AI Can Now Write Your Marketing Strategy for €495. Here's What It Still Can't Do

What's actually on offer

The Irish Times this week profiled MarkGo, a Dublin platform that builds marketing strategies for SMEs using AI, then has a vetted senior marketer review and refine the output before it goes to the client. Its starter package is €495. The founders put the typical agency fee for a strategy alone at €20,000–€25,000.

The process is simple: the business owner fills in a 15-minute questionnaire on product, competitors, audience, goals, current activity and budget, and gets a 90-day plan back within about 48 hours. The pitch is built on a big claim — that roughly 60% of SME marketing spend brings no measurable return.

They're right about the problem

I'm not going to pretend otherwise. The founders describe small businesses throwing money at 'random acts of marketing' — tactics chosen because they looked good in the moment, not because they served a plan. I see exactly that every time I sit down with a founder: a TikTok push here, a sampling day there, a paid social boost when sales dip. None of it joined up.

If a €495 tool gets more founders to stop and ask 'what are we actually trying to achieve?' before they spend, that's a win for everyone — including consultants like me.

Where a generic plan runs out for food and drink

Here's the bit that AI-only tools can't close, and it's the bit that makes or breaks a food and drink brand. A strategy tells you what to do. It doesn't know the category rules, the people or the timings that decide whether you can actually do it.

•       Listings — range reviews, buyer timelines and what a retailer needs to see before they'll take a punt on a new SKU. Miss the window and the plan is dead for a year.

•       Retailer relationships — how to pitch a buyer, what promo mechanics they'll back, and how to negotiate support without giving away your margin.

•       Compliance — HFSS rules, health and nutrition claims, allergen labelling. Get these wrong and your 'bold creative idea' can't run at all.

•       Activation reality — sampling, shopper marketing and in-store execution cost money and lead time that a questionnaire won't surface.

•       Category nuance — what works in chilled dairy is not what works in ambient snacks. Knowing the difference comes from having done it.

Use the AI plan as a brief, not a bible

The founders who'll win here are the ones who use both. Let AI do the research and give you structure fast — then get someone who knows the category and the retailer landscape (me) to pressure-test it before you spend a penny.

That's exactly the gap I built BTM to fill: strategy that's already been pressure-tested against the buyer meeting, because I've spent years on the brand side of those conversations. Cheap AI strategy doesn't threaten that. It makes the case for it.

•       Feed it real data — sales, retailer feedback and actual margins, not best guesses.

•       Challenge the channel mix — ask why each channel is there and what it's meant to deliver.

•       Map it to the retail calendar — range reviews, key seasonal moments and promo slots first, then creative.

•       Get it sense-checked — an hour with someone who knows your category will save you months of wasted spend.