Marketers still trapped in approval loops, report

The study finds that campaign delays are largely caused by approvals, revisions and collaboration across multiple tools

Enterprise marketing teams are losing time in production workflows rather than strategy or creative development, according to a report from Knak. The study finds that campaign delays are largely caused by approvals, revisions and collaboration across multiple tools, while artificial intelligence has yet to eliminate these bottlenecks.

The report, Marketing Production in the Age of AI, focuses on the work required after marketing concepts are approved, including handoffs, revisions and rebuilding content before campaigns are launched. Knak says these production tasks affect even large organisations responsible for marketing at companies including Google, Amazon, Uber, Meta and OpenAI.

Workflow challenges delay campaign launches

According to the report, producing a single email often requires significant coordination. Sixty percent of surveyed organisations involve at least four people, while 54 percent use between three and five separate tools during production. In addition, 69 percent require two to three rounds of revisions, resulting in more than 300 dollars in internal labour costs for each email. Half of the respondents still rely on email, Slack or Teams conversations to manage approvals.

Artificial intelligence has been widely introduced into marketing production, but the report suggests its impact remains limited. Seventy percent of respondents use AI in production workflows, yet 88 percent say AI-generated content still requires moderate to substantial human editing before publication.

AI supports drafting, not campaign launches

Jennifer Delevante, chief marketing officer, Knak: "Marketers were told AI would hand them back time for strategy. Our data says it hasn't happened yet. It's not a talent problem or a creativity problem. It's the production layer — the gap between a good idea and a launched campaign. Until that gets fixed, teams will keep buying tools that get them to a draft and leave them stuck before launch."

The report also found that 85 percent of marketing teams missed at least one planned campaign launch during the past 12 months because of workflow constraints. Nearly one in ten reported missing launch dates more than five times each year. The leading causes were approval processes, design and creative production, and coordination across teams.

Email remains the primary investment area

AI adoption is concentrated on early-stage creative work. Sixty-four percent of respondents use AI to generate first drafts of copy, while 56 percent use it for image creation. Only 25 percent use AI to build or code emails and landing pages, where production work is most time-consuming.

Email continues to be the most important marketing channel for surveyed organisations. Eighty-eight percent produce campaign assets for email, compared with 60 percent for paid social media. More than half of respondents plan to increase their investment in email over the next 12 months.

The report also examines how advanced AI users improve production efficiency, how team structures and technology choices influence campaign delivery, and the factors that distinguish organisations that consistently launch campaigns on schedule from those that experience recurring delays.

The full report can be accessed here

www.knak.com

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