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Visibility.
It was once the most common answer I heard when I asked marketing leaders what was wrong with their content operations. “We have limited visibility into the content planned and produced and how effective it is,” they would say.
A CMO of a Fortune 1000 company even admitted that she learned about the company's thought leadership by subscribing to the newsletter. “I have no idea what they're planning,” she said.
In the last two years this word has faded.
Generative AI stormed into our vocabularies and accompanied the creation of content in the content. Speed and volume are the new watchwords, and senior executives appear to have retreated into content waste as the cost of doing business.
“Visibility? Meh. Why do we worry about it when we're producing so quickly? What's the worst that can happen? It's not needed?”
Well, yes. And that is exactly the problem. I talk about it and the solutions in this video. Read on for even more details.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxdq2otsfnk
The same logic was applied to digital ad spend. Despite estimates that 22% of all AD budgets are lost to fraud, only 23% of marketing leaders in a 2023 survey described fraud as a concern. 14% said they were “not worried.”
Now we're sleeping in the same room with content strategy – or more accurately, the lack of one. Forrester estimates that 65% of customer-facing content goes unused due to issues with discoverability, relevance, or quality.
Let's do some quick math: If marketers recovered even half of that wasted content, could overall marketing results improve?
The messy content machine
Consider how raw ideas become marketing messages, thought leadership, articles, and campaigns. This process – now supercharged (or messed up) by generative AI – usually starts with someone creating or curating the “right” inputs to feed the content machine.
Leaders may set the themes, but those themes are soon distorted by siled teams with tools that promise efficiency but deliver chaos.
Here's the irony: Ai was supposed to make this easier.
Spoiler: It doesn't.
AI amplifies the chaos. Ideas are invisible until they are transformed into content. And without visibility, companies fall into the same trap: content is everyone’s job, but no one’s strategy.
Frontline teams use AI to pump out hyper-specific content for immediate needs. Meanwhile, central teams struggle to manage the tidal wave of content or hesitate to trust it all – because they have no visibility into what's generated by AI and what's made by humans.
Imagine you run an automobile assembly company. The average car has 30,000 parts along a line that is about 1,000 feet long.
Now imagine you only have visibility into the last 50 feet. You would have no idea how many cars are coming, what models, and whether anyone has replaced an important part.
This is what many organizations' content operations look like today: No visibility, no targeting, and no control.
The fear factor in content collaboration
At the heart of this visibility crisis is a deeper, often overlooked issue: a fear of collaboration.
I've noticed this fear growing in recent years – especially in environments where production speed is a priority. Collaboration is often perceived as a bottleneck that requires more time for multiple voices to be heard, consensus and conflict to be resolved. Simply put, the focus shifted from “crafting with intention” to “publishing for speed.”
AI has only added to this challenge, increasing the tension between speed and meaningful collaboration. Let's unpack this further:
Fear of losing control (to the machine)
A global company I worked with tried to use AI to grow massive amounts of SEO-focused content. But regional teams often find it tone-deaf and irrelevant. Leadership is reluctant to work with regional teams to improve relevance, fearing they will “pollute” AI training data or slow production. The result? AI content that is fast but increasingly ineffective.
Fear of too much process
At one SaaS company, the CEO proudly claimed, “Genai will soon replace mid-level employees.” They have implemented AI tools for everything – content creation, analysis, release schedules, etc., but without a collaborative framework, the tools have become operations. Teams generate more content but lack strategic direction. The result? Algorithmic disorder.
(This situation reminds me of actor and director Ben Affleck's comment on AI and art: “AI is an artisan at best… artisans know how to work. Art knows when to stop.”)
Fear of failure (in the AI spotlight)
I know of a medium-sized consultancy that used AI tools to centralize content marketing creation. But I also know that individual practitioners fear that the shared system will reveal their work as less polished. So they tried to use their own models. Instead of fostering collaboration, AI reinforced silos. The result? Missed opportunities and a more complicated case for future AI investments.
Generative AI will perform much better in environments with precise inputs, processes and collaboration.
Logistics offers a perfect analogy: AI optimizes supply chains when it has complete visibility into raw materials, production stages and delivery schedules. Your “supply chain” content is no different.
Embrace the AI-infused chaos
Here's the uncomfortable truth: AI doesn't eliminate our content chaos – it amplifies it.
Regional teams continue to create their own content. Subject experts still upload slide decks that do not align with the strategy. AI will still generate headlines that sound right but miss the point.
And that's fine – as long as there's a mechanism to make the chaos visible to the people who need the content to mean something.
Think of your content strategy and the visibility it provides as air traffic control. They don't dictate every takeoff or landing. But you need to know what's in the air, what's ready to launch, and what's grounded.
Generative AI isn't going away – it's just becoming more central to content creation. The first step to thriving in this new era is regaining visibility.
How to start:
- Map your content supply chain: Identify each stage of content creation, including when AI contributes.
- Test and choose collaborative tools: Prioritize tools that improve visibility and teamwork, not just automation.
- Build a culture of partnership: Embrace AI as a tool that works with the individuals on your team and their role in the process, not instead of them.
- Slow down to speed up: Sometimes the most effective way forward is to pause, reflect, and create intentional friction in your content process. This pause isn't about delaying progress – it's about ensuring sharper focus, encouraging creativity, and making decisions that lead to impactful, sustainable momentum.
It's your story. AI can help you tell it – but it still needs you (and a strategy) to run it.
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Hand injured content:
Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute
Create your very own Auto Publish News/Blog Site and Earn Passive Income in Just 4 Easy Steps
