The New Operating Model

Marketing has been restructured. Most companies haven't caught up.

Budgets are flat, agency spend is being cut, and AI has changed what a small team can deliver. Ballintra is built for this environment: executive-led strategy and hands-on execution, run as Modern Marketing Operations rather than headcount or retainers.

01The Squeeze

The old way of scaling marketing has stopped working.

For two decades, marketing scaled by adding headcount or agency retainers. That model is breaking: budgets have flatlined, and CMOs are cutting agencies and roles to fund what works. Marketing now has to run lean and tie directly to revenue.

7.7%
Average marketing budget as a share of company revenue in 2025 — flat for a second year, and down from 9.5% in 2022.
39%
Of CMOs plan to cut agency budgets, chiefly by ending underperforming relationships and renegotiating scope.
59%
Of CMOs say their budget is insufficient to execute their own strategy.
22%
Of CMOs say generative AI has already reduced their reliance on outside agencies for creative and strategy.

Source: Gartner, 2025 — survey of 402 marketing leaders in North America, the UK and Europe.

02The Leverage

AI-enabled workflows change what a small team can deliver.

The answer to a flat budget isn't more hours; it's a different way of working. McKinsey estimates generative AI could lift marketing productivity by 5 to 15 percent of total marketing spend — about $463 billion a year. Paired with global talent, lean teams now do full-department work.

Source: McKinsey & Company, 2023.

03The Shift

Discovery is moving from search to AI answer engines.

Buyers increasingly find vendors through AI assistants and generative search, not blue links. As AI agents turn intent into curated recommendations, competition moves from visibility and spend toward relevance and positioning. Being legible to models is now part of good positioning and PR.

Source: McKinsey & Company, 2026.

04The Model

Modern Marketing Operations.

Ballintra is not an agency and not a traditional consultancy. It's an executive-led model where strategy and execution stay in the same hands, one seat owning the whole go-to-market rather than a fragment of it.

Marketing, restructured

Owns strategy & outcomes Senior marketing leadership
Velocity

AI agents

Content, campaigns, targeting, and reporting at machine speed.

Scalable agent capacity
Craft

Global talent

Vetted technical and creative specialists from across the world.

Scalable global headcount
The output High-impact, low-cost marketing — enterprise-grade capability without enterprise overhead.

The leader — a founder or operator who has held the P&L — owns the strategy and the outcomes. AI handles velocity and precision in execution. Global talent delivers craft at speed. No department overhead, no agency markup.

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06Sources
  1. Gartner, Gartner 2025 CMO Spend Survey Reveals Marketing Budgets Have Flatlined at 7.7% of Overall Company Revenue (May 2025).
  2. McKinsey & Company, How Generative AI Can Boost Consumer Marketing (December 2023).
  3. McKinsey & Company, AI Productivity Gains and the Performance Paradox (April 2026).