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What happens to your marketing when people stop checking their emails? Are we going to have AI talking to AI through us? And how do we protect ourselves as business owners?

In this episode, I’m sharing a prediction I’ve been thinking about all week: AI agents are going to change the way we reach people, and a huge part of digital marketing as we know it could look very different in the next few years.

I’m talking about what this means for email marketing, webinars, and traditional funnels, what I’m testing in 2027, and why attention is the most valuable asset you can build.

Key Takeaways

• What happens when people no longer read emails
• Writing for humans vs AI Agents
• Lead generation in 2027 (the strategies I’m testing)

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READ THE EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Emily Hirsh:

When someone gives me a webinar, And I see that AI wrote it, it’s like, it’s not infused with you. Of course, it’s not gonna do well. You cannot use Claude to actually write your webinar out it’s gonna sound like AI, it diminishes their creativity and their magic and even their products. I hope that AI takes things that humans don’t need to do anymore and somehow creates the capacity that they can do more things that they love, more things that only humans can do, and genuinely your art, your art is your expression, and how can you express and connect with other humans in the best way possible? So use AI not to replace that, but to create capacity for that.

Embodied CEOs don’t chase trends. They pave the way they lead from within. Move by purpose, unshaken by noise. When you are the source, you do not need permission.

Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the podcast. I hope you guys are having an amazing week. I feel like every day right now of mine just flies by. There’s, like, so much happening, so many exciting things that we’re working on in my company. I, I genuinely feel like I am rebuilding the company leveraging AI in a really cool way, and it’s like every department and every role needs it integrated, and I have this vision, and I just…

I can’t stop until it’s done. And then I’m expanding it into things that we can add for our clients and tools. One of the things I’m building right now is this webinar audit tool. So it takes all my webinars that I’ve ever done and my, like, way that I structure a webinar and teaches it, and then it will allow our clients to upload either a transcript or slides and audit it based on that.

So I think that’s pretty cool, and I’m so excited to run my November cohort that I announced on the last podcast, which is anybody who’s a client. So if you are a client at any level, Activate, Scale, Done-for-you VIP, even my mastermind members, you get to participate in this, which I’m gonna run a 30-day cohort.

We’re gonna do a live training each, each week and give you some tools and, and things to basically work on how to AI-proof your offer. We’re gonna focus on your offer. We’re gonna focus on what you’re selling, and that could be building a tool within it. That could be shifting the way that you position it.

That could be adjusting the offer to be more interactive, to be more done for you. It could also be systems on your back end where you do a done-for-you component in your offer, but you build a system with AI to be able to do that. Basically pulling your magic and, and everything that is yours out and seeing how can you leverage AI to make your offer more irresistible and more set up for speed and ease for your potential buyer.

So that’s happening in November. If you have considered working with us, this is the time. Like, we could finish the year strong. We could launch funnels for you, Black Friday, get all the marketing in place, and you’ll get to be a part of this cohort, which I’m very excited about. So helpmystrategy.com takes you to our application page.

You can see that, and everybody who is a client by the end of the month is invited into this cohort. So I’m, I’m, I’m pumped. I’m really pumped to be able to pour into our clients also with an extra piece of training. So today, I figured I would talk about a couple of things on my mind a couple of takeaways and things that came up in coaching calls this week, but also something I’ve been really thinking about a lot in terms of AI in business and not really like, “Let me talk about tactically what this means.”

So as I’ve really overhauled everything in my business in the last month and become pretty obsessed with AI in a way that is very much how can I make it so that myself and my team is spending all of their time doing only what they can do? Meaning our strategists can go even deeper on strategy because they have support everywhere else.

Our ads managers, same thing. Like everywhere possible, how can we get AI to do our chores and not our art in building out systems and building out automations? And also what it’s really good at is pulling large amounts of data. So like client quality control, marketing dashboards, I’ve been building that But as I’ve been doing this, I’m realizing that I think everybody is going to have agents in the next year, which means most of what someone is consuming is going to be filtered through an agent, right?

Email marketing, I don’t think a lot of people are gonna still check their emails. I think a lot of people still do, but that’s gonna go away, and there’s gonna be these agents doing it. And I’m already seeing this now where someone does something with AI, then they go bring it in to a human, and then that person puts it in their I- AI and is responding to it.

