Ann Handley recently shared her frustration about how AI is overwhelming marketing. Specifically, she said:
“I’m tired of wondering if a beautiful bit of writing came from a human… or Claude.
I’m low-key stressed about the future of marketing.
I’m high-key stressed about the future of thinking.” (Same, Ann. Same.)
If going full send on AI in marketing means my entire career is based on how fire my AI prompts are… I’m not that excited either.
Now let me be clear – I am not against the use of AI. I’m talking with ChatGPT (who I call Chad) daily. I’m excited about AI tools rolled out on LinkedIn, HubSpot, and in my workplace tools like Microsoft. AI-powered tools have nearly endless capabilities and can give small teams a huge leg up when it comes to marketing. It can be rocket fuel for your campaigns — if you have the right pilot.
The Big Idea: Scale ≠ Headcount
“We fired 500 people and replaced them with AI agents who do the job in half the time.”
A terrifying and real statement that has become increasingly more common as AI models improve. This is not the kind of AI revolution I am rooting for.
Many of our customers are SMBs, or organizations with big dreams and small budgets (Shout out to my friends at M2D2 and MTLC who are making big waves in their communities). AI is what elevates their work, giving them the capabilities of larger organizations without matching the headcount.
As more of us are asked to “do more with less” (who’s ready for “do the most with nothing” because I’m seeing a trend), finding a way to scale impact as a small team is crucial to your business’s overall success.
We’re finding AI use cases in a variety of different areas for our customers.
Two StitchDX AI Solutions Making It Happen
Using ChatGPT and AI-powered transcription tools, we’ve worked with customers like M2D2 to increase the quantity of content they’re sharing, without sacrificing quality. Since 2023, we’ve also been using tools like Descript and Vizard to help smaller teams deliver video content. With video taking center stage, boosting output helps smaller teams stay in the spotlight.
Along with using existing AI platforms, we’ve started building a few of our own. Working with a platform partner, we built two agents that help small teams make a bigger impact.
Meet the Newsletter Curator Agent
A few of our customers are a source of news and information for their audience. Sourcing, reviewing, and organizing a newsletter that shares relevant updates for their networks is a time-consuming task. With help from one of our digital platform partners, we created an agent that:
- Finds up to 10 articles from approved sources
- Confirms that these articles align with specific criteria relevant to the audience
- Checks that the articles come from live links that were published within the last 7 days
- Takes these 10 articles and organizes them into an easy-to-read newsletter
In addition to all of this, this agent is also set to run automatically every week. No more panicking Monday morning when you haven’t even started on the next newsletter issue.
This agent is a non-linear agentic RAG (Retrieval Augmented Generation) AI model. It uses multi-step reasoning to evaluate, course-correct, flag concerns, and improve outputs each time it completes the process. This agent is just a glimpse into what’s possible with these AI-powered tools.
Next Up: The Website Audit Analyst, courtesy of AI
This tool is something our team has done in the past. A website audit, which can take countless hours and multiple people, is something that is a beneficial sales or discovery tool, which means those hours don’t always lead to closed business deals.
The Website Audit Analyst Agent (Website Triple A?) is built on the foundation of our company’s existing experience and expertise, and in a matter of hours, can provide a detailed website assessment report. This report can explore:
- Individual page content clarity, quality and SEO
- AI visibility and discoverability
- Target audience analysis
And so much more!
Where AI Fits in the Creative Process (and Where It Doesn’t)
At this point, I’ve left my ivory tower built on the dreams of not falling prey to AI dependence. I’m using it (daily, if I’m being honest) and I’ve found benefits alongside the bad.
AI tools like ChatGPT and Claude are fantastic for brainstorming, outlines, and quickly formatting data. GitHub Copilot is becoming everyone’s favorite programmer, and the NotebookLM from Google created an incredibly real-sounding podcast episode.
These tools have massive potential but cannot — dare I say should not — replace the impact human creators can have. This includes:
- Brand voice & tone: keeping every sentence unmistakably you
- Emotional nuance & empathy: choosing the right story, angle, or word to move real people
- Context & judgment: knowing which insights matter and which are noise
- Ethics & accuracy: spotting bias, protecting privacy, and upholding brand standards
- Final polish: adding the humor, metaphor, or narrative hook AI still can’t fake
When we pair AI’s speed with human subtlety and soul, we get work that’s both efficient and unforgettable.
Looking Ahead: HubSpot × OpenAI & Continuous Innovation
HubSpot’s newly announced partnership with OpenAI signals deeper, native GPT-powered features on the horizon — think smarter email drafts, faster call summaries, and AI-generated campaign recommendations delivered inside the CRM.
As of now, we’re still missing truly tailor-made models and an easy ‘sound-like-us’ dial. Translation: we’ve got more testing to do before we unleash this for every customer.
Key Takeaways for B2B Leaders
AI isn’t here to replace us — it’s here to amplify us. Start by handing off one high-effort, low-creativity task to an AI helper and measure the hours you win back. Then reinvest that time in strategy, storytelling, and the human touches no model can mimic.
And if you’d rather skip the trial-and-error, partner with a team that’s already pressure-testing these tools. We’ll make sure every new capability boosts results without risking security, quality, or your brand’s voice.