The AI Marketing Companion

Sandy Carter
  • 4.8 (87)
  • Marketing
  • Updated Biweekly

The AI Marketing Companion, hosted by Sandy Carter, is the world's most entertaining marketing podcast. Sandy is a bestselling author of "AI First, Human Always," a Forbes Top 150 contributor, and a keynote speaker at Davos, CES, SXSW, and the United Nations. She took the mic in January 2026 from founding host Mark Schaefer, carrying forward 13 years of laugh-out-loud conversation, surprise guests, and sharp insight. New episodes dig into AI, agentic commerce, and the future of digital business, always fun, always interesting, always ready to turn your marketing intellect up to 11

  1. 6d ago

    How a 24-Year Army Veteran Built 360K LinkedIn Followers by Telling Stories

    America turns 250 this year. Every brand on the planet is reaching for the moment. And most of them are about to miss it completely. Michael Quinn has spent years studying why, and what to do instead. He is a 3x LinkedIn Top Voice with a following above 360,000, a Forbes Coaches Council member, and the founder of Tenova LLC, with a monthly social reach that exceeds two million people. He knows what makes content land, what makes brands earn trust, and what the difference looks like between honoring a moment and just borrowing it. In this conversation we get into three ideas that every marketer needs right now. Story is the only strategy that lasts. Authenticity is a decision, not a vibe. And the opportunity sitting inside America's AI disruption is bigger than most brands realize. Michael also designs an AI-powered campaign to honor the 250th live, and closes with what he wants every marketer to do the moment this episode ends. If you want to get this moment right, this one's for you.     SPOTIFY SHOW NOTES America is turning 250. And the biggest marketing opportunity of the decade is sitting right in front of every brand on the planet. Most of them are going to waste it. In this episode of The AI Marketing Companion, Sandy Carter sits down with Michael Quinn, 3x LinkedIn Top Voice, Forbes Coaches Council member, and founder of Tenova LLC, to talk about what it actually takes to own a cultural moment like America's 250th. He shared 3 ideas that are simple but not easy!  1. Story Is the Only Strategy That Works Brands are flooding the zone with America 250 content right now. Flags. Fireworks. Slogans. Almost none of it will be remembered by August. Michael has built a following above 360,000 on LinkedIn and a monthly reach beyond two million people by doing one thing differently: starting with a real story, not a campaign brief. The brands that will own this moment are the ones that find a human being at the center of the celebration and let that person speak. Not a tagline. A story with stakes, with heart, with something true at the center of it. 2. Authenticity Is Not a Vibe. It Is a Decision. Every brand wants to feel authentic right now. Very few are willing to make the decisions that create it. In a world where AI can generate unlimited content in seconds, the one thing that cannot be faked is a genuine point of view. That is what audiences are filtering for. That is what earns trust. And trust, Michael says, is the only currency that compounds. 3. The Opportunity in America Is Bigger Than You Think AI is reshaping the economy faster than anyone predicted. A lot of people are scared. Michael sees something different. He sees an opening. America at 250 is not just a birthday. It is a reset point. The brands and individuals who use AI as a tool for human storytelling rather than a replacement for it are going to have an extraordinary advantage in the years ahead. The opportunity is real. The window is open. About Michael Quinn SGM (Ret.) Michael Quinn is the founder and Chief Growth Officer of Tenova LLC and its HireMilitary brand, a verified Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business. He is a 3x LinkedIn Top Voice with a following above 360,000 and a monthly social reach beyond two million people, a Forbes Coaches Council member, and creator of the Digital Networking Professional Program. His brand promise: Teamwork and Innovation. Connect with Michael LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/quinnmi Tenova LLC: https://tenovallc.com/ HireMilitary: https://www.linkedin.com/company/hiremilitary-us Connect with Sandy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandyacarter/ Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/sandycarter/ Sandy Carter: https://sandycarter.net/   If this episode moved you, share it with one marketer who needs to hear it before America's 250th.