And I’m like, “Is the future, like, we’re just gonna have AI talking to AI through us?” It can’t, it can’t be. Like, that’s not gonna be a good thing. And so I’ve really been thinking about this, and I don’t fully have a solution, but I’ve been thinking about how do we protect ourselves as business owners, because why?

Because attention is currency. And I do think at some point we will lose the ability to get attention through email, which is a huge part, obviously, of digital marketing, right? You run ads, and you post on social, and you get leads going into funnels. And now you have their emails, and you email them, and that’s how you manage promos and launches and nurturing and all the things.

Like, that’s a huge piece that has never really been replaced. And I’ve just been sitting with, like, what is going to happen? And I come back to the importance of playing the long game with media and content because I do think that no matter what happens with agents, people will still consume content because content is equivalent to today’s TV and entertainment.

And a lot of people don’t even, myself included, watch TV, but I scroll Instagram, and I consume content in that way. So whether that’s podcasts or YouTube or actual social media content, I think that that will be one of the biggest ways to capture and maintain people’s attention, which points to this, this need to start now at making sure you are building out a long-term play around content.

And it’s why I have invested since April heavily in content, and it kind of… Like, this week was just like this even more reason to keep this atop of mind because attention is the number one currency, and the way that we can capture and maintain attention is going to change a lot in the next few years because everybody’s gonna have this kind of filter with these agents, and the agents are gonna be Doing majority of the things and even speaking for people.

And especially when you think about email, I mean, I know myself at this point, I don’t read a single promotional email or a s- a single email, even a newsletter, even a podcast email from somebody in somebody’s list, and that’s not a, a great thing to be like, “That’s the direction we’re headed in,” right?

I’ve also thought about what are ways that you can own attention. Is it communities that you build? Is it, you know, very easily like your own app or something that you have? Like, ways that you own a spot where somebody will want to hear from you every day. And then I’ve even gone as far as thinking, are we gonna see a pull into where you’re not gating things with your name and email requiring an opt-in?

Like, are we gonna see a direction where we, we use ads to push content, like visibility ads heavier to get them in front of the right people? And then are we gonna use DM, back and forth DM, not even going to email list? Are we gonna use ungated content, so it’s on a page and someone consumes it right there?

Someone goes right from there to booking a call or right from there to purchasing? I don’t know. I don’t know the answer to these things, but these are things I’ve thought about wanting to test. I also think maybe you could think about adjusting copy to be speaking to a- an agent. Like, are we gonna have to change our marketing copy when we send out emails to speak to an agent to be able to try to get it through the agent to the person, and what is that gonna look like?

And I’d be so curious today how many people have agents filtering their emails. Like, is it as much as I think it is? Is it not quite? You know, I, I should do a poll on my Instagram. I’d be curious from you guys. Like, do you read your emails? Do you read your promotional emails from the brands that you like and the brands that you trust?

So I think that in 2027 The focus on how can you pour into places where you are capturing attention and you somehow it’s direct. So it’s content in the form of social media, podcast, YouTube, or it is some sort of community that you have. I know a lot of people have turned towards doing something like Substack maybe it’s a school community, something where you own being able to get that attention.

And then when we look at funnels, do we need to start… You know, this is something I’m gonna probably start testing in my own business. Do we need to do more DM funnels, less worrying about getting email leads, more DM, more text messages? Because I know I still read my text messages. You can send me a promotional text message, and I get annoying ones and, but I open them and delete them.

You know, I see them. So it’s– I think people will still read their text messages. I think people will still read their DMs. And I think maybe we can get through the agents to people, you know, in, with specific copy, but you’re gonna have to massively change the way you write the copy, ’cause you’re gonna write it for an agent.

So that’s something I’m, I am thinking about, and I am going to be testing as we go into 2027 with myself first, I’m always the guinea pig, and then with clients. You know, and I do think some industries will be impacted faster than others. I think the B2B crowd will turn towards agents faster, already has, already is. I think the B2C, so if you’re in health and wellness, you’re targeting a mom, you’re targeting consumers I think they will be slower to pick up AI and have an agent be managing their emails. So that matters, too. But I think going into 2027, the most important thing you can do is go, “What’s my long game?”

Like starting now, what’s my long game? I’ve talked about this on the podcast. Like content is a slow burn. It is not going to get you initial fast sales, but it will start to pick up momentum and it’s extremely valuable because someone who follows you, you have their attention. I mean, somebody who follows you, consumes your content, watches your stories on Instagram, you have their attention and that is the most valuable asset.

