Influencer - That Job Category Could Get Wiped Out by AI, Now What

"Pink-haired Aitana Lopez is followed by more than 200,000 people on social media. She posts selfies from concerts and her bedroom, while tagging brands such as hair care line Olaplex and lingerie giant Victoria’s Secret." - Ars Technica, December 29, 2023

Brands pay Lopez about $1,000 a post to promote their products and services. That's even though she is fictional, a presence created through Artificial Intelligence by Barcelona, Spain creative agency The Clueless. 

Human influencers in that $21 billion sector should be very frightened. Their source of revenue can go poof. 

Actually, brands may prefer the AI versions, which come across just as humans do in whatever context, because there is no threat of scandal from misconduct or worse (such as a youthful death). In addition and perhaps more importantly, AI-created influencers are billed at less than the human kind. In a sense the latter could be pricing themselves out of the market. 

So many youth, locked out of the traditional job market or simply underemployed, have turned to becoming an influencer. Intoxicated that they landed on their financial feet and into a seeming pot of gold they don't focus on the reality of the relatively short shelf lives of influencers. A common career trajectory is: At the top at age 19, totally over by 22. 

However, as we know, the career-planning solution isn't the old Get a Good Education. Posters on Reddit Career Guidance have made it explicit that uni (that is the university) is a business, not the provider of a career path. You do study, not experience. Experience, that is skills proven out with testing, is what employers demand. Many predict uni is a legacy industry, like the local newspaper. It will either disappear or become something else. Meanwhile some like Harvard seem in a cycle of self-destruction. 

So, what now? From the get-go, as in high school, youth might develop marketable skills through paid work, internships and volunteering. Grown up now, those are the kinds of clients for my coaching practice who have had stable employment. Often they have had shots at launching their own businesses. 

Sure, some youth will, as usual, go the cognitive route all the way through law or medical school. If you can get in and stay in, you may be able earn a good living. Of course, currently there is a but. There is growing unemployment in law (with the exception of Paul, Weiss which might be the only New York City large firm hiring in corporate, at least according to professional anonymous networks). Medical doctors are fleeing the profession because of burnout and/or discontent with payment schedules. Things aren't so hot in management consulting or finance either.

We may be circling back to being a nation which makes things and does things. At OpenAI Sam Altman made a new kind of technology. He didn't pontificate about trends in technology as do think tanks or the media. 

Think about this: The oldest of the boomers - we 70 or more - tended to have part-time jobs in high school and even grade school.  At age 11 I operated a Wallace Brown greeting card/religious icon business. We control 30% of the nation's wealth. 

Complimentary confidential intuitive coaching session. No pressure. Maybe even some lightness of being. Exhale. Please contact Jane Genova for an appointment (text/phone 203-468-8579 or email at janegenova374@gmail.com)