Generative AI, whether for copywriting, design, or animation, is definitely one of the most important changes to the business of creative agencies, but the tools don't have taste. They hand you the average of everything they've been trained on, and right now that average is easy to spot.

Here's what gives it away.

Start with the small interface details, because that's where the lack of care shows first. Look at the selected state on a navigation menu. A model will usually mark the active link with nothing more than a thin border, and that border sits unevenly, tight on one side and loose on the other. 

It's the same story with the little all-caps label that sits above a heading, the "eyebrow." The letter-spacing runs too wide, making the text get crammed against whatever is below it, and the space above never quite matches the space to the left. You'll spot a stray "status" tag dropped into a layout for no reason, with off spacing again. 

Another issue tends to be the lights. Little glows scattered across the page, soft blooms behind sections, particles drifting through a hero. They usually show up next to the other giveaway: a purple gradient, often sitting beside a gray that doesn't actually belong with it. 

Color and type are the next layer. AI reaches for the same few fonts every single time, Inter most of all, so a site built entirely in it feels anonymous before you've read a word. It tends to pile on colors too, and pack in more than a section needs, mistaking density for richness.

With Imagery you get either the generic stock photo everyone recognizes or a flat illustration filling in for something that should have been a real photograph. Even the icon set gives it away, since most tools default to the same one.

That's the difference an expert eye makes. It isn't that we avoid AI; we use it too. It's that we're the ones choosing the typeface, the palette, the spacing, the single glow that earns its spot. We give it a real reference to work from and a design system to stay inside, so what comes out looks like your brand instead of the average of everyone else's. AI can move a project along faster than ever. It still can't tell you what your brand should feel like. That part is the work, and it's the part worth paying for.

The main way to avoid all of this is to work closely with the client from the very start. We begin with branding and industry questionnaires, then build the brand guidelines together before any real design work starts. Only then do we bring in AI to help execute, always guided by a human who has been doing this work since long before these tools existed. That way we get the speed and usefulness of AI while the creative direction stays in the hands of a real person with real experience. The tools are fast, but taste and direction are still what make a brand worth trusting.