    33 min

  2. Jun 23

    Your Brand's Soul Isn't Dead, It Just Needs AI Done Right | Tatyana Kanzaveli

    A few weeks ago, I was talking with a marketing leader who summed up the challenge facing most teams in a single sentence: "We need to create three times more content with the same number of people." I suspect that sounds familiar. Every platform wants more. LinkedIn wants consistency. Short-form video is consuming marketing calendars. Leadership wants greater visibility. Customers expect faster responses. Somehow, all of that has landed on teams that aren't dramatically larger than they were a year ago. So marketers do what marketers always do. They look for leverage. Right now, that leverage is AI. The problem is that many teams discover the downside almost immediately. The content gets produced faster, but it starts sounding generic. The personality fades. The perspective that made people pay attention in the first place gets lost somewhere between prompt number three and post number thirty. That's why I enjoyed my conversation this week with Tatyana Kanzaveli, founder of SocialBrilliance.ai. What interested me wasn't another promise to generate more content. We've all seen enough of those. What interested me was her focus on preserving voice. Because I don't think marketers have a content volume problem anymore. We have a differentiation problem. The internet is filling up with competent content. What remains scarce is content that sounds like it came from a real person, a real company, or a real point of view. Tatyana and I spent a lot of time discussing how smaller marketing teams can use AI without giving up the very thing that makes their brand recognizable. We talked about brand voice, publishing velocity, authenticity, and the guardrails that matter when AI becomes part of your content process. One idea from our conversation stuck with me. The goal isn't to use AI to sound better. The goal is to use AI to sound more like yourself. That may sound obvious, but it's a very different approach from what much of the market is selling. As I was preparing for the interview, I realized it also completed a pattern that emerged across all of our June episodes. First, Simon Davis challenged the idea that more content is automatically better content. His warning about AI slop wasn't really about technology. It was about originality. The brands that stand out will be the ones that continue to contribute new ideas instead of recycling the same ones faster. Then Shawn Reddy joined me to discuss Claude's Dynamic Workflows. His message was that the next generation of marketers may be valued less for writing prompts and more for designing systems. As AI becomes capable of handling increasingly complex work, workflow design becomes a competitive advantage. And now Tatyana brings the third piece of the puzzle: authenticity. Looking back, June was really about three skills marketers need to develop in the AI era. - The ability to avoid AI slop. - The ability to build intelligent workflows. - And the ability to scale an authentic voice. Technology will continue to change. Models will improve. New tools will arrive every month. But those three capabilities feel surprisingly durable. If you can think originally, build intelligently, and communicate authentically, you'll be ahead of most of the market regardless of which AI platform happens to be winning the headlines.   I'd love to know what you think. Of those three skills—original thinking, workflow design, or authentic voice—which do you believe will matter most over the next few years?

    32 min

  3. Jun 18

    The AI Shift Marketers Must Know: Claude Just Overtook ChatGPT

    Anthropic's Claude has officially surpassed ChatGPT in enterprise adoption—but that's not the biggest story. The real shift is happening beneath the surface. In this episode of AI Marketing Companion, Sandy Carter sits down with Shawn Reddy of Team Nebula to explore why businesses are moving beyond prompts and chatbots toward dynamic AI workflows that can execute real work. From content creation and campaign execution to brand consistency and productivity, this conversation breaks down what marketers need to know about the next phase of AI. In this episode: 00:00 Introduction 02:10 Anthropic surpasses OpenAI in enterprise adoption 05:25 Why marketers should care about the shift 08:40 The most important Claude Opus 4.8 feature most people are missing 12:15 What dynamic workflows actually are 16:40 Dynamic workflows vs prompt engineering 21:05 Turning a webinar or podcast into a complete content engine 27:20 Can AI workflows reduce AI-generated "slop"? 32:10 The marketing skills becoming more valuable in the AI era 37:05 One workflow every CMO should implement in the next 90 days 41:55 What marketers are still underestimating about AI 45:30 Lightning Round 49:15 Final takeaways  Key Takeaways • AI is shifting from answering questions to executing workflows. • Dynamic workflows may become more important than prompt engineering. • Marketers can automate entire content distribution pipelines while maintaining brand consistency. • The future competitive advantage won't be access to AI—it will be workflow design. • Human judgment, creativity, and strategic thinking become more valuable as execution becomes automated.  Guest Shawn Reddy Founder, Team Nebula Shawn works with organizations implementing practical AI systems and workflows that help teams scale content creation, operations, and business processes.  Related Reading • Read Sandy Carter's Forbes coverage of Anthropic's rise in enterprise adoption:https://www.forbes.com/sites/sandycarter/2026/06/05/claude-becomes-the-enterprise-favorite-as-anthropic-passes-openai/ • Read Sandy Carter's analysis of the government's Fable restrictions and what they mean for enterprise AI leaders: https://www.forbes.com/sites/sandycarter/2026/06/13/anthropic-fable-government-lockdown-enterprise-ai-risk/  Subscribe for more conversations on AI, marketing, business transformation, and emerging technology. #Claude #Anthropic #ChatGPT #ArtificialIntelligence #MarketingAI #GenerativeAI #ContentMarketing #CMO #FutureOfWork #AIMarketingCompanion

