{"id":11254,"date":"2026-08-06T08:35:07","date_gmt":"2026-08-06T14:35:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/?p=11254"},"modified":"2026-08-06T08:35:07","modified_gmt":"2026-08-06T14:35:07","slug":"how-agencies-are-evolving-to-overcome-ai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/?p=11254","title":{"rendered":"How agencies are evolving to overcome AI"},"content":{"rendered":"
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AI is forcing content marketing agencies to evolve or go out of business. The technology is commoditizing content production and making routine marketing assets faster and cheaper to create. To compete, agencies have to compete on something AI can\u2019t easily replicate: judgment, creativity, and business strategy.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the conclusion of the study, \u201cTechnology-Enabled Democratization: Impact of Generative AI on Content Marketing Agencies,\u201d published in the journal \u201cIndustrial Marketing Management.\u201d Based on interviews with agency leaders and their clients, the researchers argue that AI is changing not just how marketing work gets done, but what clients are willing to pay for.<\/p>\n

For years, agencies differentiated themselves through production capacity. They had the writers, designers, developers, and specialists needed to create content at scale.<\/p>\n

AI changes that.<\/p>\n

One client interviewed for the study described the shift bluntly:<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe are on the same level. Small companies can produce exactly the same content in the same way. A single person can do an awful lot of what used to require a big organization and a large number of content creators.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Companies can now use AI to draft articles, generate images, personalize campaigns, analyze data, and build simple applications at a fraction of the previous cost. Capabilities that once differentiated agencies are becoming widely available to businesses of every size.<\/p>\n

That doesn\u2019t eliminate the need for agencies. It changes what they\u2019re hired to do.<\/p>\n

AI solves the production problem, not the attention problem<\/h2>\n

Making content easier to create doesn\u2019t make it more valuable.<\/p>\n

As AI lowers production costs, it also increases the supply of competent marketing content competing for the same audience\u2019s attention.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

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<\/p>\n

One business customer interviewed for the study put it this way:<\/p>\n

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\u201cOver the last month, we have produced two or three times the amount of content, but actually, the number of readers has not grown in proportion, or those who consume the content, or how much they consume.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Another participant described the challenge facing marketers:<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe challenge is that when everyone does the same\u2026 the amount of web content will blow up. Even though it might be cheap to produce the text, does it give you the benefit anymore?\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The bottleneck is no longer production. It\u2019s attention.<\/p>\n

As content becomes more abundant, differentiation comes from understanding customers, developing original ideas, and creating campaigns that deserve attention rather than simply adding to the volume.<\/p>\n

Agencies are moving up the value chain<\/h2>\n

The research suggests agencies are responding by shifting away from execution work and toward higher-value services such as strategic consulting, AI implementation, personalization, and business advisory work.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a significant change in how marketers should evaluate agency partners.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re choosing an agency primarily because it can produce more blog posts, emails, or landing pages each month, you\u2019re evaluating a capability that AI is rapidly commoditizing. The greater value increasingly lies in an agency\u2019s ability to identify opportunities, shape messaging, connect marketing to business objectives, and help organizations integrate AI into their operations.<\/p>\n

Production remains important. It simply isn\u2019t enough on its own.<\/p>\n

What this means for marketers<\/h2>\n

The same shift will influence how marketing organizations build internal teams.<\/p>\n

As AI takes over more routine production work, the value of marketers increasingly comes from applying business context, exercising judgment, and directing AI toward meaningful outcomes rather than simply generating more content.<\/p>\n

The study argues that expertise is becoming less about creating assets and more about deciding which assets should exist, how they support business goals, and how AI fits into broader marketing workflows.<\/p>\n

One agency executive summarized the transition this way:<\/p>\n

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\u201cI do still think people\u2019s creativity is what customers are ready to pay for\u2026 The strategic work and creativity, to use these tools creatively, only the people can do.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

AI isn\u2019t reducing the value of expertise. It\u2019s changing what expertise customers are willing to pay for. Production is becoming easier to buy. Judgment, originality, and business context are becoming harder to replace.<\/p>\n

The study was conducted by Risqo Wahid, researcher at the School of Business and Economics, <\/em>University of Jyv\u00e4skyl\u00e4<\/em><\/a>; Joel Mero, professor of marketing at the School of Business and Economics, University of Jyv\u00e4skyl\u00e4; and Paavo Ritala, professor at the LUT School of Business and Management, <\/em>LUT University<\/em><\/a>. They interviewed 13 content marketing agency professionals and nine client-side marketers to examine how generative AI is reshaping agency business models and client relationships. It can be <\/em>downloaded here<\/em><\/a>. (No registration required.)<\/em><\/p>\n

The post How agencies are evolving to overcome AI<\/a> appeared first on MarTech<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AI is forcing content marketing agencies to evolve or go out of business. The technology is commoditizing content production and making routine marketing assets faster and cheaper to create. To compete, agencies have to compete on something AI can\u2019t easily replicate: judgment, creativity, and business strategy. That\u2019s the conclusion of the study, \u201cTechnology-Enabled Democratization: Impact … <\/p>\n

Read more “How agencies are evolving to overcome AI”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"featured_media_urls":{"thumbnail":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"medium":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"medium_large":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"large":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"inspiro-featured-image":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"inspiro-loop":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"inspiro-loop@2x":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"portfolio_item-thumbnail":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"portfolio_item-thumbnail@2x":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"portfolio_item-masonry":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"portfolio_item-masonry@2x":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"portfolio_item-thumbnail_cinema":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"portfolio_item-thumbnail_portrait":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"portfolio_item-thumbnail_portrait@2x":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false],"portfolio_item-thumbnail_square":["https:\/\/martech.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/compass-answers-strategy-human-knowledge-800x450.png",0,0,false]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11254"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11254\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/attentionmedia.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}