Unless you’ve been living on a remote island without wifi for the past few years, (lucky you tbh), you’ll have noticed that the age of AI is very much here.
Everyone and their mum seems to be obsessed with what they can use it for. We can’t spend a minute on social media without seeing yet another reel about how someone automated this with Claude and outsourced that to an agent. And every day there seems to be a new tool, skill, plugin or site that’s getting all the hype.
And yes, AI is great. Especially for small surf businesses, where everyone on the team is already wearing five different hats. It can make work faster, easier and occasionally much less annoying.
We use it at Lineup too (obviously) and over the past few months, we’ve spent a lot of time trying to stay up to date with the latest tools and developments. Mainly, we’ve been figuring out where AI can actually make our lives easier.
But in the process, we’ve noticed something.
AI still has many limitations. And if you rely on it too much, it can backfire and hurt your business in the long run.
So, we put together a few use cases where we’ve found AI genuinely helpful, plus a few where we think it’s best avoided for now. Including some truly terrible AI examples at the end.
And no, this isn’t a rant about how human marketers are still better than AI.
Although we are ;)
Just kidding.
Kind of.
More and more people are using ChatGPT and other AI tools to research where to travel, what to book and, presumably, where they can learn to surf without being shouted at by an angry local.
This means it is no longer enough to think about where your business appears on Google. You also need to know what AI tools are saying about you.
Try asking a few different platforms the kinds of questions your potential customers might ask. “What are the best surf camps in Nicaragua for solo travellers?” “Where can I learn to surf near Lisbon?” “Which wave pools in Europe are good for beginners?”
Do you appear in the answer? Is the information correct? Does the tool understand what you offer, who it is for and what makes you different? Or does it confidently claim you are located three hours away and specialise in yoga retreats?
AI tools gather information from your website and other online sources, so clear and consistent information matters. Your location, offers, surf levels, prices and frequently asked questions should be easy to find and understand.
There is a lot more to say about how to improve your chances of appearing in these answers, so this probably deserves its own article. For now, start by checking what the main AI tools already know about your business. You might be surprised.
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One of the best things AI can do is work through an amount of data that would normally make you want to throw your laptop against the wall.
A quick example: We recently did a massive performance analysis for Alaïa Bay on every ad we’ve run in two years across Meta and Google: We exported all the data, used AI to clean up inconsistencies in the ad names and then analysed the numbers from different angles, including format, audience, language, messaging and creative concept.
Of course, we had analysed the campaigns manually before. With complicated spreadsheets. But an analysis of this size would have taken us days (plus we’d have to do it again a few months later, as we test more).
And having such a comprehensive overview, was a game changer. We found some high-performers that we had previously not identified as such, and really valuable insights.
And this goes far beyond advertising. You could use AI to work through your booking or sales data, identify seasonal patterns, compare your different products or find out which customers are most likely to come back.
You can also feed it your reviews and ask it to identify recurring themes.
What do people love most? What were they worried about before booking? Which parts of the experience do they keep mentioning?
Those insights can become content ideas, campaign angles and better website copy.
IMPORTANT: AI can do a lot of the heavy lifting here, but you still need someone who understands the business to ask the right questions and work out what the results actually mean.
Customer support is a tricky one.
A bad AI chatbot can actually make things worse. You explain your problem. It sends you an article that has nothing to do with it. You try again. Same story.
Thanks, but no thanks.
But behind the scenes, AI can be brilliant. Connect it to your inbox and let it sort through the noise. It can flag urgent messages, summarise long email threads and tell you what still needs a response.
It can also help draft replies to the questions you get over and over again.
“Do I need to bring a wetsuit?”
“Can I join if I’ve never surfed before?”
“What happens if there are no waves?”
You could even introduce a little AI assistant to make sure people get a response whenever it takes you a bit longer to get back to them:
“Hi, I’m Sunny, the surf camp AI bot. We’ve got your message. The team is currently a bit swamped, but I promise they’ll get back to you as soon as they possibly can.