    34 min

  4. Jun 9

    AI Slop Or Original Thinking?

    AI has solved one of marketing's oldest problems: creating content at scale. Now it may be creating a new one. In this episode of The AI Marketing Companion, Sandy Carter welcomes Simon Davis, Co-Founder and CEO of wearemighty, to discuss the growing challenge of maintaining originality in an era of unlimited AI-generated content. Simon shares how a request for 25 million branded assets led his team to discover a critical flaw in many AI workflows: content scales faster than brand consistency. That insight ultimately led to the creation of SecretSauce, a platform designed to help organizations preserve their identity across millions of assets. Together, Sandy and Simon explore the rise of AI slop, the hidden costs of brand drift, the future of agent-driven marketing, and why the most successful brands of the next decade may be those that remain unmistakably human. Whether you're leading a marketing team, building a brand, or experimenting with AI, this episode offers practical insights into the future of creativity, differentiation, and trust. Key Topics: AI slop versus original thinking The hidden costs of unlimited content Brand drift and consistency at scale Marketing agents and autonomous publishing Teaching AI to understand a brand Why originality matters more than ever Subscribe to The AI Marketing Companion for conversations at the intersection of marketing, technology, and the future of business.

    33 min

  5. May 27

    Will AI Take My Job? Insights from a Mother-Daughter Conversation

    Will AI take your marketing job? That's exactly what this conversation explores. In this mother-daughter discussion, we talk about how AI is changing marketing, creativity, and the future of work. Instead of fear, we focus on understanding how AI can actually help marketers think better, move faster, and create smarter. We discuss: • How AI is transforming marketing jobs   • Why AI should be used as a system, not just a shortcut   • The difference between automation and creativity   • How marketers can stay valuable in the AI era   • The danger of relying too heavily on AI   • Practical ways to use AI without losing your human touch One of the biggest takeaways from this conversation is simple: AI may speed things up, but creativity, storytelling, emotion, and critical thinking still belong to humans. If you're a marketer, creator, business owner, student, or simply curious about the future of AI, this conversation will give you a realistic perspective on where things are heading.   #AI #Marketing #ArtificialIntelligence #AIInMarketing #DigitalMarketing #FutureOfWork #MarketingCareer #Creativity #AITools #BusinessGrowth

    29 min

  6. May 13

    The 5 Must-Know AI Lessons for Marketers

    Described AI is changing marketing faster than any technology shift we've seen before. The question is no longer whether marketers should use AI. The question is who will use it well enough to win. In just 30 minutes, you'll learn the five AI First lessons every marketer needs right now to stay relevant, drive measurable business outcomes, and lead in a world where agents, automation, and intelligent systems are becoming part of every campaign and customer interaction. We'll cover why some companies are seeing massive gains from AI while others are stuck in endless pilots. How to identify the AI use cases that actually increase revenue, productivity, and customer engagement. What skills marketers need to develop now as AI reshapes content creation, search, personalization, analytics, and decision-making. And where human creativity, trust, emotional intelligence, and strategic thinking become even more valuable in an AI-driven world. You'll also hear the biggest myths holding teams back, the hidden risks leaders often miss when they automate too aggressively, and practical ways to use AI today without losing your brand voice, your customer trust, or your competitive edge. Whether you're a CMO, founder, strategist, creator, or marketing leader, this session will give you practical insights, real-world examples, and a clearer roadmap for what comes next. AI First, Human Always. AI is the accelerant. You are still the advantage.

