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Courses teach you the buttons.
This teaches you the market.

Honest notes on the AI marketing stack from someone who has to make it pay: what each tool is good at, what it costs today, and who should not buy it. 70 tools checked against the vendor’s own pricing and docs.

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Latest articles

GuideAgents

The AI marketing stack for 2026: what is worth paying for

Most stacks are bought one free trial at a time. Here is the order to buy in, what the free layer already covers, and where the money is wasted.

1 October 2026 · 4 min

ComparisonPaid social

Motion vs Foreplay vs Atria: which creative tool does a paid social team need?

They get compared as if they were rivals. They mostly do different jobs, and the price gap between them is more than tenfold.

1 October 2026 · 3 min

ComparisonAutomation

n8n vs Zapier vs Make for marketing automation: the pricing unit decides it

All three will move a lead from a form to a CRM. They disagree about what to charge you for, and that disagreement is the whole decision.

1 October 2026 · 3 min

ShortlistCreative

The best AI video tools for UGC-style ads, and the rule that keeps you out of trouble

AI actors can give you thirty hooks by Friday. They cannot give you a customer. Here is what each tool is for, and where the line sits.

1 October 2026 · 3 min

WorkflowAutomation

An AI creative testing workflow with Claude, n8n and Meta

The useful version of 'AI runs my ads' is small: a nightly data pull, one fixed prompt, and a person who signs off. Here is the whole loop, with the prompt.

1 October 2026 · 4 min

AnalysisPaid social

Meta's Muse for Small Business: what it means if you run ads for a living

Meta's own agent can now connect to an ad account, analyse what is working and draft next week's campaign. It is US and Canada only, and the post is careful about what it does not say.

1 October 2026 · 3 min

QuizAgents

Which AI marketing stack are you? A five-question quiz

Five questions about how you work, not what you wish you had time for. You get a stack of four or five tools and one thing to stop paying for.

1 October 2026 · 2 min

01 / Browse by job

Eight jobs a marketing stack has to do.

13 toolsAI creative & adsImage, video and copy generators that are actually usable for paid ads, and where each one falls over.9 toolsPaid socialCreative analytics, ad research and account management for Meta, TikTok and LinkedIn buyers.10 toolsSEO & AEORanking in Google and getting cited by AI assistants. Two jobs that now share one budget.10 toolsContent & socialWriting, repurposing, scheduling and newsletters for teams that publish every week.8 toolsWorkflow automationThe plumbing: tools that move data between your ad accounts, sheets, CRM and AI models.11 toolsAnalytics & attributionWhat actually drove the sale. Attribution, product analytics and reporting connectors.9 toolsOutbound & GTMProspecting, enrichment and sequencing for agencies and B2B teams that sell as well as advertise.16 toolsAI agents & skillsAssistants, coding agents and the data tools that feed them. The layer everything else now plugs into.

02 / Start from who you are

Agencies & B2B teamsYou need tools that survive ten brands and three stakeholders, not a clever demo.Solo foundersYou need the smallest stack that works, and a clear idea of what not to buy yet.Creators & freelancersYou need tools that pay for themselves in hours saved on the first client.Media buyersYou need more good creative per week and attribution you can defend in a client call.

03 / From the directory

Checked, not scraped.

All 70 tools

Activepieces

AutomationAgents

Open-source automation platform for flows, AI agents and tables, in the cloud or on your own servers.

Best for
Teams that want an open-source, self-hostable automation tool with a low-cost cloud plan.
Price
$20/month billed monthly (Plus, 10,000 credits/month)
Free plan
Our notesVisit site

AdCreative.ai

Creative

Generates ad banners, ad copy, product photos and short videos, and scores creatives before launch.

Best for
Small ecommerce teams that need a steady supply of static ad variations without a designer.
Price
$39/month billed monthly (Starter); $20/month billed yearly
Our notesVisit site

Ahrefs

SEO & AEO

SEO data platform for backlinks, keywords, rank tracking and site audits, with LLM visibility tracking.

Best for
Teams that need backlink and keyword research on competitors as well as their own site, in one subscription.
Price
£23/month (Starter); Lite is £99/month
Free plan
Our notesVisit site

Airtable

Automation

No-code database and app builder with automations, interfaces and AI agents.

Best for
Marketing teams that need a structured content calendar, creative tracker or campaign database with light automation.
Price
$20/user/month billed annually (Team)
Free plan
Our notesVisit site

Apify

AgentsAutomation

Marketplace of ready-made web scrapers and automation tools, called Actors, that run in the cloud.

Best for
Marketers who want data from a specific site or social platform without writing a scraper themselves.
Price
$19
Free plan
Our notesVisit site

Apollo

Outbound

B2B contact database with built-in email sequences, a dialler and AI prospecting agents.

Best for
Small sales teams and founders who want prospect data and sequencing in one tool without stitching several products together.
Price
Free plan
Free plan
Our notesVisit site