At the end of this month, we’re finally getting to do something we’ve talked about for a long time: meet in person for our first-ever team retreat. We sat down with a few team members who’ll be joining us for the retreat and asked for their honest thoughts ahead of the festivities. One theme keeps coming up as we get closer: excitement around connection.

AI can show up in first drafts, brainstorm sessions, and content planning. Sometimes it’s intentional. Sometimes it’s informal. Often, it’s not talked about at all. Some people disclose when they use AI. Others don’t. In some cases, there’s no expectation either way. So people default to their own judgment. This is where inconsistency starts to show up.

New platform updates roll out constantly. Trends change weekly. Best practices evolve faster than most teams can keep up with. In the middle of all of this noise, one of the most valuable sources of insight is often already sitting in front of us: user behavior. The way people interact with your brand can reveal where you’re building momentum and where you’re creating friction.

To explain the concept of clarity through design, today we’re spotlighting long time partners Eighty2degrees, led by Ambica Prakash. The center of their approach is a simple idea: understanding the work first is what makes it possible to communicate it well. We sat down with Ambica to explore how that shows up in practice.

The term “AI fatigue” captures the very real exhaustion that comes with both creating and consuming AI-generated content. Marketers are burnt out from using it, and audiences are starting to reject it. If your goal is to grow your audience, build real connections, and earn trust, you can’t afford to sound like everyone else. Avoiding that outcome starts with being more intentional about how you use AI.

In the age of AI, internet user behavior has changed. People no longer rely on websites for information. Audiences get data from social posts, videos, and increasingly, AI-generated summaries. That’s why it’s time to revisit how your audience is discovering, learning about, and connecting with your brand and rethink your strategy to be up to the task.