Your customers hate AI. The numbers are hard to ignore. A Quinnipiac University poll found that 55% of US adults believe AI will bring “more harm than good,” up from 44% just a year ago. Booking.com‘s research puts 26% of consumers in the “AI detractor” category, actively opposed to using it. NBC News found that nearly half of those surveyed hold a negative view of AI.
This isn’t a niche concern. It’s a mainstream sentiment. And if you’re still planning to use AI to grow your business, it’s your problem to solve.
What makes this more than a PR challenge is that many of the criticisms are valid. There will be job disruptions. Deep fakes and misinformation are real. Environmental and energy costs are escalating. And when corporate leaders publicly predict 20–30% unemployment in the next few years while announcing layoffs “because of AI,” they’re making your customers’ concerns worse, not better.
This episode is about what you can actually do about it. Tim offers four practical steps that let you use AI in ways that don’t put you on the wrong side of the backlash.
Key Insights for Strategic Leaders
In this episode, Tim Peter breaks down:
- The AI favorability gap is widening. It’s a business problem, not just a PR one. 55% of US adults now believe AI will cause more harm than good, up from 44% a year ago. 26% of consumers actively oppose AI. These aren’t fringe opinions, they’re how your customers feel. If you’re using AI to grow your business, you need a strategy for addressing this, not a plan to wait it out.
- Customer criticisms are built on valid ground. Job disruptions are already happening. Deep fakes and “nudify” apps demonstrate real harms. Environmental costs are real. Acknowledging the validity of your customers’ concerns isn’t a weakness. It’s your only honest starting point. Companies that dismiss concerns as irrational are setting themselves up for a backlash that’s entirely avoidable.
- History offers hope, but doesn’t dismiss the short-term. Technology has been disrupting jobs since before the telephone operator. The US workforce today is more than three times larger than when “Desk Set” — a 1957 film about office workers afraid computers would take their jobs — came out. That’s the long run. As Keynes said, in the long run we’re all dead. Your customers need to pay rent in the short run too. Both things can be true. And you must acknowledge those very real concerns.
- Four steps to use AI without losing your customers. First, follow the law — disclosure requirements around AI are evolving rapidly, and you need competent counsel to understand your exposure. Second, understand the message you’re sending: are you helping or hurting your workforce, your community, your customers? Third, develop your own voice. Content quantity is not the goal, content quality is. Know what you want the output to sound like and feel like before you ask AI to help create it. Fourth, and most importantly: be human.
- “Be human” is not a platitude — it’s the only durable strategy. Your job in marketing, sales, and customer experience is to create customers: to connect with people in ways that make them want to work with your business. That job doesn’t change when you use AI. If you’re not using AI to make your customers’ lives better, you need to ask yourself what on earth you’re using it for.
- You are sending a message when you use AI. Make sure it’s the one you mean to send. Customers are already choosing not to work with businesses because of how those businesses approach AI. Ignoring their concerns won’t make them go away. It will only make it look like you don’t care. And then AI won’t be the thing the customers hate. They might just hate you too.
Whether you’re in hospitality, B2B, retail, or services — and especially if you’re the leader who has to answer “what’s our AI strategy?” while customer sentiment is moving in the wrong direction — this episode gives you a practical framework for using AI in ways that build trust rather than erode it.
55% of People Hate AI: How to Use it Without Losing Your Customers (Digital Reset Episode 493) — Headlines and Show Notes
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Related Episodes
Buy the Book — Digital Reset: Driving Marketing and Customer Acquisition Beyond Big Tech
Tim Peter has written a new book called Digital Reset: Driving Marketing Beyond Big Tech. You can learn more about it here on the site. Or buy your copy on Amazon.com today.
Past Appearances
Rutgers Business School MSDM Speaker: Series: a Conversation with Tim Peter, Author of “Digital Reset”
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