For a while now, I've been vague about what we're building and how Engage is transforming from a longtime digital marketing agency. Our website went to a single landing page; our branding transformed, but we didn't say much. That ends today.
The new Engage Digital pre-launch site is live, and this post is the first part of the story: why we're transforming, what we're building, who Ed is, and what happens between now and early 2027.
I am so looking forward to taking this journey with you. So let's dig in.
Why We're Pivoting From Marketing Agency to Tech Startup
I've spent decades in agency marketing. My career started in sales and largely remained connected to that space, while adding marketing and technology. I have met and had discussions with some of the leaders within tech that shall remain unnamed here, but all of those early experiences shaped me and, ultimately, Engage. We always tried to leverage technology in unique ways that impacted our clients positively and regularly established systems and processes that made the work we do more efficient and effective.
I'm proud of that work, our clients, and I'm proud of the people who did it alongside us. It's the reason I'm confident about what comes next.
Over the last year, I watched as AI became more capable and mainstream and though it got me excited, I also recognized the problems that were being created. When the task mentality that was online marketing began to merge with AI capabilities, the gaps became more and more obvious. Doing more, faster isn't always the right answer. In fact, it usually isn't. Yet that's exactly how most people are using AI.
Here's what those years taught me. Run an agency long enough and you learn exactly where good marketing gets hard. It isn't the doing. It's knowing what to do next, what NOT to do for this industry or that business type, this month, for that reason, and being willing to change it when the picture, the data, and the results change. That judgment lived in our heads. It took years to build, and it only ever reached the clients we had room for.
Here's the real story. We've done amazing work for clients. It was always custom, and it was built on the same principles I'm talking about here. But that work is time-consuming and costly. Our clients typically pay $4,000 a month or more. That model doesn't scale, for us or for our clients. More businesses need hands-on, customized marketing that gets real results, and the only way to get there for everyone is what we're building.
So we asked a simple question. What if that experience could sit inside a system, available to far more businesses than any one agency can serve? What if we could couple the speed of execution delivered by AI with the experience of a highly experienced digital marketing team, at scale? So I spent the better part of the last 12 months studying, researching, and learning about AI from the ground up. That research led us here.
That's the pivot. Engage Digital is moving from agency to a digital marketing technology company. Same team, now with a new CTO and development team, united to drive real transformation in our industry.
What the New Engage Digital Is Becoming
Engage Digital is building an AI marketing technology that is squarely aimed at results, not tasks.
It's a system built to run all of your online marketing with you, adjusting toward real business outcomes along the way. At the heart of the new system is our team and their decades of marketing experience, processes and guidance that we have seeded into a substantial knowledge base, so it's not just general AI-driven.
Two words in that description are very important: "with you." You know your business better than any system will. You are empowered to have as much input, control and involvement as you want. Engage Digital does the deep, experienced research and all the heavy lifting of running the marketing while you set the direction and guide the recommended course. You can also dial back the need for your involvement as the system shows its capabilities, and dial it forward for specific functions as they are being adjusted.
It isn't ready for you yet, and I'd rather say that plainly than dress it up. We're building toward an early 2027 release date, but it is coming. Join the waitlist to follow along.
Who's Ed?
Meet Ed, your AI CMO.
Ed sits at the center of the Engage Digital system. You have one point of contact that learns your business, your industry, your competitors and what makes you unique. Under his direction, the prioritized work is organized into six main functions:
- Analyze: understand your business, your market and what your marketing is doing now.
- Think: weigh the options against the outcomes we're focused on.
- Recommend: bring you a clear strategy and prioritized plan and the reasons behind it.
- Execute: carry the plan out across your marketing.
- Evaluate: measure what's moving the needle, then adjust the work toward results.
- Guide: show you what's been done, what's next, what's being adjusted based on the data and where your input matters most.
You're always in the loop. Ed leads the marketing. You lead the business. That means you can see what's happening, add context and requests, and insert content in real time.
Why It's Needed
We watched the old agency model, founded on tasks and scheduled work activity, dominate the industry. Not in a dramatic way, and not because anyone was careless. It was a structured model the entire industry built for a different era, and it got harder to sustain for everyone in it: the business owners paying for it and the teams working within it.
Then AI showed up, and we saw a lot of business owners run straight to it, as if it were the Hail Mary for everything marketing had ever struggled with. We understand why, but faster isn't always better, and it certainly doesn't always lead to improved outcomes. So if your marketing feels stuck and someone shows you a tool that can produce a month of content in a few minutes, you'd reach for it. And many are.
For most of them, I think it's going to go badly. When the excitement and feeling of power and control begin to fade, and the marketing results are exactly where they were (or even worse) it is going to lead to uncomfortable times. We want to avoid that.
It won't be because AI is bad. It's because a tool that does tasks can't run marketing without a deep understanding of actually doing effective marketing. Knowing what to do, without an experienced understanding of why, is problematic at best. Running marketing means deciding what to do, in what order, for which customers, and what to change when something isn't working. A very fast pair of hands doesn't supply any of that. Somebody still has to know what the hands are for, why they adjust, and when.
That's the gap we're building into. Engage isn't the old agency model with a new coat of paint, and it isn't a pile of AI tools with a login. It's built for what comes after both. The new digital marketing model that has been needed for a decade already. We're delivering it. Soon!
What Happens Next
We're building toward an early 2027 release, and our team will be heads down for most of it. We expect to hit it. But hear me clearly: I will not compromise on the technology being absolutely nailed just to hit a timeline. We will have it right, then we will launch it.
If you want to follow along, join the waitlist at engagedigitalinc.com/subscribe. You'll get progress updates and our newsletter as we build. That's all the waitlist is.
If you're even more jacked up about what we're doing and where it's going, we should talk. We have already signed a handful of early adopters who wanted the opportunity to get involved earlier and get some big benefits as well. If that's you, join the waitlist and reach out to me on LinkedIn or X and we will schedule a time to chat.
FAQ
Who's Ed?
Meet Ed, your AI CMO. Ed sits at the center of the Engage Digital system. You have one point of contact that learns your business, your industry, your competitors and what makes you unique.
Is it ready?
It isn't ready for you yet, and I'd rather say that plainly than dress it up. We're building toward an early 2027 release date, but it is coming.
When does it launch?
We're building toward an early 2027 release, and our team will be heads down for most of it. We expect to hit it. But hear me clearly: I will not compromise on the technology being absolutely nailed just to hit a timeline. We will have it right, then we will launch it.
How do I follow along?
If you want to follow along, join the waitlist at engagedigitalinc.com/subscribe. You'll get progress updates and our newsletter as we build. That's all the waitlist is.
Robert Caruso
Founder & CEO, Engage Digital
