Back from a week off in Hawaii featuring snorkeling, beach yoga, and an 8-hour tsunami warning and evacuation...
But luckily, no one was hurt and no damage was done to the island. 🏝️
Now that I am back, it's time to trade in the sounds of the waves for the just-as-calming LinkedIn notification 🧘 and the AI + Marketing weekly.
Here's one thing I noticed diving back into AI + Marketing trends: people are getting really good at calling out AI BS and replies.
The brands that are actually winning right now? They're not trying to hide their AI use.
We built all this tech to help us connect at scale, and the real competitive advantage is... being genuinely human about how you use it.
More on this and some other good stuff in today's digest, including:
~ Cannabis CMOs using AI to stay hyper-local (brilliant)
~ Brands now paying double to fix the robotic copy they thought would save them money (whoops)
~ Plus, the White House basically shrugging at AI regulation and leaving it up to us to figure out.
What are you seeing out there? Are your customers getting better at sniffing out the robot replies?
As always, thanks so much for reading! It's been so fun curating each week, and I hope you are having fun reading (or at least learning one thing), too!
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🔵 Top AI + Marketing News
AI big bang demands marketing evolution
MarTech | 6-minute read
Overview: MarTech argues AI is blowing up org charts; survival hinges on rewiring strategy, teams, and metrics.
Key points:
- Alignment, profitability, and true customer-centred models top the “evolve-or-die” list.
- Only 19 % of firms show real sales–marketing alignment…AI widens that gap.
- Long-term CLV replaces short-term revenue as the north star.
My take: The piece argues (which I agree with!) that you can’t bolt AI onto a campaign model built for quarterly spikes. Shift comp plans and dashboards toward lifetime value, retention, and cross-sell so everyone has skin in the “keep customers happy long-term” game. Once upside is measured in months or years, teams suddenly care a lot more about data quality and model tuning.
Elite brands wield AI to outsmart chaos
Rolling Stone | 7-minute read
Overview: Cannabis-chain CMO Brianne Dezzutti shares seven AI playbooks that keep multi-location brands agile and hyper-local.
Key points:
- Hourly product-intelligence scrapers flag price and SKU shifts so teams match demand before rivals react.
- Cross-platform listening dashboards surface regional micro-trends, fueling zip-code-specific campaigns and inventory calls.
- AI-powered visual audits and automated voice-of-customer loops turn review data into real-time merchandising and CX fixes.
My take: This reads like an ops masterclass….AI handles the chaos so marketers stay in strategy mode. Must-steal tactics for retail CMOs, ops-heavy franchises, or any brand juggling dozens of fast-moving SKUs and locales.
Choosing the best AI app for marketers
CMSWire | 7-minute read
Overview: Side-by-side teardown of ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, MidJourney & Veo for 2025 marketing use-cases.
Key points:
- ChatGPT owns 80 % of generative-AI traffic the article cites, great for multi-format content needs.
- Claude’s “transparent reasoning” cited for regulated industries.
- Video-first tools (Veo 3, MidJourney) now compete on brand safety controls.
My take: Shiny-tool FOMO is real, but governance beats tool collecting (use my directory, thoughtfully, peeps!). Start with a two-week pilot against a single task (example: repurpose blog → LinkedIn thread) and grade tools on latency, export formats, etc. The winner is the one your staff actually keeps using after the Slack hype dies. :)
White House AI plan splits advertisers
Digiday | 6-minute read
Overview: New federal AI framework favors speed over strict rules, leaving ad-industry guardrails murky.
Key points:
- Marketers worry IP and data-privacy risks shift to brands & courts.
- Some see freedom to experiment; others fear costly litigation.
- States and trade bodies may fill the gap with piecemeal standards.
