Human-First AI Marketing Podcast by Avenue9

Discover how to harness the power of AI without losing the human touch. Hosted by Mike Montague, Founder of Avenue9, this podcast delivers actionable insights to help small and mid-sized businesses market like big brands. With expert interviews, relatable success stories, and practical tips, we show you how to amplify your marketing efforts with AI tools that enhance—not replace—human creativity and connection. Whether you're a business owner, marketer, or curious about the future of AI, this is your go-to guide for building smarter, more authentic marketing strategies. Want to be a guest? Send Mike Montague a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/1738519089289300a62eab036

Human-First AI Marketing Podcast by Avenue9 is a business podcast hosted by Mike Montague, with 106 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Mike Montague hosts Human-First AI Marketing Podcast by Avenue9, a business show with 106 episodes published.

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  Human-First AI Marketing Podcast by Avenue9

  Using AI for Local SEO with Tyler Henn

  Oct 4, 202632 min

  Send us Fan Mail AI is changing how people search for local businesses. Longer, more conversational searches give tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Google’s AI-powered search more context to understand what someone actually needs and recommend businesses that are genuinely relevant. In this episode, Mike Montague talks with local SEO expert Tyler Henn of Henn House about what this shift means for local businesses and how reputation, reviews, third-party validation, and a strong Google Business Profile are becoming increasingly important signals for both traditional and AI-powered search. Tyler shares practical strategies for improving local visibility, including building service-specific website pages, creating clear connections between your services and locations, and giving search engines enough context to understand exactly who you serve and what makes your business unique. They also explore a refreshingly simple idea for the AI search era: build the online reputation your business has earned in the real world. AI can help capture customer stories, reviews, expertise, and other trust signals so great local businesses become easier for humans and AI to find, understand, and recommend. Key Takeaways: Third-party validation matters more in AI search. Reviews, citations, and mentions across trusted platforms help search engines and AI systems understand your reputation and credibility. Conversational search rewards specificity. People can describe exactly what they need, making detailed information about your services, expertise, and customers increasingly valuable. Build a reputation worth recommending. Great customer experiences, strong reviews, and consistently doing good work create the signals that help local businesses earn visibility. Your Google Business Profile is the foundation of local SEO. A complete, accurate profile with the right categories, services, and information gives Google important context about your business. Give search engines enough detail to understand what you do. Clearly defining your services, specialties, locations, and customer needs increases your chances of appearing for specific searches. Create dedicated pages for important services. Individual service pages give search engines more context and create more opportunities to match your business with relevant searches. Make your differentiation specific. Concrete practices, specialized processes, customer experiences, and real stories provide stronger reasons to recommend your business than generic marketing claims. Your entire local presence contributes to SEO. Your website, reviews, social activity, networking, business listings, and offline reputation collectively shape how your business is understood online. Use AI to amplify expertise you already have. AI can accelerate research, content, and SEO work when it is guided by someone who understands the strategy and knows what good work looks like. Competitive local SEO still requires expertise and judgment. AI can help establish a solid foundation, while highly competitive markets require thoughtful strategy and ongoing execution. AI search is becoming increasingly personalized. As AI understands more context about a searcher’s needs and preferences, local recommendations can become more specific to the individual. The Human-First AI Marketing Podcast is brought to you by Avenue9 . We use artificial intelligence to amplify your unique voice, empower your marketing team, and enable your scaling business to achieve big-brand success. Explore new avenues available with AI marketing at Avenue9.com. No matter where you’re starting from or how big your goals are, we turn modern marketing challenges into exciting opportunities. Let's get started with a discovery consultation! Want to be a guest? Send Mike Montague a message on PodMatch here.

