Marketing Services

By the end of this year, roughly 4 in 5 small businesses will be using AI somewhere in their marketing. That number on its own tells you nothing useful, because using AI and getting value from it are two different things, and most of the businesses in that statistic are doing the first without the second. Recent coverage puts current small business AI marketing tool adoption at around 54%, with another quarter planning to start within the year. The adoption curve isn't the st

Most small business owners expect to spend more on marketing this year, and more time on it too. Recent research puts it at roughly two-thirds expecting bigger budgets and around three-quarters expecting to spend more hours on it. Marketing has stopped being the thing squeezed in around the real work. For most small businesses now, it is the real work. More spend and more time don't automatically mean better results. They mean more opportunity to either get it right or waste

Two numbers from the same quarter, moving in opposite directions. UK marketing budgets grew by a net 6.9% in Q2 2026, according to the IPA Bellwether. Almost a quarter of firms raised their spend. Over the same three months, the share of those firms expecting better financial prospects at their own business fell from +0.6% to -9.6%. So companies put more money into marketing while feeling worse about their own year. That is not as odd as it first sounds, and it matters more t

Only 6% of small businesses have built AI into their daily work. That comes from a 2026 study of 1,320 small businesses, which also found 21% use AI regularly. So roughly one in five reach for it often, and one in sixteen have made it part of how the business runs. Everyone else has tried something, seen it work once, and drifted away from it. If that describes your business, the tool was not the problem. Buying AI is easy. Building it in is the hard part Marketing is usually

Most SME founders I meet are doing something with their marketing. Posting on social media, sending the occasional email, maybe running some ads. But when I ask what's working, I usually get a shrug. Sound familiar? The problem is that you're busy creating content and ticking boxes, but without a clear strategy you're hoping something sticks. That's exhausting, expensive, and it rarely delivers the growth you need. After 25 years working with SMEs across toys, consumer brands

Find the right marketing audit or strategy package for your SME Quick intro: help that arrives this week, not next quarter As a busy founder you have pressing problems and not much time to solve them. Marketing that isn't landing, messaging that feels unclear, a content plan that never quite gets written. My fixed-price reviews, the 90-Day Starter Blueprint and the AI training kit are built for exactly that. No calls needed, and most are delivered within five working days. Me