You’re in marketing for one reason: Grow. Grow your company, reputation, customers, impact, profits. Grow yourself. This is a community that will help. It will stretch your mind, connect you to fascinating people, and provide some fun along the way. I am so glad you’re here. -Mark Schaefer
Too small for a blog post, too interesting to ignore, here are observations from the world of marketing and beyond.
MarkBot must die
About two years ago, I created a custom GPT loaded with my books, speeches, classes, and marketing frameworks. I also trained it on my values and how to treat people. I called it MarkBot — an experiment to scale my impact as mentor and teacher — always free, always private.
There was an upside and a downside.
Upside: Many loved it and used it relentlessly. Some people told me it was the best thing on the internet. The advice it gave was extraordinary, and frankly better than what I could have provided on my own.
Downside: The number of people signing up for live, one-hour paid personal consulting calls through my site declined by 90%.
The MarkBot must die now, but it’s not because of the business decline. I am actually joyful that the experiment worked so well and helped so many people.
It has to go away because OpenAI is retiring the custom GPT function. This seems like a wacky move — canceling your customer’s most creative and useful work — but alas, the end is near. OpenAI is forcing my hand by discontinuing the Custom GPT function in a few weeks.
I have looked high and low for a replacement, but there isn’t one that would be:
- Free for users and for me
- Completely private
- Requiring no new investment or infrastructure to maintain
- Secure and safe for my underlying instructions and documents
I believe a replacement for MarkBot will come along eventually. I hope this is not goodbye, but for now, MarkBot will be retired with the rest of the Custom GPTs on December 11, 2026. Adios my little buddy.
AI made me sad
I have a new book coming out in January — a revised and expanded version of the bestselling personal branding book KNOWN for its tenth anniversary. It is SO GREAT, my best book, and you will love it.
I went back to my human designer for an updated cover. It needed to be similar to the beloved first edition, so it would feel familiar, but different enough to show that it is fresh (80% new content!).
I paid for six different cover versions. Here is the original cover with the best version my human designer came up with.
It’s good, but the star bothered me. The star hints at awards and fame, and my book explicitly states that a personal brand is not about fame. It’s about having the reputation, authority, presence, and trust to help you accomplish your goals.
On a whim, I sent the same instructions to ChatGPT, and this was the result:
I think it’s perfect.
So does the human designer.
So … I paid a human designer, and we ended up choosing an AI-generated book cover created for free in 10 seconds.
This just seems so weird to me. And sad.
Not even sure what to write about it, other than to say … the best cover won.
Make money, save money
There are many similarities between the marketing approach to AI today and how we first approached the internet so many years ago.
A little-known fact is that I helped create and commercialize one of the world’s first corporate intranets. We were so early, we had to install computer terminals at our global customer locations so they could access our system!
Like AI today, the internet seemed like a magic trick. Most marketers became intoxicated by making sites that were sexy and showy. They wanted attention. They wanted WOW. They wanted awards.
I focused on one thing only: applications that made money or saved money. While most of my colleagues had projects that withered away, my system conquered the globe (we even served Russia and China) and delivered millions in cost savings.
Don’t fall into the AI magic trick trap. Make money. Save money.
I’m feeling it.
The Intimacy Economy
A few years ago I saw a headline: “The Loneliest Generation.”
It was about Gen Z, who were showing up with record levels of depression, isolation, and self-harm. What are we doing to our kids?
This was one of the reasons I wrote Belonging to the Brand. Yes, it’s a business book. But I was also sounding an alarm and showing how marketers could actually do something good in the world. A brand community where people feel connected might be the only marketing that people actually seek out.
Since I wrote the book, it has been cool to watch brands show up in ways that support mental health.
- Powerade, a brand associated with accomplishment and winning, sponsored a national campaign about pausing for mental health.
- With 42% of teens saying that talking about their feelings is important to them, McDonald’s new “Draw How You Feel” Happy Meal boxes trade the classic red package for a blank canvas. This ties into a broader trend of experiential and wellness-driven packaging.
- Maybelline launched a global initiative (“Brave Together”) to destigmatize anxiety and depression, committing $10 million to support 1 million conversations and providing an online resource hub created with mental health experts.
Marketing is the root of a lot of problems, especially when our advertising dollars fuel toxic social media feeds. There is no easy answer, but maybe marketing for real intimacy, connected to pain and the real anxiety of our customers, is a healthy first step.
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