Hello. This isKototsuki Design.
We’ve been getting the question, “Do you use AI?” quite often lately. The answer is “Yes.” It saves time, helps with preliminary research, and, to be honest, it’s a tool we rely on quite a bit.
However, as part of our policy for website development, there’s one thing we’ve decided we absolutely won’t compromise on: we do not use AI at the points of contact with our clients—what are often called “touchpoints.” Outside of those areas, we use AI quite actively. Today, I’d like to explain that distinction as concretely as possible.
To summarize our approach simply, it comes down to these four points.
- We do not use AI at touchpoints
- Actively use AI wherever it saves time outside of touchpoints
- We won’t use it if it involves taking on unnecessary risk
- Do not leave “unknowns” unaddressed
It’s not a simple choice between “using AI” and “not using AI.” It’s about where and for what purpose we use it. That’s what we prioritize.
Our Approach to “Where to Use AI and Where Not to”
Broadly speaking, we’ve organized it like this: We don’t use AI at customer touchpoints. We actively use AI behind the scenes—in areas that lead to time savings and increased efficiency. And we decide not to use AI in situations where the risk is high or where we don’t fully understand how the system works.
Let’s discuss each of these points in a bit more detail.
What Exactly Is a “Touchpoint”?
A “touchpoint” refers to any point of contact between a company or brand and a customer (or someone who might become a customer in the future). It’s a term commonly used in the world of marketing, but its meaning is simple: it refers to every single “moment a person comes into contact with the brand.”
The moment you happen to catch a glimpse of an ad. The moment you open a website. The moment you see a social media post. The moment you walk into a physical store. A phone conversation. The moment you open a package you received. We experience countless touchpoints in our daily lives without even realizing it.
And touchpoints are not merely about the “number of interactions.” Each one is an opportunity to build impressions in the customer’s mind—whether it’s “I like this brand” or “This doesn’t quite feel right.” Surprisingly, how the experience felt tends to stick in people’s memories more than whether the design was polished or not.
Touchpoints Before, During, and After Purchase
When viewed along a timeline, touchpoints can be broadly divided into three categories.
Before a purchase has been made, touchpoints include casually coming across the brand on social media or in online ads, arriving at the website via search results, or seeing word-of-mouth recommendations from acquaintances. The role at this stage is to “raise awareness” and “spark interest.” If the first impression here isn’t very good, it becomes difficult to get customers to move on to the consideration phase.
At the moment when a customer actually makes an inquiry or signs a contract, touchpoints include form submissions, email exchanges, the wording of quotes and contracts, and how the customer is treated during meetings. Since this is a time when customers often feel a great deal of tension and anxiety, it’s important to prioritize giving them a sense of reassurance—that “a real person is taking care of me”—rather than treating it as mere administrative processing.
Touchpoints continue even after the transaction is complete—from follow-ups after delivery to after-sales support, and the customer’s ongoing experience with the product. Whether a customer feels they “made the right choice” depends not only on the moment of delivery but also on how the company engages with them afterward.
Touchpoints exist both online and offline
Touchpoints aren’t limited to just websites. Online, they include homepages, social media, email newsletters, and review sites. Offline, they encompass business cards, brochures, store interiors and exteriors, customer service, phone interactions, and mailed materials.
In creative fields like ours, touchpoints include not only the “products we create”—such as designs, photographs, copy, illustrations, websites, printed materials, and logos—but also the “way we interact” with customers, including customer service, the atmosphere of the store, the demeanor of staff, and how we handle customer inquiries. When you list them all out like this, you realize that touchpoints actually cover a surprisingly wide range.
Why Are Touchpoints So Important?
The reason we should value touchpoints isn’t simply because “it creates a better impression.”
If each individual touchpoint provides a positive experience, those experiences accumulate and lead to the perception that “this brand is trustworthy.” Conversely, even a single instance of careless service can instantly shatter the trust built up until that point. People naturally want to share positive experiences with others. The quality of touchpoints directly influences the rate at which customers recommend the brand to others.
If a brand’s “authenticity” is maintained at every touchpoint, its identity becomes clearer. Inconsistent impressions are hard to remember. Precisely because we live in an era where it’s difficult to differentiate products and services based on features alone, I believe the quality of the experience at each touchpoint is what ultimately makes a brand the one customers choose.
That’s why we don’t want to just “tweak” touchpoints haphazardly—we want to design them with a clear purpose. And to be honest, we don’t want to leave that design and execution entirely up to AI.