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  Human-First AI Marketing Podcast by Avenue9

  Old School Service, New School Tools with David Levine

  Sep 27, 202632 min

  Send us Fan Mail In this episode of the Human-First AI Marketing Podcast, Mike Montague talks with David Levine , author of Old School Service, New School Tools , about how small businesses can use AI without losing the personal touch that keeps customers coming back. David shares lessons from nearly 20 years of running a brick-and-mortar business, where strong relationships, genuine conversations, and memorable service helped him compete without the biggest budget or the lowest prices. Together, they explore how AI can act as a multiplier for customer service, marketing, and follow-up, freeing business owners to spend more time shaking hands, picking up the phone, listening to customers, and building trust. The big takeaway: technology changes, but human nature does not. The businesses that win will use new school tools to make old school service easier, more consistent, and more scalable. Key Takeaways: Use AI as a multiplier for better human service. David’s core message is that AI should speed up repetitive tasks so business owners can spend more time calling customers, visiting clients, listening, and making people feel valued. Technology changes, but human nature does not. Tools will keep evolving, but people still want to be seen, heard, appreciated, and helped by real humans. Customer experience matters more than customer service departments. David encourages businesses to think of service as the full customer experience, with sales, support, operations, and follow-up all working together. Listening sells better than selling. He argues that many customers avoid salespeople because they feel sold to, while salespeople who listen closely can create better conversations and better outcomes. Authentic reviews build trust; fake reviews destroy it. David warns against buying reviews and recommends earning steady, real feedback from happy customers, even if that means only asking for a few reviews each week. Bad reviews can become opportunities. He explains that AI can help business owners pause, de-escalate, and draft thoughtful responses when emotions are running high after a negative review. Follow-up should add value instead of saying “just checking in.” David points out that generic follow-ups feel empty, while AI can help create more useful, customized messages that serve the customer. Small moments create raving fans. Smiles, sincere apologies, quick communication, surprise value-adds, and anticipating customer needs all help turn ordinary service into memorable experiences. Protect your team if you want happy customers. David connects employee experience to customer experience, sharing that a happy, motivated team is more likely to create positive customer moments. Raving fans beat AI. His biggest takeaway is that companies using AI to create more time for real customer connection will build loyal fans, and those fans remain more powerful than any algorithm. The Human-First AI Marketing Podcast is brought to you by Avenue9 . We use artificial intelligence to amplify your unique voice, empower your marketing team, and enable your scaling business to achieve big-brand success. Explore new avenues available with AI marketing at Avenue9.com. No matter where you’re starting from or how big your goals are, we turn modern marketing challenges into exciting opportunities. Let's get started with a discovery consultation! Want to be a guest? Send Mike Montague a message on PodMatch here.

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  Human-First AI Marketing Podcast by Avenue9

