Just a Small Biz Girl in an A.I. World

If I had a dollar for every time I saw “Claude this” and “Claude that” on my feed last week alone, I’d be a millionaire.
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​Okay, that’s dramatic. But at a minimum, I’d have enough for a very decent bottle of wine.
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Because nearly overnight, the usual online business fear tactics seem to have code-switched.
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What used to be “5 things you need to stop doing if you want your business to succeed” has become “5 Claude prompts that will turn your 8-hour workday into 30 minutes.” What used to make you feel behind in business now wants to make you feel behind in the undeniable future of artificial intelligence.
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​Same fear. New costume.​
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And honestly? It has me raising an eyebrow.
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Now the message seems to be that if you’re not using AI to do everything, automate everything, generate everything… you’re toast. Which, respectfully… feels a little dramatic.​
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And what this utopian AI marketing machine, complete with its seemingly bottomless campaign budget, keeps skipping over is that buyers are getting savvy AF.
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We can spot the em dashes.

We can clock the suspiciously perfect AI imagery.

We can smell the ghostwritten thought leadership.
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Half the internet feels like it’s playing AI police, trying to detect the deep fake before offering it our attention or trust.
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And beyond the meme-able absurdity of that all, there’s a more serious undercurrent here, too.
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​We’ve all read the headlines. Layoffs. Entire roles being reimagined or erased due to AI. Corporate career paths that once felt stable suddenly feeling… less so. It’s impossible not to notice the complicated love-hate relationship people are developing with AI.
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I know I have.
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And to be clear, I’m not here to doom spiral. I use AI every day. I’m not anti-tool.
But I have been sitting with a thought that keeps growing louder…
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​And honestly, my optimism might surprise you.
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​Because while AI is undeniably changing work, it also seems to be increasing the value of what feels unmistakably human. And that feels like very good news for small businesses.
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In a world flooding with prompt-generated sameness…

Soul stands out.
Taste stands out.
Point of view stands out.

The handmade website.
The weird little phrase only you would write.
The brand with fingerprints all over it.

That stuff lands differently now.

Maybe even more than before.
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​In some strange way, I think we’re inching toward a kind of small business renaissance… where boutique, human-centered, creatively brave businesses aren’t competing with AI, they’re becoming more valuable because of it.
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​And maybe that’s the opportunity.​
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Not to ‘out-AI’ the robots.

But to double down on what makes you irreplaceably human.
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​To create work with texture. Presence. Perspective. To make things with soul.​
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Which, not coincidentally, is the kind of work I care about supporting most.
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The creatives and small businesses whose humanness is the magic. The ones building something nuanced, thoughtful, and alive. The ones who want their brand to feel unmistakably theirs.
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Because in an AI world, that may be the ultimate differentiator.
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Or as I keep wanting to say it…
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​Maybe the rebellion is making things with soul.

🤎

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