Do marketers still matter?
The answer is yes
Hello 👋🏾
Itsjustwriting is four years old now—basically, a toddler in the process of developing its own personality. When I created it, I wanted to share about writing, building a marketing career, and my life. Now Itsjustwriting is evolving into a newsletter about content strategy, customer research, building a marketing career, and my life (I love giving unsolicited gist). Thank you to all of 228 who read what I write.
In an obvious ragebait tweet, a founder claimed to have built Claude Code for marketing. They claimed it could do everything marketers do and eliminate the need for the role. To quote them: “It does a marketer’s work in minutes by browsing, clicking, and posting like a human”.
If you know anything about marketing, your brows are probably creased right now. And rightfully so. No marketer worth their salt spends their time browsing, clicking, and posting… No one.
This tweet got me thinking about the role of marketers, specifically content strategists, in 2026—the year of our lord AI.
The barriers to content production have been blown out of the water
Producing content is now easier than ever. And I am not talking about browsing, clicking, and posting. I mean the research, writing, editing, design, coding, et al that marketers spend hours on can be done with AI tools. (The results are not always great tho).
This means you can record a webinar and proceed to create a newsletter, cut a couple of clips for YouTube or LinkedIn, write a blog, and repurpose insights into a downloadable resource in a few minutes.
For the overworked (and underpaid) marketer, that’s great news.
But the bad news is that
It’s harder to stand out because your competitors are using the same AI tools, which might look exactly like yours
It’s harder to prioritize the right marketing activities. More teams are engaged in random acts of content because they can make stuff.
It’s difficult to get your audience’s attention. There’s just a lot more content out there. And over time, I predict that our audience will become skeptical about AI content just like they started sniffing out articles optimized for Google alone.
These reasons are also why the “Now you can replace marketers” startup I mentioned in the intro will crash and burn (yes, I am a bit salty about the tweet). They are focused on the production process while not considering the strategy aspect of marketing.
I wish I could say they are the only ones making that mistake.
A lot of marketers are concerned with the ship. They want to make stuff and send it out into the world. Their bosses want them to make the same stuff the competition is making, so they don’t lose to their rivals.
Very few stop and ask: Why are we doing this? Should we even be doing this? What’s the plan here?
You’re a smart marketer. It might be time to start raising those queries.
A question about playing might be the answer
There’s an idea from Richard Rumelt, author of Good Strategy, Bad Strategy, that could help you avoid the abovementioned situation.
In his book, Rumelt emphasizes that good strategy involves making clear choices about where to play and where not to play. Basically, deciding areas/channels/tactics you’ll compete on. He argues that organizations that try to do everything and be everywhere will fail. Instead, they should focus resources on areas where they have an advantage. What does this mean for content marketing?
For example, before generating another blog post, because you can, run it through these questions:
Does this channel support our revenue goals? (Check your attribution data)
Do our customers actually read blogs before buying? (Ask your sales team what content prospects mention or jump in and listen to the recordings)
If yes, what specific information do they need at this stage? (Map to buyer journey)
If not, where are they actually finding info before buying? (Ask your customers)
This is where content strategists become invaluable. It’s our job to start asking uncomfortable questions like: Where can we actually win? What’s our competitive advantage on this channel? What are we stopping so we can focus our efforts elsewhere?
I doubt that this is something Claude Code or any other AI tool can automate. (At least until they achieve AGI).
PS. I do video versions of these newsletters on my YouTube channel. If you’d like to watch them, head over to YouTube and subscribe.
I spent the New Year with my mummy in Zaria. Home was restful and the food was plentiful.
I taught a class on content writing basics to the students of the WriteRight Academy. I covered how and why we write content, how it supports business goals, and walked them through the research, outline, drafting, and writing processes, amongst other things. Thanks to Joy Ogide for inviting me.
My poetry book is available for pre-order. Delivery is available in Abuja and Lagos. Get your copy here. If you live elsewhere and want to purchase, an e-book will be available next quarter.
I started actively consulting with one of the startups I invested in. I wanted to get into GTM and a bit of product marketing while also setting up content foundations for them. All for selfish reasons because this will look great on my resume. I built my first buyer persona doc for a B2C product and I am so proud.
I am currently touring Senegal with Joy! I usually do solo trips, so it’s so nice to travel with someone. Watch out for the vlog on my YouTube channel 🫵🏾
