Artificial intelligence is rapidly lowering the barriers to creating professional-looking marketing content, giving small businesses access to capabilities that once required dedicated designers, marketers, or agencies. But as those tools become more widely available, simply using AI may no longer be enough to help a business stand out.
That tension is emerging in Adobe’s research on how small businesses are adopting AI. While 66% of small businesses surveyed are already using AI for marketing, 64% believe the technology is also making it easier for brands to blend together. Adobe’s findings suggest that the next challenge for small businesses may be less about gaining access to AI and more about deciding what to do with it.
One theme running through the research is what Adobe describes as “taste” — the individual perspective, judgment, and creative instincts that shape how a business presents itself. More than half of small business owners surveyed, 56%, said they believe the advantage will go to whoever has the best taste. At the same time, many entrepreneurs remain uncertain about their own creative decisions, with 63% saying they second-guess their design and content choices.
Small Business Trends spoke by email with Parimal Deshpande, Vice President, Community & Partner Product Marketing at Adobe, about what these findings mean for small business owners, how entrepreneurs can develop a distinct point of view, and where AI tools such as Adobe Express fit into the creative process.
Deshpande also discussed why AI should serve as a starting point rather than the finished product, how small businesses can use AI without sacrificing their identity, and why confidence in one’s own creative judgment could become increasingly important as the technology becomes more accessible.
Here is the conversation.
Leland: Adobe’s research found that 66% of small businesses are already using AI for marketing, but 64% also say AI is making it easier for brands to blend together. If everyone eventually has access to the same powerful AI tools, what will actually separate a great small business brand from an average one?
Parimal: Some small businesses will take the first version of content that they generate with AI tools and share it with their community as-is. No edits, no human touch, no revisions. A GREAT small business will use AI as a creative partner to get to that first version, but will further refine the content with their own distinct point of view and human touch to create the final asset.
Leland: Adobe says “taste” is becoming a competitive advantage. For a small business owner who isn’t a designer or professional marketer, what exactly does good taste mean, and how can they develop it?
Parimal: To me, good taste isn’t necessarily about being a graphic designer or creative person, it’s about having a clear point of view and knowing what feels right for your business and your audience. The good news is that taste can be developed. It comes from paying attention to your industry, experimenting, seeing what resonates, and importantly, refining it. Our research found that 56% of small business owners believe the advantage goes to whoever has the best taste. When everyone has access to the same technology, your perspective becomes the differentiator.
Leland: Can you walk me through a realistic example of how a solopreneur or small business owner might use Adobe Express and its AI tools—from the initial idea all the way to something they actually publish or use in a marketing campaign?
Parimal: Let’s say you’re a small business owner with a very specific POV, but no marketing or design team. You can start in Adobe Express by generating an initial visual direction or creating a first draft of social content. This is where I’d advise you to really focus on the wording and direction for your prompts. It’s the prompt that’s the game changer. From there, you can refine that work using your own brand colors, fonts, imagery and messaging, and quickly create variations for different channels and formats using magic resize. Finally, you can use the content scheduler to consistently get your posts live and really show up like a full-scale agency across all your platforms.
Leland: One of the most striking findings is that 63% of small business owners second-guess their design and content decisions, while only 37% trust their instincts. Why do you think there is such a large confidence gap among small business owners?
Parimal: The findings reinforce something we’ve seen for a while: the technology is moving faster than people’s confidence in using it. Small business owners have more access to powerful tools than ever, but having the capability isn’t the same as feeling confident in one’s creative decisions. That gap shows that while entrepreneurs know their personality is their biggest asset, they’re still incredibly intimidated by the actual act of sharing it. It’s one thing to know you need an opinion to stand out, and it’s another thing to have the guts to hit ‘post’ when you’re worried your specific taste won’t resonate with an audience.
Leland: If a small business owner listening to this interview remembers just one thing about how they should be using AI to grow their business without losing what makes their brand unique, what would you want that to be?
Parimal: We found that 79% of small business owners know that having a clear point of view is exactly why people follow them, yet 63% still second-guess their own creative instincts. It shows us that while 66% of small business owners have already embraced AI to handle the technical side of things, the real struggle is no longer access to tools—it’s the internal hurdle of trusting that their unique taste is actually enough to resonate with who they’re trying to reach. Adobe Express can help people feel more confident using AI tools while keeping their own taste and point of view at the center.
Deshpande’s responses point to a shift in the role AI may play in small business marketing. As generative tools become increasingly capable and widely available, access to technology itself may provide less differentiation than it once did. The distinction could increasingly come from how business owners guide those tools, edit what they produce, and incorporate their own perspective into the final result.
For small businesses, that means AI can help remove some of the technical and production barriers associated with marketing without necessarily replacing the decisions that define a brand. Generating a first draft, resizing content for multiple platforms, or scheduling posts can save time, but determining what sounds, looks, and feels appropriate for a particular audience remains a human decision.
That may also explain the apparent contradiction in Adobe’s research: small business owners recognize that their individual point of view helps attract customers, yet many still hesitate when it comes time to put that perspective in front of an audience.
As AI makes content creation faster and easier, the challenge for small business owners may increasingly be deciding when to rely on automation and when to intervene. The technology can help businesses create more content and operate with capabilities once associated with larger marketing teams, but standing out will still depend on what the business owner brings to the process.
This article, "Adobe’s Parimal Deshpande on Why Human Taste Matters in the AI Era" was first published on Small Business Trends