Blending Human Insight and AI: 7 Marketing Campaigns That Go Beyond the Ordinary

The best marketing doesn’t just grab attention, it touches on deep human truths. And these days, few tools can bring those truths to life like AI. Yes, AI can churn out content at scale, but the real magic happens when brands harness it to solve meaningful problems, spark real emotions, and inspire genuine engagement.

Below, I’ve highlighted seven creative campaigns that blend AI-driven technology with deeper human insight. Each one breaks through the noise by addressing a tangible need or tapping into a shared experience. The result? Marketing that people can’t stop talking about, and actually enjoy sharing.

1. Coors Light: Turning Bad Seats into Great Moments

Campaign: Obstructed Brews

What Happened: At select ballparks, fans stuck behind pillars or overhangs could snap a photo, upload it to Coors Light’s AI-powered tool, and instantly receive a Venmo credit for a free beer.

Why It’s Meaningful: This isn’t just a fun gimmick; it starts with empathy. Everyone’s felt the frustration of an obstructed view at a game or concert. By using AI vision to validate a blocked seat, Coors Light showed a playful, human-centered approach: turning disappointment into delight.

2. Pedigree: Changing Lives with AI Adoption Ads

Campaign: Adoptable Dynamic Dog Ads

What Happened: Pedigree harnessed AI to transform local shelter dog photos into studio-quality images, then automatically placed those images in targeted digital ads and billboards. Real-time updates ensured once a dog was adopted, the next waiting pup appeared.

Why It’s Meaningful: More than just an AI flex, it speaks to the universal love of pets, and the heartbreak of homeless animals.

By connecting shelters to potential owners on a hyper-local level, Pedigree tapped into an emotional cause, using tech to solve a real problem (visibility and awareness for adoptable dogs).

3. Nike: Time-Traveling a Sports Legend

Campaign: Never Done Evolving (Serena Williams vs. Serena Williams)

What Happened: Nike simulated a tennis match between a young Serena Williams and her older self using AI, analyzing years of footage to replicate her distinct playing style at each age.

Why It’s Meaningful: This campaign strikes at our collective fascination with legacy and personal growth. Beyond the technological wow factor, it’s really about celebrating Serena’s journey, showing how AI can take a deeply human narrative (“What if we could compete against our past selves?”) and make it tangible in a brand story.

4. Klarna: AI Marketing at Scale—and at Speed

Campaign: AI-Generated Seasonal Campaigns

What Happened: Klarna used generative AI to create dozens of themed campaigns, Mother’s Day, Back-to-School, holiday, across multiple countries, customizing copy, imagery, and translations with minimal human oversight.

Why It’s Meaningful: Marketers have always aimed to be “in the moment” for every consumer niche, but scaling that locally is tough. Klarna’s approach shows how AI can address a genuine consumer desire, ads and offers that actually feel relevant, while also slashing production time and costs.

5. Orange (France): Challenging Perceptions with Deepfakes

Campaign: Les Bleus / Les Bleues Highlights

What Happened: In a striking video, Orange superimposed the faces of France’s men’s national soccer team onto footage of the women’s team, only revealing the trick at the end.

Why It’s Meaningful: Viewers realized they’d been cheering for the women all along, confronting their biases about women’s sports. The deeper human insight here is equity, Orange used AI to literally show fans that skill and excitement in sports aren’t defined by gender. It’s a conversation starter that goes beyond marketing.

6. Virgin Voyages: Personalizing Celebrity with “Jen AI”

Campaign: AI-Powered J.Lo Invitations

What Happened: Virgin Voyages let prospective cruisers receive a personalized video invite from an AI-generated Jennifer Lopez. With a few details, each user got a shareable clip of “J.Lo” personally inviting them on a cruise.

Why It’s Meaningful: It speaks to the basic human desire for recognition and personal connection. Instead of a generic endorsement, the brand leveraged AI to scale the feeling of “Hey, this invite is just for me.” That emotional spark is what gets people talking, and booking.

7. Burger King (France): Embracing AI’s Weirdness

Campaign: A.I.lloween

What Happened: For Halloween, Burger King used AI to generate eerily distorted images, melting faces, uncanny limbs, and featured them in a series of haunted ads.

Why It’s Meaningful: Most brands try to smooth out AI’s quirks. BK flipped that script, leaning into the strange outputs. Not only did it stand out, it cleverly tapped into our fascination (and mild fear) around AI’s “uncanny” side, perfectly aligned with Halloween’s theme of playful horror.

Four Big Takeaways on AI-Driven Creativity

1. Start with a Human Tension: Whether it’s missed opportunities for dog adoption or the frustration of an obstructed seat, these campaigns begin with a real human issue. AI then amplifies the solution, rather than leading with “Look what AI can do.”

2. Embrace Personalization that Matters: Klarna and Virgin Voyages show how hyper-customization can be more than a novelty. Done right, it makes consumers feel seen and special, and that’s what forges deeper brand relationships.

3. Marry Technology with Empathy: Nike and Orange used advanced AI to highlight human journeys, Serena’s evolution and biases in sports fandom. When technology underscores the emotional core of a story, it resonates on a whole new level.

4. Dare to Be Different: Burger King’s haunted images and Coors Light’s free “sorry beer” are proof that quirky, bold ideas can pay off. In a crowded media landscape, fresh angles cut through. Just ensure it’s aligned with your brand’s personality and values.

Putting It All Together: Insights + AI = Authentic Innovation

Ultimately, AI isn’t a silver bullet, it’s a tool that can enhance the marketing work you already do, especially when driven by true human insight. If you only scratch the surface (“Let’s use AI because everyone else is”), you risk blending in with the crowd. But if you dive deeper, identifying real issues, emotional triggers, cultural conversations (the Nichefire team is great at this), and then harness AI to address them in surprising ways, you get campaigns that people want to share and support.

Here’s how to make it happen:

1. Do Your Homework: Start with research. Get to know your audience’s struggles, passions, and motivations. Pedigree’s adoptable dog ads and Coors Light’s obstructed seat photo tool exist because those teams understood their consumers’ emotional triggers.

2. Collaborate Across Disciplines: AI may be complex, but it’s most powerful when integrated with creative strategy, consumer insights, and brand purpose. Bring data scientists, creatives, brand managers, commercial AI experts like BOI (Board of Innovation) and subject-matter experts into the same room early on.

3. Prototype, Learn, Evolve: AI changes fast. Don’t wait for perfection. Build a small pilot, gather feedback, watch how users respond, and iterate. The quicker you test, the quicker you spot ethical pitfalls or sharpen the emotional resonance.

4. Focus on the Why: The best question to ask: “How does this help the human on the other side of the screen?” If your answer is compelling, if it solves a problem, sparks a feeling, or connects people, AI becomes an engine for truly unforgettable marketing.

Whether it’s bringing a legendary athlete’s past to life, championing women’s sports, or turning a misfortune into a free beer, these campaigns remind us that technology is at its best when it serves genuine human experiences. That’s the sweet spot where AI meets empathy, brand meets community, and marketing meets real impact.

Join the Conversation: Which of these campaigns inspired you the most, and where do you see the greatest potential for AI-driven marketing grounded in human insights? Let’s brainstorm in the comments, I’d love to hear your ideas, questions, or even counterpoints as we continue exploring AI’s role in creating marketing that matters.

About the Author

Jason Hauer is CEO of HauerX Holdings and an Inc. 500 honoree. He partners with commercial AI tech and solutions companies to turn ambition into market leadership.