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Interview with an Elusive Human Graphics Designer By Jennifer L. Jacobson and Amanda Foster-Best  Face it; your brand’s reliance on generative AI graphics is making you look bad, and that’s not just me, a marketing executive of 25+ years, who thinks it. Your customers notice it too, and not in a good way. Visually, AI is everywhere, as bog standard as the “follow us on Facebook” icon was in 2011. From your local food truck who wanted a quick eye-catching vinyl wrap with “almost” Disney-like characters, to every small business who just hired their teenage nephew to run their social media page, you can’t escape the slop! The late revolutionary's words ring true now, more than ever: I don’t want that much organization in my life! We need more fruitcakes in this world! We need people that care! I’m mad as hell and I don’t want to take it anymore!” Real marketers and creatives with real experience are being told to step back and be wowed by what middle management can “create” without having ever attended one art school lecture.
And believe me, I get it; creating unified brand visuals that work across social media, your website, printed materials, YouTube, TV advertisements, and more can be overwhelming for anyone. But you don’t have to struggle alone. You can find and hire a graphics designer, often a local one, and get your brand’s visual house in order while supporting the creative economy and looking fabulous. You’ve tried and failed to get generative AI slop to work for you. The good news is, there’s time to do the right thing and get your shit together. I talked with graphics designer Amanda Foster-Best, about what makes a good powerful visual brand, why it matters so much, and more. How to Actually Connect with Your Audience In the Age of AI Slop - The Case for Staying Feral7/28/2026
 After twenty-five years in marketing and PR, the biggest takeaways I can tell anyone interested in the craft is to learn the art of storytelling, and learn how to think like your audience. It really is that simple. It's all about your story, but it's also about how you position it. Is your brand launching a new app, or are you improving the way people interact with each other? Is your nonprofit doing an end of year capital campaign, or are you inviting donors to help you navigate potential challenges in the coming year? Find the better story and learn how to tell it with honesty, sincerity, and key facts. Good PR is a Garden. So often people think of PR as "spin" or "hype" and that kind of PR is often not only dishonest, it's also short-lived. I like the kind of storytelling that requires me to sit with clients, learn who they are, what they think, who they serve, and how the hell they are making the world a better place. Then I look for the stories that will best highlight this. I look for ways to weave that into larger narratives in the world. It's not rocket science. It's not even a formula; it's a garden. It's a method of planting seeds in one season, of harvesting in another, of planting plants that want to hang out together, of introducing positive microbes to the soil, and of being mindful of outside forces that may impact the garden. Not every seed you plant will grow and that's ok. Some seeds have a completely different lifecycle than others, and that's ok. Some seeds grow into plants that yield fruit every year, others need to be replanted every year. It's all ok and it's all welcome.
Finding a Good Marketer Nowadays. I believe marketing should be something that most people can understand, and I work hard to help my clients understand what good marketing really is. I'm tired of tech bros in marketing spouting off acronyms at their customers like everyone in the room has an MBA. There's no 100% proven formula that every brand should follow. There's no "do these five things" guarantee to business success with your email marketing campaigns. Don't trust people who try and sell you their system, despite never having met you. Instead, look for those who genuinely care, who get results, love what they do, and who are dedicated to their craft. These will be people who have walked the marketing path with hundreds of brands and they know how to guide you to a future that works for you. So now we come to the part of the timeline where AI is not only in the picture, it's screaming at the top of our feeds, it's literally "making" news. It's 30% of the videos promoted to us online (not an official statistic, but more of a speculative one). A lot of brands are wondering how to stand out from the slop, whether or not they should use AI to make their marketing materials, and what the future of customer engagement looks like now. So here is my honest opinion, and yes, it flies against the multi-billion dollar agenda Big Tech wants us all to believe. Friends, this is a time when being human matters. Being weird matters. Being authentic matters. The truth is, it has always mattered, but they gave us cell phones and social media feeds to doomscroll so that we would become more distracted, anxious, and easy to control.
 If you’ve been online for more than a minute, your feed is probably flooded with pro-AI articles and tips about getting the most out of this absolutely perfect, never-fails, product that can solve world hunger, vibe code the perfect social media platform, and do your job so you don’t have to. I know. AI is truly a wonder to behold at all times. Everyone should use it. Constantly. For everything.
But there is one thing that the one percent still doesn’t want you to know. They’re hiding it from you Neo. It’s this one secret that has kept them wealthy and in places of power for years. That’s right; I’m talking about potatoes. Yes, the humble potato. Everyone at the top knows that it is the ultimate secret to success. And it’s about time we started giving the humble potato the credit it deserves.  I was at SXSW the year that Yamtrader.com launched. The booth was a giant yam. People were invited to get a $50 gift card for trading in an actual, physical yam. It was weird and Yamtrader was something people talked about.
