A practical manual for CMOs and marketing leaders

by: Muiz Thomas

If you’re leading marketing right now, you’ve probably seen enough “AI will change everything” headlines to last a lifetime. I get it, I’m tired of them too.

This isn’t another one of those breathless predictions.

This is the practical stuff: frameworks, working examples, and the awkward cross-functional bits that rarely get talked about.

If you want something to hand your SEO lead or content strategist and say, “start here,” you’re in the right place.

📌 TL;DR: What This Guide Covers

Phase	Core Objective	Success Metrics
1. Strategic Assessment	Understand your AI blind spots	Clear gap analysis and action priorities
2. Category Entry Points	Map buyer triggers your competitors miss	15+ validated buyer triggers informing content strategy
3. Cross-Channel Consistency	Coherent brand story across all touchpoints	90%+ message consistency, fewer mixed signals
4. Content Ecosystem & Query Fan-Out	Build a content network that answers the full range of buyer questions	50%+ lift in AI citation rates and content coverage
5. Authority Signals	Earn trust outside your own site	Third-party validation AI systems trust
**6. AI Parsing
Optimisation**	Make your content AI-readable through layered optimisation	More citations pulled directly from site
7. Performance Management	Track what drives AI-influenced pipeline	ROI visibility into new acquisition channels

Resource Requirement: Senior strategic lead + 15-25% of digital budget + cross-team coordination.

Phase 1: Strategic Foundation & Assessment

A) Brand Perception Audit

You think you know how your brand comes across, right? Your team gets it, customers get it, even competitors probably get it. But AI models? They could be describing you in ways that would make your brand team cringe.

So, what do you do?

Run regular brand perception checks. And I mean regularly, this isn’t a “set it and forget it” thing. Models change fast, and what looks good today could feel off next month.

Platform	Test Query Set	Frequency	Owner
ChatGPT	Standard 5-query set	Weekly/Monthly	SEO Lead
Claude	Standard 5-query set	Weekly/Monthly	SEO Lead
Gemini	Standard 5-query set	Weekly/Monthly	SEO Lead
Perplexity	Standard 5-query set	Weekly/Monthly	SEO Lead

My standard query set:

“What is [Brand Name]?”