Chapter 01 / The expertise bottleneck

AI keeps sending work back to your experts.

AI writes the first draft faster. Product marketing still checks that what it says about the product is true. Industry marketers still add what a retail or manufacturing buyer cares about. Sales still asks whether the pitch fits the customer. The same few people touch every version.

Your next industry campaign or partner launch waits on the same specialists who are already fully booked.

01.1

Your best product marketer is still the last stop.

A polished draft is easy to get. A statement about the product that a salesperson can defend in front of a buyer takes product knowledge, current proof and judgment.

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01.2

Your team keeps teaching AI the same company.

When people explain the company to AI again and again, the facts they need are not stored anywhere reusable. The facts about the product, proof from customers and what is happening in the market need one place people trust.

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01.3

The marketer with a working idea needs someone to build it.

A promising trial can stall between the marketer who understands the campaign and the IT team that controls the systems.

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01.4

You can start before you buy anything new.

Written methods an AI can follow, tools that make documents readable to AI, and shared workspaces for AI assistants already exist, most of them free. What marketing lacks is a person with the time and access to put them to work.

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The numbers behind this chapter

First, how leaders rate this area overall. Then four specific ways of working, each asked separately.

How leaders rate this area overall · Q1

The one-line self-assessment, asked before the detailed questions.

10%Starting. No consistent approach yet.

32%Experimenting. Individual teams are trying their own approaches.

41%Repeatable. Everyday work follows an agreed approach.

11%Established. One shared approach, improved regularly.

5%Don’t know

581 people were asked; blank answers are left out. This is how leaders rated their own company overall. The four specific ways of working below were asked separately. Nobody checked either answer against the actual work.

What is actually in place · Q3

Four ways of sharing expert know-how, each rated on its own.

Someone is named to keep customer, market and product facts current, with the source attached.

24%32%28%11%

Not happening 24%A few one-off trials 32%Used in several recurring jobs 28%The normal way of working, reviewed regularly 11%Don’t know 5%

An expert’s way of doing a job is written down so another person, or an AI assistant, can repeat it.

25%33%32%

Not happening 25%A few one-off trials 33%Used in several recurring jobs 32%The normal way of working, reviewed regularly 6%Don’t know 4%

Teams adapt freely available tools or written methods to handle a recurring job, rather than buying new software.

34%34%19%

Not happening 34%A few one-off trials 34%Used in several recurring jobs 19%The normal way of working, reviewed regularly 6%Don’t know 7%

A marketer and a systems person from marketing ops or IT share responsibility for keeping a working process running.

14%45%30%7%

Not happening 14%A few one-off trials 45%Used in several recurring jobs 30%The normal way of working, reviewed regularly 7%Don’t know 4%

581 people were asked; each row counts only the people who answered that row. Each row adds to 100% before rounding. “Used in several recurring jobs” and “the normal way of working” are shown as separate answers, not added together. Answer wording is shortened here; the questionnaire and explorer carry the full text. Explore every response ↗

Put the findings to work

Pick one recurring marketing job. Give it one kept-up-to-date set of approved facts and proof, and a written method someone other than the expert can follow.

Read what to do next ↗

Next chapter / 02

Your best product marketer is still the last stop.

Your team keeps teaching AI the same company.

The marketer with a working idea needs someone to build it.

You can start before you buy anything new.

First, how leaders rate this area overall. Then four specific ways of working, each asked separately.

The one-line self-assessment, asked before the detailed questions.

Four ways of sharing expert know-how, each rated on its own.

Someone is named to keep customer, market and product facts current, with the source attached.

An expert’s way of doing a job is written down so another person, or an AI assistant, can repeat it.

Teams adapt freely available tools or written methods to handle a recurring job, rather than buying new software.

A marketer and a systems person from marketing ops or IT share responsibility for keeping a working process running.

Pick one recurring marketing job. Give it one kept-up-to-date set of approved facts and proof, and a written method someone other than the expert can follow.

Too many AI tools leave people doing the connecting. ↗