And you have it in a deep way because throughout their day or every single day, they’re having an interaction with you, which is really rare, right? To be able to get someone that far into your customer journey that you have that level of a relationship with them. So for your 2027, I would sit down and think about what’s the slow burn?

What is the consistency? Where is the place that I’m gonna show up, I’m gonna get better at creating, I’m going to build my audience, I’m gonna nurture my audience? And no matter what, I don’t care about the numbers, I’m gonna show up and create this content so that I can build this so that when it becomes a necessity to be able to be a successful business because it’s the number one place that you are getting traction, you have it.

I do think we’ll be able to use ads to amplify content and I– right now I teach visibility ads and they only get, you know, 5% of the total monthly budget usually for an account, but maybe that is gonna shift. Maybe we need to put more percentage there so we can push out content, you know, and get people paying attention to a brand and as a follower and get them in, versus like as lead generation starts to be harder.

And then that begs the question of, okay, what about webinars? If someone signs up for a webinar, you have to almost position the funnel now to be like it’s gonna go through an agent. So write it as if it’s a super important meeting that they cannot miss and make sure it gets added to their calendar.

Fascinating. It’s fascinating me. I’ve been thinking about this all week and I’m like, “We’re gonna have to change. Part of our marketing is going to be to agents, to get through agents to the human.” Is the very soon, if not already here reality, and I, I think a lot of people’s marketing has… is not caught up to that, and I would like to test some things.

I wish you could do a test and see the percentage of people that, like, are opening your emails if it’s them or agents. And then communities. And, you know, I do think that doing things that are gonna create connection, so whether that’s in-person events or live calls or having a community where people are.

I have my Obsessed membership. I honestly don’t talk about it enough and push it e-enough, but it’s like a $7 a month community of, like, 100 people in there. And things like that, it’s something I own and have the attention of these people who are in this community with me, and I can deliver content, and I know I can get through to them.

I can connect with them. It, it’s so easy now to make things like you know, an app. If you are a, a fitness company or that would make sense for your business, like an actual app that someone has and gets in the habit of looking at every day, again, that’s gold value for your business. today we cannot be marketing for the last five years.

E-everything, like especially this year, it all kind of like clicked and merged, and e-everything is changing. And the way that humans are now interacting is changing because of agents. And I think we will go through this phase also where people use too much AI, and they get really lazy with it, and it diminishes their creativity and their magic and their content and even their products Because it does take a discipline to not use AI to tell you how to think.

And as you use it, you do have to be very intentional that it’s not filling in things that you don’t agree with or that, you know, aren’t as deep as you would go. And so for me, like, we really don’t… I, I think AI actually sucks at all marketing strategy. Like, I’ve tested it. Even in my AI that’s, like, pretty good because it has all my stuff and my trainings, and it will give me suggestions that I’m like, “That is a terrible idea.”

So marketing strategy, it really sucks at that, and especially at making it custom to a business. It’s not the best at copy. I mean, I think it can help with pieces of copy and, like, refining headlines or giving you different options for, like, punchy one-liners. It’s just not the best at copy. I mean, I have two full-time copywriters, and we potentially need more because the human has…

That’s, that’s actually out of all the AI I’ve built, I haven’t touched copy because we already have some… What it’s good at, what it’s good at is pulling a bunch of stuff in the client’s voice into one spot, like transcripts and past emails and all that. It’s great at that. Actually writing the copy, it’s not very good at.

It’s also not good at content and creative. and actually, like, being able to take the creator’s unique magic and amplify that, AI cannot do. It just, it can’t. And I actually don’t think it will ever get there. And I think there’s gonna be a huge, desire for human-created content. I think it’s gonna become the new luxury, and I think that people who create and really pour their time into creating content in that way are gonna do really well That’s why I am really pushing use AI to make it so that you have as much possible time for that creation so that you can use AI for all the… H- honestly, what AI is great at is operations. It’s good at operations and admin and quality control and finance management. I mean, I have it doing so much in those categories.

It’s not good at marketing, at creativity, at art, you know, all those. So use it to make all of that easier in your business and life. And then what you will need to do is have more depth when it comes to your actual art, which is in the form of content, long form, short form. It’s your webinars, if you do a webinar, like your actual presentation.