I have rarely seen its level of absurdity matched in modern marketing, though many have tried. Behind the whole operation was Tri-Net, an HR, payroll company that provided services for startups. The company was trying to showcase what a bad startup was, but that’s beside the point.  Credit: CBS (from the 2026 Grammy Awards show, "In Memoriam" segment, which was amazing!) For many of today’s musicians, being on live, nationally televised awards shows comes about as naturally as a cat, walking calmly, through a busy dog park." Nowadays, a broadcasted, live awards show is, as the youth today say, generally “fighting for its life." If you've watched live awards shows for decades, much of the polish and presentation has suffered in recent years. I recently saw a post from a mutual about how the Grammy Awards have changed since the late 2010s, and how artists aren't appearing as disciplined and intentional. Now artists just “appear.” As someone who has studied broadcasting and music specifically, I have my reasons as to why this is.
In the Age of AI Our Relationship to Creativity Matters - and other Feral PR Consultant insights12/14/2025
 A Random Person’s LinkedIn Post: "Look what I made with generative AI!"
Me: * Looks at content. Looks at profile. Rolls eyes. * They're an AI influencer, helping companies go from idea to product in record time. They have no background in creating. I'm guessing these are the same people who didn't take art classes in school, didn't go to art shows, have never gone to a gallery or museum and been swept away emotionally by a work of art that spoke to them. They don't have a relationship with art, so they don't know art when they see it. The Problem: When you refuse to acknowledge people's relationship with art, you're at risk for losing your relationship with empathy and the best of humanity. I Fixed the TIME Magazine 2025 Cover So You Don’t Have To - musings from a Feral PR Consultant12/13/2025
 You’ve probably seen the 2025 TIME Magazine Person of the Year cover, elevating tech titans as the Architects of AI, on the humble I-beam.
As a marketer and PR professional who has studied propaganda, my heaviest takeaway is this: TIME has been compromised, again. TIME is not reflecting or reporting on reality. It’s trying to create a new one And who does that benefit? How does that change how people in the future think about history? The picture suggests:
 “We’re just not ready for PR,” or, “We’re at a point where we don’t need PR,” are things I’ve heard potential clients say to me, and some of those clients were right. They didn’t need PR at that time. And, while not paying thousands a month for public relations can save you money, doing so at the wrong time can cost you in the loss of customers, failing brand loyalty, and possibly the downfall of your entire business or organization.
So how do you, the founder or manager of a startup, nonprofit, or emerging brand, actually know when you need PR? I’ve set up some questions to help you decide for yourself if your brand actually needs PR right now.  By Jennifer L. Jacobson, Founder of Jacobson Communication
What if I told you I could save your new startup tens of thousands of dollars on public relations costs, and position your unique brand for success better than big-box, bulky, one-size-fits-all PR firms? I’d have your attention, right? Well, it’s true. I want your startup to succeed, and I want public relations to play a big role in that success. In my decades in public relations, I’ve worked with hundreds of startups across all levels; from brand new entrepreneurial passion projects seeking patents, to established startups seeking acquisition. At some point they all need public relations, but this can be an expensive, confusing, and time-consuming process.  AI offers a tempting prospect; a shorter, less labor-intensive path to written content creation. What marketing director wouldn't want that? Yet, while there are times when using AI can help you see things differently and while there are times when it might clarify your understanding of a complex subject, when it comes to the creative and strategic writing side of comms, I strongly caution you against the use of AI.
On the surface it looks harmless; you’re going to type in some prompts and use what AI spits out to make a press release. But don’t be fooled. |
Jacobson Communication is a one-woman PR firm that delivers game-changing public relations and brand development to extraordinary clients with a story to share.
AI AND POTATOES!
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Land AcknowledgementAcknowledgement to the southern Lushootseed-speaking Coast Salish Indigenous Peoples whose land I live and work on.
This land also includes the traditional land and waterways of the first people of Seattle, the Duwamish People of past and present. It is with honor and gratitude to the land itself, the plants, animals, and the Duwamish Tribe that I practice my work. This land is also on and adjacent to the traditional homelands and waterways of the Puyallup Tribe. The Puyallup people have lived on and stewarded these lands since the beginning of time and continue to do so today. I recognize that this land acknowledgement is one small step toward true allyship, and I commit to uplifting the voices, experiences, and histories of the Indigenous people of this land and beyond. To learn more about the Puyallup Tribal Language program, visit: https://www.puyalluptriballanguage.org It is my hope that we all deepen our understanding, awareness, and relationship to where we live in the world, and that we, individually and as a group, do our part to heal the wounds caused by genocide, enslavement, displacement, and other such atrocities, many of which have been intentionally carried forward into our present day and built into modern systems of power. Here is a list of books that might help you on your way to decolonizing the mind.
My thoughts are my own, and not necessarily those of my clients or those I work with. May your thoughts also be your own. Ready to Tell Your Story? Let's Talk!Have a cookie. Click below.
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Copyright 2026 Jennifer Jacobson Jacobson Communication, The Feral PR Consultant 
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