Whether we like it or not, social media channels are in a phase of rapid change because of AI.
TikTok creator Roberto Nickson called AI an “infinite content machine” and predicted that content output will 100x in the next decade.
If content quality and volume are no longer bottlenecks, what happens when:
Doubters write off AI by saying “The quality still isn’t there — AI images look uncanny, avatars seem robotic, and the writing is obvious.”
Betting on these issues lasting feels risky given how fast the tools are improving.
In Nickson’s video, he summarizes this shift as one:
“from production moats (quality, volume) to taste and distribution moats.”
I agree. Winning in this new landscape hinges on two human‑powered advantages:
Here’s how to build your brand with these differentiators before the AI tidal wave hits.
AI has stripped away the last barriers to production.
When content production costs and turnaround times shrink, the volume of posts hitting our feeds shoots straight up.
This creates an unexpected side effect: content quality parity across the internet.
If anyone can hit a “good‑enough” standard with a few prompts, then looking and sounding polished is no longer a way to standout.
Algorithms feel the strain, too.
Faced with endless variations on the same templates and hooks, they throttle repetitive formats, making sheer output an unreliable growth strategy.
Audiences adapt just as quickly.
Crisp visuals and clean scripts used to be enough to halt the scroll. Now, viewers skim faster through feeds of quality content, subconsciously raising the bar for what earns a pause, a like, or a share.
The two moats that once protected brands and creators — superior quality and publishing volume — are at risk.
To stand out in feeds that refresh at machine-like speed, we need a new source of defensibility for our brands—both personal brands and corporate.
Distribution has always been key to marketing.
However, our primary distribution channels are being challenged:
In this landscape, reach you don’t control or own is borrowed time.
Owned distribution channels, like email and community platforms, have always been invaluable for this reason.
That’s why we see community platforms thriving and major creators and brands promoting their own niche communities more than ever — platforms and forums like Substack, email lists, Reddit, SMS threads, private Discord servers, etc.
While social networks are risky because we don’t control our reach or the platform’s longevity, these channels are portable and permission‑based.
The best creators are finding ways to do soft hand‑offs on their top of funnel channels to their owned channels, creating resilient content and brand ecosystems.
This converts increasingly sparse, hard-earned social attention into connections you can reach at will without having to compete with AI content.
A thousand subscribers who reply, comment, and purchase outperform a hundred‑thousand silent followers.
That’s why making fewer, higher quality connections is key.
And in the landscape we just discussed, the things that don’t scale are most impactful in building those connections:
Touch points like these tighten the bond and raise engagement signals that social algorithms still respect.
If TikTok actually gets banned, SEO dries up, or another marketing channel fades, owning your audience becomes your brand’s lifeline.
AI can now crank out decent visuals, copy, and audio on demand.
What it still can’t do is care — or sense which ideas feel fresh and which ones are saturated.
Taste is our selective instinct. It’s the ability to spot what’s new, relevant, and on-brand for our unique voices.
When everyone can create decent content, knowing what to create becomes most important.
Even before AI has significantly impacted our feeds, these unique calling cards are what make content and brands stand out. That’s why we follow the creators we connect with, even if they are creating similar content to someone else.
Some of my favorite recent examples of taste:
Maybe some of these creators use ChatGPT to help come up with post ideas. Perhaps they use Midjourney to help create their visuals.
We don’t know. And the key point is we don’t care.
What we care about is the fact that they came up with content ideas and a delivery that resonated with us. That’s taste. And that’s what’s going to keep standing out as our social feeds ebb and flow with AI content trends and algorithm updates.
While taste is rooted in our perception and preferences, it gets sharper the more we feed it — the more great content we consume, the more patterns we spot, and the better we get at curating what matters.
We can learn a lot from those creator examples—not just in what they post, but in how they apply and express their taste to make their content unique.
Here are a few ways to be intentional about how you apply and showcase your taste:
As AI tools make quality content the norm, taste becomes our compass — guiding us on what to create, putting our unique stamp on our content, and finding ways to resonate and connect with our audiences.
We’re in a moment where applying AI to amplify taste and distribution gives creators and brands a rare advantage.
Right now, it’s still very possible to grow organically on social media. And AI can help you do it faster — from brainstorming ideas to producing polished content. But as more people adopt these tools, sameness will spread, and standing out will get harder.
It’s a window of brand-building arbitrage that won’t stay open forever.
As AI output floods our feeds, the differences between our posts will blur, algorithms will continue to ration organic reach, and attention will be even harder to earn.
That makes the present and near future a critical period of time for brand building.
To seize this moment, double down on the two moats most likely to survive the AI flood:
Some creators are already doing this exceptionally well — combining top-of-funnel reach with intentional taste and owned channels to build content ecosystems that last:
These creators have built brand systems where their unique top of funnel content is fuel for their owned channels.
This not only deepens and increases the value of their connections with their audiences, it also protects their brands amid marketing channel uncertainty.
Because when this all plays out, the creators and brands able to sustain and grow won’t be the ones who published the most content.
It will be the ones whose content people can’t wait to open, delivered on channels algorithms can’t take away and AI can’t saturate.
If you’re building that kind of brand — one that lasts beyond the feed — now’s the time to double down on two things you can own: distribution and taste.
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