Creating Smarter Marketing Plans with AI Collaboration
- Chris McLellan
- Oct 24
- 3 min read
Updated: Nov 4
The AI-enabled marketing function really kicks into gear when human teams and AI systems collaborate to create coordinated plans, powered by insights, that align with business and marketing goals, turning insight and intent into actionable strategies for growth.
This is the anchor post for an open research initiative focused on developing a practical framework for building an AI-Enabled marketing function. Marketers, vendors, and other stakeholders are invited to contribute. To participate as an attributed collaborator, email: chris@friendselectric.ca
Overview
In an AI-enabled marketing function, the Planning stage provides the bridge between information and creation.
This is when marketers collaborate with tools like AI Research Assistants to establish detailed but adaptable plans that support business and marketing objectives.
Each item in a plan is tagged with contextual information including publishing dates, format, channel, owner, and campaign. These are vital ingredients in the prompts that will be used to inform the prompts that will be used by AI production tools in the next stage of the system to create high-quality first drafts.
Inputs/Outputs For Smart Plans
Key inputs:
Insights from the Marketing Knowledge Base
Creative ideas, briefs, and objectives from Collaboration Space
Business goals, campaign calendars, and team availability
Guardrails and governance parameters (fact-checking, compliance rules)
Key outputs:
Strategic plans with quarterly objectives and metrics
Budgets with channel investments and ROI-related data
Campaign plans with key milestones, activities, and owners
Content plans that adopt a content lifecycle approach to maximize productivity
Other plans that help to execute the over marketing function e.g. AI adoption plan
Tips For Building Smart Plans
AI-assisted planning is not about handing over control. It is about using AI to make the planning process faster, smarter, and more consistent.
The following best practices show how to combine human strategy with AI support to move from static knowledge to an active content plan that drives results.
Review Frequently
Plans are where the rubber hits the road, so review it daily to ensure that the next few days align with expectations. The AI Research Assistant provides an interactive experience for these reviews, but ensure that all human stakeholders get around the table (r Zoom) at least once per month.
Align With Objectives
As covered in the post on Marketing Knowledge Bases for Content Engines, every item in your Content Calendar should be tagged with one or more marketing objectives (which always align with a business goal).
If your team cannot easily answer “Why is this in our Content Schedule?” it probably shouldn't be there.
Ensure that every blog, video, podcast, and post supports a clear marketing objective such as generating leads, building brand equity, launching products, building thought leadership, or expanding into a new sector, industry, or geographic region.
These objectives should be easy to find. Just open your Marketing Plan :)
Define Guardrails for Governance
Fact-checking, approvals, and compliance cannot be afterthoughts. They must start in the planning process.
In each plan, add columns for governance like 'Owner', 'Fact Checked', and 'Status'. The goal is to ensure all activities are captured with accuracy, transparency, and trust in mind.
Explore Other Posts In The Series
Planning (this post)
Production
Orchestration
Tracking
Join This Research Project
For many marketers, AI is simultaneously everywhere and nowhere.
Teams are testing its capabilities, but few are adopting operational systems to actually guide its implementation, mainly because so few frameworks actually exist.
This research project is all about learning in public and building smarter and more productive marketing functions through controlled human-AI collaboration.
If you have expertise in marketing, creative strategy, knowledge management, system design, or AI agents and would like to become an attributed co-author of the design and Build Notes doc, please get in touch.
Email: chris@friendselectric.ca
About Friends Electric
Friends Electric is a private AI marketing consultancy founded by Chris McLellan, a Certified Chartered Marketer and contributing member of the AI Marketing Committee at the Canadian Marketing Association.
He's also founder and producer of the Ask AI podcast, and serves as Technical Committee Lead and co-author at the Digital Governance Council for the Data Collaboration Framework, a Canadian and international standard governing human-ai innovation.
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