It’s connecting, you know, whether that’s in a community, in DMs, however that is happening, connecting with your audience. Those are the things that AI should not be doing. And I’m telling you, like, like I just said, people are gonna… There is going to be a, a crowd, a wave of entrepreneurs who create everything with AI.

And you will be able to see it, and they will not be successful, I think even out the gate. Like, when someone gives me a webinar, and they’re like, “Can you look at this?” And I see that AI wrote it, it’s like, it’s not infused with you. Of course, it’s not gonna do well. Like, you cannot use Claude to actually write your webinar out and make your slides.

It’s gonna sound like AI every single time. So as we head into 2027, I think that the most important thing you can do is figure out what’s your long game, what’s your slow burn, where are you investing, like putting in the penny every single day, investing and growing that slow burn, that content, that capturing of attention.

And then what in your marketing are you going to have to adjust as we move towards the reality of to get to a human, you’re gonna go through an agent, which is so crazy, and that we’re gonna have AI talking to AI. And I do think that’s going to make an impact on the way that we do email marketing, for sure.

And mostly that. And then saying, you know, do we try a new strategy? Do we try an ungated strategy? Do we try to leverage DMs more? Do we try… Text message marketing is hard because there’s so many regulations, and it is so expensive. Like, anytime I send a broadcast out to all my text message you know, list, it’s like, I don’t even know, I pay, like, $200 a text or something.

And it’s super annoying because I get, like, all these $20 charges, so I don’t even know how much it costs. Anyways, and then how can you prioritize using AI to implement s- and run systems in your company that allows you more capacity for your art? And my hope is that w- that’s what AI allows us to do. M- that is my hope.

I hope that across the board, AI takes things that humans don’t need to do anymore and somehow creates the capacity that they can do more things that they love, more things that only humans can do, and genuinely your art, which your art is not in the form of just, like, painting or drawing. Your art is your expression, and how can you express and connect with other humans in the best way possible?

So use AI not to replace that, but to create capacity for that. And then you have to think about your ideal customer, and going, “If they know that they have an agent or they have AI who can do X, Y, and Z, how do I still stay relevant? How do I still stay solving the problem, serving them, getting them what they want faster and easier?”

And that’s where this cohort that I’m running is gonna come down to. It’s gonna come down to pulling out what can only you do that you can amplify with AI, but you can essentially create a better product, a better service for your ideal customer. as we end this year and head into the next, I mean, the reality is this.

I was just saying this to a friend and, and no one knows what’s gonna happen. No one has any prediction of what’s gonna happen with AI. There’s so many scenarios. I mean, it could get so expensive and unsustainable that we end up not being able to use it as much as we think. Like, that’s, that’s a very real reality.

We also could go down a path where- 30% of the workforce loses their job and we have a really dark time. I don’t know what’s gonna happen. All I know is I can only control how I show up and how I choose to leverage it, and how I choose to serve and support with it, and it is very much here and changing everything.

I choose to not be afraid of it because what’s the point? Like, it’s here. I believe all, all of us chose to come into the world right now during this time knowing that this was gonna happen. And so the path is already gonna play out how it’s gonna play out. What can you do? Which I believe all of us have a purpose, have gifts, have magic that in this life we are given that we will never be given again.

And so how can you use that for good? How can you use that for your greatest impact? And that is truly the only thing that we can control. And so the more I get AI doing chores, the more capacity I will have for art, and that’s my hope for everybody. So that’s what I got for you guys today to think about and ponder.

I have been thinking about it a lot this week, especially the email marketing thing. I’m like, “What is this gonna do to email marketing?” ‘Cause I don’t know about you guys, but like I don’t, I don’t check my email. But I will say there are some messages that get through to me from my agent that are definitely spam and they’re not real, but it’s because people make it seem like it’s a real appointment or it’s really important.

So these marketing, typical email marketing formats are not going to necessarily continue to work, is my prediction. So we’ll be testing some different things, but I’ve been thinking about this all week and like, how could I test this and see how it does? And then also how can I continue to focus on the areas where I own the attention?

Because I think we’re gonna lose the attention of email marketing. But we still do have social media, text message, DMs, communities. That’s where people will still… People still will wanna connect, and I think that actually is gonna increase how much people want that connection because they’re gonna build these walls with their agents between communicating with humans.

So all right, everybody, I will talk to you next time.