We want people to create the things that people touch and that move their hearts.
Saying “we don’t use AI for touchpoints” isn’t simply a matter of “we don’t let AI create designs.” What matters is why we don’t use it.
The things customers pick up, look at, read, feel, and that move their hearts—that’s why we believe people should think about them, create them, and interact with them. That is our core value. This isn’t a rejection of AI—we simply believe that the nature of the work best suited for AI and the work that requires human responsibility are fundamentally different.
We do not believe that a brand’s “authenticity” can be reproduced simply by analyzing past performance or preference trends as data. The nuances in the words that emerge during conversations with customers, a single color chosen after much hesitation, or a balance deliberately thrown off—it is the accumulation of these detailed decisions that defines “authenticity.” This is a different kind of work from efficiently arriving at the “right” answer.
While speed is often seen as the be-all and end-all, when it comes to touchpoints, I feel there is value in the very act of taking time to think. This is because ideas arrived at after discarding many others—rather than those that come to mind immediately—often end up leaving a lasting impression on clients.
What we’re really selling isn’t the website itself
We call ourselves a “website design firm.” But I don’t believe what we’re actually delivering is the website itself.
What we value most is listening to our clients face-to-face and solving each individual’s problems based on the authentic insights that emerge from those conversations. In other words, whatKototsuki Designsells is “communication” and “problem-solving.” The website is merely one tangible result of that process.
Precisely because AI is evolving so rapidly, we believe there is value in “the things only a person can tell you.” There’s no information better than real, human voices. That’s why, rather than fearing AI, we aim to coexist with it effectively while keeping human voices as our starting point. That’s our stance.
So, do we not use AI? → No, no—we actually do use it
If you’ve read this far, you might think, “So Kototsuki Designis a company that doesn’t use AI.” Actually, that’s not the case at all—we use AI quite a bit.
We actively use it in areas other than touchpoints.We rely on it without hesitation for tasks like preliminary research and organizing information, brainstorming with a sounding board, drafting initial versions of documents (which we never submit as-is), streamlining simple or repetitive tasks, assisting with coding and debugging, organizing internal documents and meeting minutes, conducting competitor analysis and market research, and managing schedules and tasks.
Our approach here isn’t to “replace work that should be done by people with AI,” but rather to “use AI to free up more time for people to think.” We don’t let the time saved by AI go to waste. We use it to deepen our discussions with clients, expand our range of proposal options, and review the finer details.The goal of streamlining is to free up more time for the tasks that only humans can do.
We don’t use AI just for the sake of it
Just because AI is convenient doesn’t mean we’ll adopt it with the mindset of “If AI can do it, let’s just give it a try.” We’re particularly cautious about the following:
Do AI-generated designs or illustrations resemble existing works too closely? Does the text simply replicate phrasing that seems familiar from somewhere else? Since disputes over intellectual property rights are often irreversible even if discovered later, we thoroughly verify everything at the time of generation.
We also do not casually enter client information or details of projects that have not yet been made public into external AI services. Even if a tool is convenient, we avoid using it if we are unsure how the entered information will be handled.
Even if AI-generated output seems plausible at first glance, the details can sometimes be incorrect. Especially for areas requiring specialized knowledge, we don’t take it at face value; we always include a step where a human reviews it.Our mistakes aren’t just our own problem—they also affect our clients’ brands and trust. That’s why we judge the severity of risk not by “how we’ll be perceived,” but by “how it will affect our clients.”
We have a very clear rule: if we look at something generated by AI and think, “Well, I guess this will do,” we’ve decided not to release it. We protect ourselves. We don’t cut corners with our clients. These are the two things we absolutely won’t compromise on.
“It’s too much trouble” is no reason to use AI
The mindset we consider most dangerous when it comes to AI is thinking, “It’s a hassle, so let’s just let the AI handle it.” I understand the desire to take the easy way out. But if this becomes the basis for our decisions, the line between what’s acceptable and what isn’t will collapse in the blink of an eye.
The standard we want to use isn’t “whether it’s easy,” but “whether it’s reasonable.” Why are we letting AI handle this part, and why is a person doing that part? We need to be able to explain it in our own words. If we can’t do that, I believe our judgment is still too lax.
Conversely, it’s actually a waste to avoid using AI when there’s a rational reason to do so. Not using it simply because “it makes me feel a little uneasy” might just be a case of being prejudiced against something you’ve never tried. That’s precisely why we want to be able to clearly articulate both the reasons for using AI and the reasons for not using it.
