Claude and the Super Bowl: Finally, the first piece of effective AI brand strategy
Golden Encounters: Textbook "versus" positioning (watch the video below)
For three years, the AI category has been a branding wasteland. Every company looks the same, sounds the same, and pivots so frequently that even they’ve lost track of what they’re selling.
OpenAI becomes ChatGPT becomes GPT-4 becomes Canvas becomes whatever Sam Altman dreamed up last Tuesday. Google kills Bard, resurrects it as Gemini, then pretends nothing happened. Anthropic launches Claude 3, then 3.5, then sprinkles in Opus and Sonnet variants like a sommelier who can’t commit to a grape.
Ask a civilian which AI tool they use and you’ll get a blank stare. They’re not wrong to be confused. When every company offers chat, analysis, coding, and image generation on strikingly similar platforms, differentiation becomes impossible. There are too many billion-dollar players, bleeding too much mega-money, for that genericism to be sustainable.
But the first shards of genuine differentiation are finally emerging. And here’s the delicious irony: it’s happening because OpenAI is running out of money.
Interesting because Claude is hyperfocused on being ‘the CEO’s choice’ and dominating the enterprise sector.
So to see them roll out such effective brand advertising when they’re focused on B2B and professional services is a refreshing change, in more ways than one.