  Evaluating AI Models with Sherif Higazy

  Sep 13, 202630 min

  Send us Fan Mail In this episode of Human-First AI Marketing, Mike Montague talks with Sherif Higazy , Founder of Megaton AI , a benchmarking and advisory firm for generative media, about one of the hardest questions in AI right now: how do you evaluate which models are actually useful when everything is changing so quickly? Sherif shares what Megaton is seeing across AI video model leaderboards, why Chinese video models are currently pushing the creative frontier, and how marketers can think more clearly about model quality, cost, privacy, and real-world use cases. The conversation explores the future of AI-generated video, music, animation, visual effects, real-time generation, world models, and immersive experiences that may soon feel closer to a Holodeck than a traditional editing suite. Mike and Sherif also unpack the “attention tax” of AI slop, the role of human authorship, and why the best creative results still come from people who know what they want to say before they ask AI to help make it. Key Takeaways: Keeping up with AI model changes has become nearly impossible without active testing. Sherif explains that constant marketing hype makes it hard to know which models are actually good unless someone is regularly evaluating them. Creative AI models are harder to evaluate than text-based LLMs. Unlike text models that can be tested with clear tasks, video and creative models require more subjective judgment around quality, style, and artistic usefulness. Chinese AI video models are currently leading the pack. Sherif points to models from Chinese labs, especially ByteDance’s SeeDance 2.5, as some of the strongest options for cinematic AI video generation. Open-source and local models matter for companies with sensitive IP. For businesses that cannot upload confidential material to cloud-based tools, locally run models create a safer path to using AI video. AI video works best when users build workflows instead of expecting instant magic. Sherif emphasizes that strong results come from developing an eye for quality, learning the tools, and treating AI as part of a creative production process. AI is expanding what can be made, especially for teams with smaller budgets. He shares that projects once blocked by the high cost of visual effects, animation, or production may now become financially possible. Human authorship still determines whether AI-generated content feels worth watching. Sherif warns that audiences can sense when content lacks care, intention, or a clear creative reason to exist. AI slop creates an attention tax. He describes low-effort AI content as a burden on people’s time and attention, especially when it takes longer to consume than it took to make. Some of the strongest AI use cases are animation, visual effects, training videos, marketing videos, and music. Sherif sees these areas as practical entry points where AI can help people create things that were previously expensive or out of reach. World models may be the next major leap in creative AI. Sherif predicts that tools capable of turning images into explorable 3D spaces could open the door to Holodeck-like experiences, immersive history, gaming, and new storytelling formats. The Human-First AI Marketing Podcast is brought to you by Avenue9 . We use artificial intelligence to amplify your unique voice, empower your marketing team, and enable your scaling business to achieve big-brand success. Explore new avenues available with AI marketing at Avenue9.com. No matter where you’re starting from or how big your goals are, we turn modern marketing challenges into exciting opportunities. Let's get started with a discovery consultation! Want to be a guest? Send Mike Montague a message on PodMatch here.

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  Human-First AI Marketing Podcast by Avenue9

  Marketing Attribution & AI Analytics with Keith Perhac

  Sep 6, 202633 min

  Send us Fan Mail In this episode of the Human-First AI Marketing Podcast, Mike Montague talks with Keith Perhac , founder of SegMetrics , about the changing world of marketing attribution, AI analytics, and zero-click buyer journeys. They explore why traditional tracking is getting messier as bot traffic, AI answers, and platform-controlled experiences reshape how people discover, research, and decide before ever visiting your website. Keith shares practical ways marketers can rethink attribution by focusing on real human behavior, first-party data, CRM insights, funnel performance, and the signals that actually help teams make better decisions. The conversation also covers how AI can help uncover conversion outliers, improve segmentation, and turn analytics from a confusing spreadsheet swamp into a clearer map for smarter marketing decisions. Key Takeaways: Zero-click marketing is changing attribution. Keith explained that buyers increasingly get answers from Google, Claude, ChatGPT, YouTube, social platforms, and AI summaries before they ever reach your website, which makes the old website-first tracking model less reliable. Your brand’s knowledge now lives in many places. AI pulls from your website, social profiles, review sites, YouTube, and what others say about you, so marketers need to understand what information buyers are finding across the whole ecosystem. Attribution is about who people are and what they do. Keith emphasized that attribution should go beyond source tracking and help marketers understand which types of people are taking the actions that matter. First-party data creates more trustworthy insights. Instead of relying too heavily on ad platforms or third-party assumptions, Keith recommends asking people directly and storing useful details in your CRM through tags and custom fields. Segment analysis often matters more than surface-level metrics. For B2B companies with smaller audiences, knowing which segments convert and why can be more useful than obsessing over clicks, button colors, or broad campaign averages. Use AI to find conversion outliers. Keith shared that AI can quickly analyze funnel data by industry, source, or custom field to reveal which groups convert unusually well or poorly. Improve or cut weak segments intentionally. When a segment underperforms, marketers have a real business choice: create a better funnel for that group or decide they are outside the ideal audience. Take funnels one at a time. Keith recommends starting with one funnel, identifying the biggest conversion modifiers, and improving the most meaningful gaps before overbuilding dozens of segmented journeys. AI works best when it analyzes real data instead of guessing. Keith described SegMetrics’ AI MCP server as a way to connect AI directly to marketing analytics so it can query actual funnel and CRM data more accurately. Marketers need decisions, not more data dumps. Keith noted that AI can create a deluge of information, so the real value comes from turning analytics into clear priorities and next actions. The Human-First AI Marketing Podcast is brought to you by Avenue9 . We use artificial intelligence to amplify your unique voice, empower your marketing team, and enable your scaling business to achieve big-brand success. Explore new avenues available with AI marketing at Avenue9.com. No matter where you’re starting from or how big your goals are, we turn modern marketing challenges into exciting opportunities. Let's get started with a discovery consultation! Want to be a guest? Send Mike Montague a message on PodMatch here.