    24 min

  7. Apr 28

    DaVinci And OpenAI Shipped Agentic Commerce

    Everyone is talking about agentic commerce. DaVinci and OpenAI just shipped it. Sandy Carter sits down with Diaz Nesamoney to unpack what the news means for marketers who are still chasing clicks while the storefront moves into ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude. Diaz breaks down the brand control crisis, the content architecture overhaul every CMO needs this quarter, and the zero-party intent data hiding inside conversational commerce. Sandy closes with four lessons every marketing leader needs from the DaVinci Commerce announcement, including why brand control is now a technical problem, why OpenClaw changes the path to purchase, and why optimizing for AI agents matters more than optimizing for audiences. If you lead marketing at an enterprise and you are still running agentic commerce as a pilot, this episode is your wake-up call.

    34 min

  8. Apr 14

    Lilypath's Dan Nestle on LinkedIn as AI Branding For You!

    Dan Nestle, founder of Lilypath, joins Sandy Carter on The Marketing Companion to unpack a shift most professionals have not noticed yet. AI systems are now interpreting, ranking, and recommending people before any human ever clicks a profile. Dan calls this Authority Intelligence, a new category he built Lilypath to define. Inside the episode, Dan and Sandy cover the Gemini Deep Research moment that exposed how badly AI can misread a real expert, why LinkedIn has quietly become the number one cited domain for professional queries across six major AI platforms (per Profound, LinkedIn, and Semrush data), and what "broken" looks like when your authority signal is off: silent inboxes, irrelevant pitches, recruiters missing you, RFPs going to competitors, and a stranger suddenly getting credit for ideas you have championed for years. Dan also shares the one concrete action every senior leader should take this week to fix how AI reads them, plus a Lilypath discount for listeners. Use code COMPANION20 at checkout. Brought to you by Semrush, the platform powering the search and AI visibility data behind this conversation, and Brevo, the all-in-one CRM and marketing platform helping growing teams turn authority into pipeline.   00:00:05 - Welcome and Sponsor Mentions 00:00:54 - Guest Introduction: Dan's Early Career in Japan 00:01:57 - Dan's Career Evolution and the Founding of Lily Path 00:05:47 - Introducing Lily Path and Authority Intelligence 00:07:23 - The Genesis of Lily Path: Optimizing for AI Interpretation 00:12:42 - The New Era: Domain Knowledge vs. Coding with AI 00:16:06 - Authority Intelligence: Taking Control of Your AI Narrative 00:21:23 - LinkedIn's Evolved Role as AI's Professional Truth Source 00:27:17 - Maintaining Human Relevance & Actionable Steps for Professionals 00:36:06 - Special Offer, Conclusion, and Contact Information

    40 min
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4.8
out of 5
87 Ratings

About

The AI Marketing Companion, hosted by Sandy Carter, is the world's most entertaining marketing podcast. Sandy is a bestselling author of "AI First, Human Always," a Forbes Top 150 contributor, and a keynote speaker at Davos, CES, SXSW, and the United Nations. She took the mic in January 2026 from founding host Mark Schaefer, carrying forward 13 years of laugh-out-loud conversation, surprise guests, and sharp insight. New episodes dig into AI, agentic commerce, and the future of digital business, always fun, always interesting, always ready to turn your marketing intellect up to 11

Information

  • Creator
    Sandy Carter
  • Years Active
    2013 - 2026
  • Episodes
    358
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © AI First, Human Always
  • Show Website
    The AI Marketing Companion

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