My take: Washington handed marketers a regulatory shrug, which means the burden’s on brand lawyers and ethics committees (lucky us!). Draft your own AI usage standard now, publish it, and iterate quarterly; transparency buys goodwill and trust with partners and gets ahead of any rushed state-level rules that could otherwise blindside your roadmap. Put trust and privacy first…even if this government doesn’t agree. It’s not only the right thing to do for your users, but it will also build brand trust and loyalty.
Truth about AI in influencer marketing
Ad Age (Studio 30) | 4-minute read
Overview: Linqia outlines four AI pillars - discovery, brief-writing, content extension, deep insights.
Key points:
- Image/text recognition predicts creator ROI before contracts.
- AI-generated briefs tailor messaging to each influencer’s style.
- Performance analytics repurpose top creator frames into CTV, DOOH, paid social.
My take: AI that writes creator briefs and recycles top takes into paid ads cuts a ton of email tag, letting managers spend energy on concept sessions and post-mortems. Track metrics like “time to signed contract” and “number of assets repurposed” to prove ROI. Ya know finance loves numbers more than follower counts!
Social-media ethics in the AI age
Sprout Social | 8-minute read
Overview: As AI floods feeds, 41% of users say they’ll call out unethical brand behavior first.
Key points:
- Gen-AI blurs “real vs. automated,” raising consent & authenticity stakes.
- Responsibility for bias is shifting from platforms to brands.
- Ethical missteps now hit revenue, retention, and investor confidence.
My take: Users increasingly sniff out bot-generated replies, and they’ll be annoyed (even pissed!) if you ghost them with canned empathy. Add a human “review and humanize” step for sensitive threads, label AI assistance openly, and keep your crisis-GIF folder smaller (hehe) by being honest up front.
CMOs must reinvent for AI branding
The Drum | 4-minute read
Overview: Microsoft, Unilever & Samsung leaders say CMOs are now “change-management officers” in an AI-shaped market.
Key points:
- AI accelerates product cycles from years to months, marketing must match.
- Data-fluency and experimentation culture beat legacy brand playbooks.
- Talent mix shifting toward prompt engineers and creative coders.
My take: I agree! Marketing leaders who code prompts, not necessarily production code. will out-pace those who wait for dashboards. Allocate a test budget for weekly experiments, share results across teams, and sunset what doesn’t convert. Rapid iteration beats annual brand decks that gather dust.
Kantar: new AI rules of brand building
Kantar | 9-minute read
Overview: AI is “seismic,” turning CMOs into de-facto change officers across innovation, creative, and media.
Key points:
- AI-led trend analysis cut PepsiCo’s R&D cycles from years to months.
- Reckitt saw 30 % faster localisation using GenAI asset adaptation.
- End-to-end hyper-personalised ads now possible via omnichannel AI orchestration.
My take: Treat every AI pilot like a science fair project…hypothesis, KPI, results. And tip: document wins internally with snack-size Loom videos (oh, how I love a Loom!) so other teams can copy-paste success instead of reinventing.
Companies pay to fix AI’s blunders
Futurism | 4-minute read
Overview: This is from last month, but I wanted to pull in as it was a super interesting read I didn’t see until this week (thanks, David Villalon)! Brands that swapped humans for AI now hire specialists at premium rates to clean up sloppy outputs.
Key points:
- Writers charging $100/hr rewrite bland AI copy, total costs exceed original budgets.
- Agencies report growing “AI clean-up” service lines for broken code and content.
- Lesson: AI ignores brand nuance, forcing expensive rewrites.
My take: Plzz keep humans in the loop, track edit-to-draft ratios, and tweak prompts before you end up paying more to polish than you saved on generation.
🟣 Posts I Love
Hannah Zhang - “The best way I learned marketing wasn’t my MBA.”
Hannah argues the best modern marketers are creators: they hook fast, speak like humans (to one person, not a persona), and win on distribution and community. As AI commoditizes products, personal brand + offline community become the real moat…see examples from matcha DTC and SaaS. See Post →
Kieran Flanagan - “With AI, how do you even do marketing anymore?”
