real reason people hire you. Thanks to LLMs, output is cheap. You’re being mistaken for the machine.
If you don’t sell outputs anymore, what do you sell?
Things worth sharing
- I fell in love with KIND this week. They’re massive and popular and are recognized as the best branding agency in the world. They’re new to me, though. Loved the work they did for Gyda, a premium snow crab brand.
- Taken shows you what information browsers know about you and send to websites. From the same people: Since You Arrived shows you how the world has changed since you visited their website. And Discovered tells you about the history of the world beneath your feet.
A question to ponder
Mistaken Identity Problems can be made worse by industry peers reinforcing the wrong assumptions. One or more of your peers is unintentionally making the case for your replacement with an LLM. How can you use this to your advantage?
Until next week,
Nathan