My dad loved the "slogan" as he called it: "With a name like Smuckers, it has to be good."
He thought it was clever that the Smucker family knew their brand name was so lousy that they'd better make great jams and jellies. Then they told their brand story through that simple tagline.
Last Thursday, I was thinking about my dad and Smuckers on my long travels back from Bay City, Texas. I'd just completed a story training for the leadership team at South Texas Project, the folks who run the state's largest nuclear generating station.
Ten hours on the road and in the air, my thinking shifted to another lousy brand name: "artificial intelligence."
For the most exciting technological leap of our era, could they have picked a label that sounds colder, more mechanical, or just plain fake?
The next morning, at 2 a.m., a thought stirred me awake: What if we reframe it as "artful intelligence?"
Because that connects directly to something I've learned from 20+ years helping agencies win more business: the difference between tools that waste your time and tools that multiply your wealth.
This is the crossroads where agency principals and marketing consultants now find themselves. We're told AI will revolutionize our business, but what we actually get from Gen AI is often the shadow side of "artful": sly, slippery, devious.
Gen AI: The Shadow Side That's Costing You Money
Let's be honest. Gen AI is the digital world's "artful dodger."
Clever, sure, but not always in a good way:
Hallucinations: It invents fake statistics and quotes that could embarrass you in front of prospects. Generic slop: Content so bland it screams "AI-generated" to your clients. Trial-and-error time sinks: Hours of prompting and editing that should be billable client work. Brand voice whiplash: What should represent your unique positioning ends up sounding like everyone else.
On that long trip home, I realized Gen AI embodies the Trickster archetype—cunning, indirect, unreliable.
No wonder so many agency pros either avoid AI entirely or regret the hours lost trying to make it work.
But here's what I've learned from helping agencies transform their business models: you can't tame the Trickster. You can only choose a different archetype.
The Two Faces of Artful: Understanding Your Choice
Here's what makes "artful" so powerful for understanding the AI decision facing your agency.
It has two opposite meanings.
The Shadow Side: Cunning, sly, deceptive. The artful dodger who tricks through clever evasion.
That's Gen AI. The Trickster.
Fast? Yes. Clever? Absolutely.
But serving its own pattern-matching agenda, not your agency's growth.
It evades quality through volume. Tricks you with confidence while delivering hallucinations. Dodges authenticity through mimicry.
The Light Side: Creative skill and mastery. Skillfully executed with intention and precision.
That's what happens when you transform AI from artificial to artful.
The Strategic Partner. The Wealth Creation Engine. The tool that serves your agency's competitive advantage.
Will you rely on the Trickster who promises everything and delivers chaos?
Or will you work with AI designed specifically for agency business model transformation?
Same word. Opposite archetypes. Different economics.
The Bright Side: Artful Intelligence as Your Wealth Creation Engine
At its best, "artful" is about using technology as an extension of your strategic capabilities to amplify your competitive positioning and create measurable wealth.
This is why we built the StoryCycle Genie® to be your agency's Wealth Creation Engine. Not generic AI that fights your workflow, but systematic brand intelligence designed specifically for agency principals and marketing consultants.
The Genie applies the Story Cycle System™—proven narrative frameworks that win clients and create campaigns—with speed that transforms your project economics.
Here's what that means for your business:
Your win rates jump from 15-25% to 35-50%. You walk into pitches with immediate brand intelligence while competitors stumble in with discovery questions.
You cut project costs by 96% and accelerate development by 98%. What used to require 20-30 creative team hours takes 90 seconds to 3 minutes.
You deliver Fortune 500-level competitive research without research teams. Your clients get sophisticated brand analysis at a fraction of traditional cost.
You create comprehensive campaigns in hours instead of weeks, maintaining premium positioning while your margins flip overnight.
That's artful intelligence. Technology designed as an extension of your agency's strategic capabilities.
Tom Schwab's Wake-Up Call: From Trickster to Wealth Creation
Tom Schwab, founder of Interview Valet, experienced both archetypes firsthand.
He built his own custom GPT and ran straight into the Trickster's chaos—hallucinations, endless editing, content that didn't sound like him.