Don’t leave “I don’t know” unaddressed
This mindset goes hand in hand with “not taking risks.”
If you ask an AI, “Make this for me,” it will return something that seems plausible. But how does it work? Why does it work that way? Is it safe? To be honest, I find it scary to use something without understanding those details.
For example, let’s say we’re building a website and have AI create a contact form system. In that case, we always make sure to verify how the system works, where the entered information is sent, how personal information is handled, whether there are any security issues, and what happens if unexpected input is received.
This isn’t limited to contact forms. It applies to payment systems, user registration processes, and integrations with external services. Especially when we ask AI to help with the “back-end mechanisms,” we make a point of not judging the solution based solely on the end result.If there’s anything we don’t understand, we ask the AI again, look up reference materials, or check with an expert. It takes effort, but we believe that not settling for “it seems to be working, so it’s fine” ultimately leads to protecting our customers.
“It works, so it’s OK” isn’t enough. If there’s a problem with the code or system generated by AI, it’s up to us humans to notice it and fix it. Having AI create something and leaving everything entirely up to AI are two completely different things.
Using AI isn’t just about “making life easier”
Kototsuki DesignFor us, AI isn’t a tool designed to eliminate human jobs; it’s a tool that allows people to spend their time on the work they truly want to focus on. We use it where it’s useful. But we don’t use it where it isn’t. If we don’t understand something, we simply don’t use it. Our criteria for decision-making are quite simple.
How We’ll Engage with AI Going Forward
AI technology will continue to evolve. Just because we decide “not to use” something today doesn’t mean that decision will remain unchanged forever. As the technology becomes more reliable, we intend to reevaluate where we draw the line.
However, there is one thing we want to keep unchanged: we will never make decisions based solely on the fact that something is “convenient.” We will continue to think for ourselves, on a case-by-case basis, about whether a particular choice is truly in our customers’ best interest.
How Is This Different from a Site Created Entirely by AI?
Recently, there has been an increase in services that allow you to create a website in just a few minutes simply by giving instructions to AI. If you’re looking for affordability and speed, I think that’s certainly one valid option.
What sets us apart from those services is that we don’t compete on speed or price. Templates automatically generated by AI tend to result in websites with similar structures and similar wording. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing in itself. However, the key difference is that it’s difficult to capture a brand’s unique “character” within them.
Kototsuki DesignWhat we create isn’t a site where information is simply plugged into a template; it’s a site where we carefully craft the brand’s unique voice and atmosphere, step by step. That’s why we invest time in consultations and never leave the copywriting or design entirely up to AI. To be honest, our approach might not be the best fit for those who prioritize speed and affordability above all else.However, for those who value “the unique character of this store” or “the unique character of this company,” I believe our approach is a better fit.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q. Do you create websites without using AI at all?
No, that’s not the case. We do utilize AI for research and to streamline our workflow. However, the parts that clients see—such as design and copy—are handled by people.
Q. Are production costs higher because you don’t use AI?
We do not charge extra simply because we don’t use AI. For us, this isn’t a “special service”—it’s simply our standard way of working.
Q. Does it take longer to deliver compared to a site automatically generated by AI?
Compared to AI-powered automated generation services, the time required for meetings and production is longer. In exchange, through repeated consultations, we work together to find the words and designs that truly reflect your brand.
Q. Do you avoid using AI for coding and system development as well?
We actively utilize AI in those areas. However, we don’t simply accept something as “good enough” just because it works; we ensure we understand the underlying mechanisms and perform a final manual check before delivery.
Q. Do you think the scope of AI use will expand in the future?
I think it’s possible. Our current boundaries are based on a judgment made in light of current technology and circumstances. If AI technology or reliability changes, we’ll reassess our approach.
Precisely because we’re in the AI era, we want to value human creativity
Finally, let me summarize our four guiding principles once more.
- We do not use AI at touchpoints
- Actively use AI wherever it saves time outside of touchpoints
- Do not use AI if it involves risk
- Don’t ignore what you don’t understand
Precisely because AI is becoming an increasingly familiar part of our lives, we need to consider what tasks to entrust to AI and what tasks people should handle. I feel that thinking about this will become increasingly important going forward.
Kototsuki DesignWe will continue to work effectively with AI, not just by chasing convenience, but by cherishing the value of what people deliver to other people.
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