Articles
Articles
22 pieces, newest first. Short, sourced, and in my own words.
I write about three things. AI, and what it is actually doing to agencies, industries and the people in them. Marketing, meaning the campaigns that worked and the ones that embarrassed everyone. And the business of sport, from kick-off times to race entry fees, with the odd race report from my own triathlons. Most pieces start from a news story and end on what I’d do about it.
HMRC's £2.4bn customer system has gone to a US company
HMRC has handed Salesforce a CRM contract worth up to £2.4bn. Why it's disappointing no UK-founded business won it, and whether building it here was tested.
Do you need to be the headline sponsor of the New York City Marathon?
TCS pays to put its name on the NYC Marathon, while Bandit and lululemon run their own events around it. How do you measure which sponsorship pays back?
Ironman 70.3 Málaga 2026: race report and course guide
Ironman 70.3 Málaga race report with the swim course, bike route and run course mapped from race day. Splits, power, and what I'd change next time.
Google just admitted its AI answers are costing clicks
Alphabet stock had its worst day ever, losing $500bn, after Google said AI Mode shows fewer search ads. What it means for advertisers and SEO.
Hyrox has joined triathlon, and I'm not sure triathlon needed it
World Triathlon has made Hyrox's hybrid racing an official discipline, with the Olympics as the goal. Hyrox gets credibility. Triathlon risks its identity.
IKEA retrained the people AI replaced, and they became a €1.25bn sales channel
When IKEA's AI assistant Billie took over routine calls, reskilling 8,500 call centre staff as design advisers built a €1.25bn sales channel.
AI gets you most of the way. The last part is still yours
Epoch AI tested the best models on its own staff's real work. They met 65% of the standard. That's a useful target, not a reason to hand over the rest.
Instagram's 90-minute videos are about ad space, not creators
Instagram is testing 90-minute videos called Features. It's pitched at creators, but the real reason is room for ads that short Reels can't hold.
Cheaper isn't a reason to switch AI models
OpenAI is cutting prices by up to 90% to win Anthropic's customers. For an agency, the model should be chosen by the job it does, not by this quarter's invoice.
AI pays back in speed before it pays in profit
Apollo's chief economist finds AI has lifted profit only for the 7 tech giants. In agencies the payback is real, but it shows up as speed, not margin.
Canva's new image model is built for volume, not luxury
Canva has launched Craft, an AI image model trained on its templates. On-brand AI imagery is worth having, but premium brands need a tool built for fidelity.
Let the agents in, but watch who sends them
Walmart now lets shoppers send their own AI agents to buy for them. Amazon blocks them. Premium brands should open the door, and watch who else walks through.
The 3pm blackout is the last thing built for fans
English football still bans live TV on Saturday afternoons to protect the people in the ground. The one rule the broadcasters haven't bought, and it won't last.
The AI pilot that never lands
Most agencies are running AI pilots that will never become anything else. The problem isn't the technology. Nobody was ever asked to stop doing the old job.
ChatGPT ads will take your customer list
OpenAI lets advertisers upload 25,000 emails or phone numbers to reach matched ChatGPT users. The targeting is old. The context, a private conversation, is not.
The checkout is leaving your website
TikTok has put an AI shopping assistant and one-click buying in the feed. Google has a cart that follows you round the web. Retailers are losing the customer.
The $29 cap on the tool that was working
Accenture has capped staff Claude spend at $29 a month. Meta and Microsoft are rationing too. The firms selling AI transformation hit the bit nobody budgets.
The ad slot that delivered spyware
Researchers found government spyware delivered through ordinary ads on the BBC and the New York Times. If you buy programmatic media, this is your supply chain.
The brief nobody talked to a customer about
The most expensive marketing mistakes start in the brief, when a room of people describe an audience none of them have met. How to spot one early.
Kick-off times are a media product now
Fixtures used to be arranged for the people in the ground. Now they're arranged for the schedule. What that says about who football thinks its customer is.