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From AI Users to AI Builders: The Next Phase of AI in Marketing [MAICON 2026]

Marketing AI Institute· by Cathy McPhillips ·2026-08-03

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On "From AI Users to AI Builders: The Next Phase of AI in Marketing [MAICON 2026]"

The shift from consuming AI to building with it is real, but marketing teams should pump the brakes on the narrative that this is some natural evolution everyone needs to chase. Most organizations still haven't squeezed real ROI from the tools they're already using—they're optimizing prompts while their content strategy remains the same, which is the actual problem. Building custom AI solutions matters for teams with specific workflows complex enough to justify the engineering effort, but that's a smaller slice than the conference circuit suggests. The takeaway: audit what you're actually getting from AI today before you start thinking about building tomorrow.

From the source: Most marketing teams have gotten comfortable using AI. They've integrated it into content workflows, sharpened their prompts, and found individual productivity gains. But the next phase is already here, and it relies heavily on the ability and dedication of humans, says Zapier’s

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