AI Anxiety Is Real — But So Is the Opportunity If You Know Where to Look

There’s a sharp moment in the AI conversation where fear collides with reality — and most of us are sitting exactly there. Not panicking. Not fully convinced. Just… watching.

A recent Gigacalculator study, stacking global search data from January to November 2025, confirms what many marketers already sense: the world is Googling its way through an existential crisis.

Queries like “AI accountant”, “AI financial advisor”, and “Will AI replace my job?” aren’t fringe searches anymore — they’re mainstream.

Here’s the uncomfortable truth: some professions feel the heat more than others.

Finance Is Sweating

Financial advisors have seen a staggering 166% jump in searches for AI alternatives — and an even sharper 200% spike in people asking whether their jobs are safe.

Accountants aren’t far behind, with a 100% increase in searches like “AI accountant”.

But here’s the interesting nuance: It’s not just replacement panic. It’s experimentation.

When a profession is built on logic, rules, and repeatable frameworks, AI isn’t disruptive — it’s seductive.

Tech Isn’t Panicking — It’s Adjusting

Coders, analysts, and scientists? Their behaviour is almost casual.

Interest in AI tools? Up. Searches about losing their jobs? Almost flat.

Why? Because they understand something fundamental: AI doesn’t eliminate technical roles — it changes them.

If anything, they’ll be the ones building, training, or correcting the very systems everyone else fears.

Though there’s a twist — searches for AI alternatives among software engineers dropped 56%, yet anxiety rose 44%.

Translation: “We’re not using it to replace ourselves… but we’re aware someone else might.”

The sword cuts both ways.

Marketing Learnt the Hard Way

The biggest shock in the dataset comes from the marketing world.

Searches for “AI marketing” dropped a stunning 68% — from 89,000 searches to just 28,000.

That’s not curiosity fading — that’s disillusionment.

Marketers have now tested AI tools long enough to understand the gap between hype and reality:

• AI can draft copy.
• AI can run optimisation loops.
• AI can mimic tone.

But AI still cannot observe culture, and all great marketing lives in nuance — not output speed.

A campaign that simply “sounds good” isn’t enough. It has to feel true.

And AI still doesn’t feel anything.

Creatives & Therapists: Soft Skills Still Matter

Searches for AI therapy tools dropped 13% — despite mental health demand rising globally.

Why? Because empathy isn’t a feature update.

Same story with artists. AI art searches fell nearly 19%, not because the tech regressed — but because novelty wore off.

First, AI shocked the world. Then creatives adapted. Now we’re at the stage where AI imagery isn’t enough — it requires point-of-view, meaning, and soul.

Where Does This Leave Malaysia’s Marketing Industry?

Three observations stand out:

1. AI isn’t replacing entire jobs — it’s replacing tasks.
   The marketer who delegates repetitive work will outperform the marketer who ignores the tools.
2. Soft skills just became hard requirements.
   Listening. Judgement. Cultural intuition. Context. These are the moats.
3. AI isn’t the threat — stagnation is.
   The gap between those who upskill and those who don’t is widening faster than anyone predicted.

The Future Isn’t “Human vs AI.” It’s “Human With AI.”

Just as calculators didn’t kill mathematics and Photoshop didn’t kill photography, AI won’t kill marketing — but it will kill mediocrity.

This moment isn’t about defending roles.

It’s about redefining them.

Those who specialise — not in being efficient, but in being irreplaceably human — will find themselves not automated out, but elevated.

Because at the end of the day:

• AI can predict behaviour.
• But only humans can understand it.
• AI can generate messages.
• But only humans can make people care.

And in marketing — caring is the currency.