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  Human-First AI Marketing Podcast by Avenue9

  Where NOT to Use AI in Your Marketing with John Sampogna

  Aug 31, 202633 min

  Send us Fan Mail In this episode of the Human-First AI Marketing Podcast, Mike Montague talks with John Sampogna , CEO and co-founder of Wondersauce , about one of the most important AI questions marketing leaders can ask: where should AI stay out of the way? John shares why AI experimentation can quickly become a time suck, how teams can avoid building flashy workflows that solve no real business problem, and why the best use cases often start with repeatable tasks that happen daily, weekly, or monthly. Mike and John also explore the difference between using AI as an efficiency unlock and handing over the creative work that makes a brand valuable. They discuss AI’s role in design, strategy, production, outreach, leadership, and client relationships, with a clear takeaway for SMB leaders: AI can help creative people, technologists, and strategists move faster, but human judgment still needs to guide the ideas, relationships, and decisions that make a business different. Key Takeaways: AI experimentation needs a business purpose. John warned that teams can waste time chasing flashy AI demos, dashboards, and workflows that look impressive but do not improve the business, client relationships, or team efficiency. The best AI use cases are repeatable tasks. He recommended focusing AI and automation on work the team does constantly, such as daily, weekly, or monthly recurring tasks where efficiency gains are easiest to capture. AI is an efficiency unlock, and human creativity still leads the work. John explained that tools like Runway, Figma, and Weave can help teams turn concepts into polished execution much faster, while the creative ideas, treatments, mood, and collaboration still come from people. Guardrails matter because AI can scale weak work. He cautioned that without clear direction, companies can create workflows that “10X a C+,” making the weakest parts of the business faster and louder. Skill still separates average output from great output. John compared AI to a golf club or guitar; the tool is the same, but the output changes dramatically depending on the person using it. Leaders should decide where to invest time, not chase every tool. As a CEO, John said his focus is working with executive and discipline leads to decide where AI investment creates the biggest opportunity, with time as the primary resource to protect. Building proprietary AI tools can become an expensive distraction. Wondersauce tested a proprietary content engine, then realized available enterprise tools were quickly catching up, so they shifted back to training the team and filling specific workflow gaps. AI should support expert work as a thought partner. For brand identity and product design, John said people still need to build, test, and optimize the primary customer flows, while AI can help broaden tests, add perspectives, and improve efficiency. AI-generated outreach is easy to spot and easy to ignore. John shared that his inbox is full of automated pitches for services he either already knows how to do or has intentionally chosen to avoid, which shows the risk of using AI to scale generic outreach. AI will become more tactical and less novel over time. John expects the conversation to move away from broad AI hype and toward specific use cases, specific tools, and practical ways to get better output from the technology. The Human-First AI Marketing Podcast is brought to you by Avenue9 . We use artificial intelligence to amplify your unique voice, empower your marketing team, and enable your scaling business to achieve big-brand success. Explore new avenues available with AI marketing at Avenue9.com. No matter where you’re starting from or how big your goals are, we turn modern marketing challenges into exciting opportunities. Let's get started with a discovery consultation! Want to be a guest? Send Mike Montague a message on PodMatch here.

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