Then he tried the StoryCycle Genie®. Here's what he wrote:
"I was in awe of the content the StoryCycle Genie gave me. I largely copied and pasted three LinkedIn articles and six tweets. You made me sound smart, and you made AI sound like my brand. You can get AI crap in 10 seconds or get quality in 90 seconds. Either way, it saved me 4 hours and, more importantly, gave me a far superior product."
He continued:
"Years ago, I paid a copywriter over $1,000 to do this type of email sequence. It took weeks and hours of my time with back-and-forth. I was never happy with the results until the StoryCycle Genie."
That's the archetypal shift.
From the Trickster's chaos to strategic partnership. From wasted hours to wealth creation. From replacement anxiety to capability extension.
How to Make Artful Intelligence Your Agency's Competitive Advantage
Reframe your mindset: Don't settle for "artificial." Demand artful. Use AI designed for agency economics, not generic tools that fight your workflow.
Build on proven frameworks: The Story Cycle System™ and ABT narrative framework aren't theory—they're what wins pitches and creates campaigns that convert.
Leverage immediate brand intelligence: The StoryCycle Genie® positions you as the strategic advisor from minute one, not the vendor asking discovery questions.
Direct mastery, don't fix mistakes: With artful intelligence built for agencies, you're orchestrating strategy, not cleaning up hallucinations.
Scale your expertise without scaling headcount: Use AI that extends your team's capabilities, creating Fortune 500-level deliverables without Fortune 500-level overhead.
From One Agency Principal to Another: Your Economic Transformation
Here's what you get when you shift from the trickster schmuck to your Wealth Creation Engine.
No more hallucinations. The StoryCycle Genie® applies proven Story Cycle System™ structures to actual brand stories. It functions as an extension of your strategic thinking, not a replacement for it.
No more generic slop. Tom got content that sounded like him in 90 seconds. His voice. His brand. Because the Genie understands voice is narrative structure, emotional arc, audience positioning.
No more wasted billable hours. Tom saved 4 hours on one email sequence and got superior results. You'll apply this across every client project.
No more voice whiplash. The Genie delivers brand intelligence that understands audience positioning, value proposition, emotional promise. AI transformed from pattern-matcher to strategic partner.
You'll upload brand information once. The Genie analyzes it through proven frameworks, operating as an extension of your strategic capabilities.
You'll collaborate with the Genie, and it gets smarter about your clients and their brand stories with every iteration.
Then you'll generate content that sounds like them. Actually them. Amplified.
Most agencies hit single-client payback on their first significant project.
That's your Wealth Creation Engine delivering artful intelligence.
The Choice: Transform Your Agency Economics
You have a choice.
The Trickster that wastes billable hours, or the Strategic Partner that creates wealth.
Generic AI built for consumers, or artful intelligence designed specifically for agency business models.
Test your brand story intelligence on the StoryCycle Genie™ Brand Story Grader for FREE.
Experience how artful intelligence transforms your win rates, your project economics, and your competitive positioning.
Not as a replacement for your agency's expertise.
As an extension of it.
Because you no longer have to rely on a brand with a name like artificial intelligence, hoping it's good.
Choose your Wealth Creation Engine.
Choose artful intelligence built for agencies.
It's pretty sweet.
About the Author
Park Howell pioneered the Business of Story methodology and created the Story Cycle System™ that's generated 600% growth for implementing brands. As a co-founder of StoryCycle Genie™, he transforms business intuition into systematic competitive advantage through proven narrative intelligence frameworks that target subconscious decision-making.
As host of the widely popular Business of Story podcast and author of "Brand Bewitchery," Park has established himself as a leading authority on systematic brand storytelling that places the customer as the hero while positioning brands as the trusted mentor who guides them to victory.
The StoryCycle Genie™ exists to enthrall people as they live into and prosper from their most powerful stories. Through our proprietary Cognitive Mesh Architecture and proven Story Cycle System™, we're pioneering the category of narrative intelligence—where human strategic thinking meets AI amplification to create systematic competitive advantage through authentic brand storytelling.