Kieran lays out a 6-part plan: (1) win AI search with LLM-optimized pages and citations, (2) master short-form content, (3) ship code-powered experiences (tools/agents), (4) build an intent engine across internal + external signals, (5) automate prospecting, and (6) run micro-audience campaigns at scale. See Post →
Sol Rashidi - “Just because you CAN automate… should you??”
A CEO case study: they didn’t automate check-in kiosks because the economics and experience didn’t pencil. Sol’s point: automation is a strategy choice, not a reflex, if it’s not faster/cheaper/better (or augmenting humans), skip it. Strategic restraint is still a strategy. See Post →
Rachel Karten - “Does your brand’s social strategy have tension?”
This isn't fully AI-related, but I just love Rachel's insights and their social media substack, "Link in Bio". Rachel makes the case for deliberate “tension”...taking what people expect from your brand/category and twisting it for surprise and delight (she cites Loewe). The takeaway: great social often comes from leaning into that friction, not sandpapering it away. See Post →
Nicole Leffer - “What can GPT/Claude/Gemini/Copilot do that most marketers don’t know?”
Nicole kicks off a gold mine thread with a neat trick: generate working QR codes right in chat. Standout ideas in the comments: have Claude write small JS “agents” it can then use; use Gemini’s YouTube integration for instant video briefings; try vision mode for live style guides, concept art, or even label/ingredient analysis. See Post →
🟡 AI + Marketing Tools
All tools covered continue to be added to the 160+ AI + Marketing tool directory!
HubSpot × Claude Connector
HubSpot launched the first native CRM connector for Anthropic’s Claude, letting Sales/Service teams query records, draft replies, summarize tickets, and build workflows with Claude, governed by HubSpot permissions.
Best for: RevOps Lead • CRM Admin • Sales Enablement Manager • Support Ops.
Conversion
New AI marketing-automation startup from two UC Berkeley dropouts raised $28M to build agents that plan and execute multi-channel campaigns with minimal manual setup, drawing strong investor buzz this week.
Best for: Demand-Gen Lead • Growth Marketer • Lifecycle/CRM Manager.
Taplio Copilot for LinkedIn
AI that drafts posts, hooks, and carousels from your URLs or notes, then schedules and analyzes performance for LinkedIn-first growth.
Best for: Social Media Marketer • Personal Brand Builder • B2B Demand-Gen Lead
Veed.io AI Script-to-Video
Paste a script or brief and get on-brand, captioned social videos with stock b-roll, AI voice, and auto-resizing for Reels/TikTok/YouTube Shorts.
Best for: Content Marketer • Video Producer • Social Media Marketer
Tome 2.0 (AI Presentations & Pages)
Turn a prompt or doc into client-ready decks and one-page sites with auto-layout, charts, and embedded video, fast handoff for campaigns and pitches.
Best for: Brand Marketer • Product Marketer • Creative Strategist
🟢 Events on My Radar
Below are more interesting events added this week to the full AI + Marketing Events blog post!
The AI Conference
📍 September 17–18, 2025 - San Francisco, CA
Strong technical + applied AI program; good for marketers building with AI. Register →
AI & Big Data Expo Europe
📍 September 24–25, 2025 - Amsterdam, NL
Enterprise AI + data stack focus; helpful for technical marketers and growth teams. Register →
AI Marketing Strategies (Glossy / Digiday / Modern Retail)
📍 October 22, 2025 - Virtual
Editors from Digiday, Glossy, and Modern Retail unpack the how of AI in marketing, from agentic customer strategies to where automation truly saves time (and where the risks still outweigh rewards). Free to attend. Register →
⚫️ Cool AI + Marketing Jobs
Jobright. ai - Sr Product Marketing Manager, AWS AI Product Marketing
eBay - Director, CRM- AI Transformation
AppLovin - Director of Marketing, Growth
Sentry - Product Marketing Manager, AI
Qualtrics - AI & Innovation Evangelist
Thanks for reading!
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