What Happened to Engaging Content: AI Slop is a Human Problem

Once a month, like clockwork, little Ryan would spend a weekend morning or weekday evening at the hair salon. It was a bonding ritual with my mother, and I loved everything about it—the smells, the sounds, and the gossip.

I also loved the magazines (so did everyone else). There was no better moment than when hair was covered in chemicals for perms or lightening—time to grab the latest issue and dive into a cover story, gossip column, or top-ten trend list.

The magazines were physical, not ephemeral, but still limited. You might only pick one up during your salon visit, skipping it at the grocery store. But those publications knew that once they had you, they didn’t want you to put it down.

The target was value, not views. What was an “impression” for a gossip magazine—circulation, distribution? It was a metric just as meaningful then as it is today with blogs, social media, and SERPs. The difference is that, in the pre-digital era, these metrics were mostly static and retrospective.

Like a weather forecast, they were data points to help optimize ad sales—not to guide creative ideation.

Today, our “circulation” metrics—reach, impressions, engagement—are dynamic and often real-time (though most of us don’t use them that way). Despite having instant data, we still compile content reports monthly or quarterly.

Aside: It’s great to talk about leveraging new digital and AI tools. But if we’re not even using the data tools we already have, how are we supposed to flourish with the next generation?

In print, impression share was a promise to advertisers—not a feedback loop for creators. The words and images on the page were meant to be memorable, to add value, to provoke thought, to start gossip between readers flipping through other magazines.

That same behavioral problem persists in content marketing today. We build headlines, briefs, and campaigns around KPIs—impressions, clicks, comments, shares.

But in digital product marketing, where do humans actually make decisions? On the landing pages. On the pricing pages. The places where story should lead them—and keep them.

A Key Performance Indicator is supposed to be an indicator, not the goal. Shaping creative decisions solely by indicator performance leads to content with no emotion.

And without emotion, there is no engagement. Your KPIs might stay strong long after the breath has left your copy and the soul has left your imagery.

You’ll report, “This TikTok ad is performing great—viewers are staying fifteen seconds longer now! Great call using that Jet2Holiday audio!”

But that data won’t tell you the viewers just set their phones down to stir their coffee or answer a DM.

These are human behavior problems. Generative AI will be popular and useful—but not equally useful to everyone. Like every new technology, it depends on how you use it.

Let’s circle back to that Y2K-era salon. If People magazine had told readers to close the issue and call a phone number to find out which soap-opera star was in trouble, how effective would that have been?

Gating aside, we’re heading toward a future where generative AI tools create a hyper-commoditized flood of content. It will perform. It will hit the KPIs. But it won’t convert. We’ll trade trusted data for noise.

In 2025, we don’t need to be getting a perm to sit down and read, watch, or listen. Circulation is effectively infinite. Targeting is Orwellian.

AI tools will accelerate your process. Make sure it’s the right process to accelerate.