Kind of cute. Useful. Transparently a robot.
Just make sure people can still reach an actual human when things get complicated. Nobody wants to argue with Sunny when they got locked out of their room.
AI is great when you need to get your head around a topic quickly.
Ask it to summarise a 70-page industry report. Compare five booking systems. Research a new audience. Prepare questions for a meeting. Or come up with some content inspo.
It will come back approximately three seconds later with a long answer and several additional thoughts you did not ask for.
Very keen. Loves a task.
Just remember, as we all know by now, AI can be extremely confident while also being extremely wrong. Use it to get started and point you in the right direction. Then take over, cross-check, and add your own knowledge and experience to it.
Of course, there are many other ways you can use AI.
But for now we want to take a moment to talk about its limitations. Because if you’re not paying attention, some of them can actually backfire and hurt your business.
So, stretch that attention span for just a liiiittle longer. The really terrible AI examples are coming.
AI is trained on enormous amounts of existing content and predicts what is most likely to come next. Which means it naturally leans towards the middle.
And sometimes, towards the terrible. Because let’s be honest, a lot of the content out there is bad. Need proof? Watch this video.
Even when you give AI examples of your voice, brand and previous content, it has a habit of slowly drifting back towards generic. You keep having to pull it back and at some point you can't even tell anymore if something sounds like you.
It can get frustrating very quickly.
Which brings me to the next point: As more and more businesses use AI, everything starts to sound and look the same:
“Ready to ride the wave?”
“Whether you’re a beginner or a seasoned pro...” (Yeah, we’ve used this one ourselves in the past)
Technically fine. But devoid of even a tiny shred of personality. Your brand’s personality is one of your biggest assets!!
Your coaches’ weird inside jokes, your local knowledge, blurry phone footage, opinions and a particular way of speaking to customers.
If AI takes over all your communication, this personality and it’s voice can slowly disappear.
At the same time, people are clearly craving more authenticity.
Your clients do not need every photo, video or caption to be flawless. They want to feel like there are actual humans behind the business.
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Okay, let's get serious for a second: Before you upload your customer list, sales data or private emails, make sure you check what actually happens to that information.
Some AI tools may store your conversations or use them to improve their models. This depends on the platform, your account type and your privacy settings. Business accounts generally offer stronger protections, but you still need to check.
Remove anything that could identify a customer. Names, email addresses, payment details, passport information. AI does not need any of that to spot a pattern.
And please do not upload confidential business or client information into a random AI tool.
Basically, check the settings before you hand over the spreadsheet. Your data slave does not need to know everything.
AI can give you an answer. It cannot always tell you whether that answer is actually any good.
That is especially true when it comes to your ads and content. You still need someone who understands your brand, your audience and the difference between attention that helps and attention that makes people wonder what on earth they are looking at.
For example, here are a few images Meta AI desperately wanted us to use as actual ads for Alaïa Bay.
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Would they stop the scroll? Oh, absolutely.
Would they make anyone want to book a surf session? Less clear.
And at what cost to the brand image?
AI can generate the options. But someone with taste, context and a vague understanding of how surfing works still needs to make the final call.
AI can save surf businesses a ridiculous amount of time. It can sort the inbox, analyse the spreadsheet, summarise your reviews and help you get past the blank page.
It is most useful when there is loads of information to process, the task is repetitive, you need a reasonable first version or the result is easy to describe.
It becomes less useful when the task depends on taste, subtle creative decisions or something that already exists very clearly inside your head.
So, take a proper look at how you are using it.
Open your last ten social posts. Read your website copy. Look at the images you are putting out into the world. Could they belong to any surf business? Or do they still feel unmistakably like yours?
Then look at the work nobody sees. The messy data, repetitive emails, all the painful manual tasks.
That is probably where AI could be doing much more for you.
Let it handle the volume. Keep the thinking, taste and personality human.
And if it helps you free up some time, go surfing!!
PS: You know what else would free up a lot of your time? Letting us handle your marketing for you - send us a message to set up a call!
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