Competing For Work in the Age of AI

Camille Moore wrote an interesting Substack article called: “Snapchat Lost 1 Billion Dollars Because It Failed To Tell A Story.” While this is predominantly an article about a failure in technology marketing, there was one paragraph that caught my eye.

She wrote: “The brands earning premium prices in 2026 are the ones doing the work to articulate their value clearly enough that customers can repeat it back to a friend without hesitation. If your customer cannot explain, in their own words, why your price is what it is, your brand has a storytelling problem.”

A STORY-TELLLING PROBLEM

These days, with competitors spanning the globe and pricing options starting at “free” and moving up, finding work and keeping clients is harder than ever.

In the past, even as recently as five years ago, our technology skills – knowing how media production hardware and software worked – was a big enough barrier to entry that finding work, while never “easy,” was “easier.”

Today, the power of smartphones, combined with the wide availability of easy-to-use editing tools, means that barrier has disappeared. Throw in the wild card of “AI does everything,” means traditional business is thoroughly out of hand.

I’ve said for years that the most import client list is not those who you know, but those who know you AND know what you know.

We recently had to replace our entire heating system, after the first installer badly screwed up. This meant that we weren’t looking for a plumber with “HVAC” in their company name, but someone who really knew how to properly install a complete system. It wasn’t enough to know who they were, we needed to know what they knew.

The only way to compete with “free because it’s AI” or “I’ll just ask my cousin Fred to do this,” is to explain how and what we do that will make a difference in the results.

IT’S NOT WHAT WE WANT, BUT WHAT THE CLIENT NEEDS

The gift each of us have is the ability to combine audio and visual images into a compelling story. While story-telling is essential in any communication today, it isn’t enough to simply tell a story, we need to tell a story that interests and connects with the target audience.

Investors want to know “how does this idea grow in the future?” Consumers want to know “what’s in it for me?” Clients want to know “how does this make money for my company right now?” The answer to each of these questions is: a compelling story.

We create emotional attraction – a story that enables viewers to care about what they watch. Little Finder Guy is a perfect example. Simple, attractive, compelling and, now, pervasive. For some strange reason, we all care about this little guy.

Our personal stories, the stories we use to find and close business, should not be based on what we know, but on how we use our knowledge, our skills, our tools and our passion to tell stories that make audiences care. We create stories that emotionally connect the audience with the client.

AI can only repeat what’s been done before. Cousin Fred may know how to point a camera and edit using CapCut, but he doesn’t understand framing, or lighting, or audio, or actors, or blocking, or all the tools of production to tell stories with emotion.

Even worse, neither AI nor Fred understand that creating a shot is not the same as telling a story. That’s where we come in.

WHAT TO PITCH

As you pitch your skills looking for new clients, here are some ideas to keep in mind:

• What every client wants to know is how THEY benefit from working with you?
• Remind clients that you have the ability to make people care. This is true whether you are creating a wedding video, a dog food commercial, or an indie film.
• It isn’t just your knowledge of production that will get you the job. It’s your knowledge of what the client actually needs.

It is critical that we know more than just how to shoot or how to edit. A basic understanding of life sciences would be a big help getting work with medical or pharmaceutical clients. Knowing math helps with space or science clients. Knowing marketing helps with commercials.

Do you speak multiple languages, know how to dance, deeply understand a sport, work well with children? All those interests that make each of us unique, also make each of us a unique story-teller. BUT, the client also needs to know you have those skills.

The more you know beyond production or post, the more valuable you become. Your knowledge provides informed guidance in structuring the script, improving the production or clarifying the edit. It prevents problems by realizing when something doesn’t make sense. In enables you to discuss concepts with the client using language and examples that they understand.

Just as we need to create stories in our videos, we also need to create stories about our skills – about ourselves. Not to invent skills we don’t have, or pretend to be who we aren’t, but to explain in an emotionally connected way why the unique skills we have will create a unique connection between the client and their audience.

Because AI did not invent Little Finder Guy. People like you did.