AI CMO for growth-stage companies
Tell it your revenue goal. It sets the strategy, splits the budget and runs seven AI agents. You approve the big calls.
Real marketing money, nobody senior deciding where it goes
Most companies between 2 and 100 million in revenue spend tens of thousands a month on marketing without a CMO. The plan is last year's plan. The question every CEO asks has no clear answer.
Channels by habit
Budget follows what ran last year, not what pays back now.
Agencies grade themselves
Every report says the channel works. None ties it to pipeline.
Misses show up late
A slipping channel is found at month end, after the spend.
A full-time CMO costs 230,000 to 350,000 USD a year. A fractional CMO costs 5,000 to 25,000 USD a month for a few hours a week. Public benchmark ranges.
Marketing that answers to one revenue number
An AI CMO is software that does the management job of a chief marketing officer: it works back from your revenue target, decides where the budget goes, writes the plan, directs the work and reports whether you are on track.
Pipeline your target needs
$3.4M
Computed from target, win rate, deal size and sales cycle, with every assumption shown.
Budget split by channel
6 lines
Each channel gets a monthly amount and a target CAC or ROAS, rebalanced as results come in.
Answer to "are we on track"
Weekly
One page every week: on track, at risk or off track, with the decisions taken and needed.
Figures from the sample board above, a fictional 5 million USD target.
From revenue target to a weekly report in six steps
The same chain a good CMO runs in their head, written down, connected to your data and checked every week.
How the CMO decides
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1
Target
Revenue goal, run-rate, win rate, deal size, sales cycle.
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2
Pipeline
Opportunities, leads and traffic needed each month.
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3
Budget
Monthly split by channel with target CAC or ROAS.
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4
Plan
Quarterly and monthly goals, owners and deadlines.
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5
Agents
Seven agents take briefs and do the work.
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6
Report
Weekly score and decisions for the CEO.
Connects to GA4, Search Console, Google Ads, Meta Ads, LinkedIn Ads, HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive, Klaviyo, Mailchimp and Shopify, read-only by default. All integrations
Every call comes with its reasoning and two buttons
The CMO writes recommendations the way a good operator would: what to do, why, the expected impact, the risk and the effort. You decide how each one runs.
Cut Meta prospecting 22 percent and move $4,400 a month to LinkedIn Ads
- Expected impact
- Cost per opportunity down 14%
- Why
- Payback 27 months vs band 18
- Risk
- Low, reversible
- Effort
- Agent, 10 minutes
Approve
The default. Nothing changes until an Approver on your team clicks. The agent then does the work and logs the outcome.
Auto-execute
For moves you trust, inside your rules, such as shifts up to 10 percent of a channel. Anything bigger still waits for you.
The CMO decides, seven agents do the work
Each agent receives briefs from the plan, produces tasks and drafts, and reports status back to the board. Growth runs four at once, Scale and Enterprise all seven.
SEO agent
Finds the searches your buyers make and plans the pages that win them.
More qualified organic visits and demo requests
Paid Ads agent
Paces spend, moves budget between campaigns and drafts new ad sets.
Lower CAC and steadier ROAS
Content agent
Briefs and drafts bottom-of-funnel pages, comparisons and case pages.
Pages that convert readers who are ready to buy
Email agent
Builds nurture, onboarding and win-back sequences and watches their results.
More leads turning into pipeline
Social agent
Plans founder and company posts around the quarterly themes.
Steady reach with the accounts you sell to
CRO agent
Designs tests on pricing, signup and demo pages and reads the results.
More of the same traffic turning into revenue
Competitor agent
Watches competitor pricing, pages and messaging and flags what changed.
No surprise price cuts or launches
How the CMO directs all seven
Each Monday the CMO turns the quarter plan into a brief per agent: goal, budget and deadline. Every agent reports status back daily, and anything off pace is reassigned before the CEO report goes out.
One page every Monday, written for the CEO
On track, at risk or off track against the pipeline your target needs. Three decisions taken, three decisions needed, and the numbers behind them one click away. By email and in the app.
When results slip, the plan changes, inside your limits
Each channel has a KPI band. When it misses that band two weeks running, the CMO revises the plan and the budget, writes down why, and either waits for approval or runs it, depending on your rules.
Re-plan ledger, sample company, weeks 6 to 9
Auto-execute limit 10 percent of a channel
| Week | Channel and KPI | Change | Route | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | Branded search, CPA 41 USD, band 30 to 45 | Bid cap up 6 percent | Auto-executed | In band |
| 7 | Email nurture, SQL rate 3.1 percent, band 4 to 6 | New trial-day-5 sequence | Auto-executed | Watching |
| 8 | LinkedIn Ads, CAC 2,900 USD, band 2,400 to 3,200 | Budget up 8 percent | Auto-executed | In band |
| 9 | Meta prospecting, payback 27 months, band 12 to 18 | Meta 7,600 to 3,200 USD, LinkedIn 3,600 to 8,000 USD | Sent to Approver, shift 58 percent | KPI missed 2 weeks |
Every row keeps its reason. Week 9 moved more than the 10 percent auto-execute limit, so it waited for a named Approver.
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Maximum shift per channel
Auto-execute only moves up to the share you set.
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Monthly spend cap
Total spend never goes above it automatically.
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Approval threshold
Anything above it waits for a named Approver.
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Decision log
Every recommendation, approval and outcome is kept.
The return, in numbers a CFO accepts
A worked example. A 12 million USD company spends 60,000 USD a month on marketing and pays a fractional CMO 10,000 USD a month, the middle of the public 5,000 to 25,000 USD range.
| Fractional CMO, a year | 120,000 USD |
| VirtualCmo Scale, billed yearly | 11,988 USD |
| Spend nobody ties to pipeline, if 10 percent | 72,000 USD a year |
| Room in the budget before any growth | 180,012 USD |
The 10 percent is an assumption for the example, not a measured result. Your numbers go in the calculator.
Your number
Three inputs, nothing is sent anywhere.
- Spend without a pipeline link, a year
- $72,000
- Fee difference vs Scale at $999 a month
- $108,012
Room in your budget a year
$180,012
This sizes the opportunity, it does not promise it. Money only comes back when the unaccounted spend is moved to channels that pay back, which is what the plan proposes and you approve.
Get my CMO planVirtualCmo, a fractional CMO, an agency or AI content tools
Each is good at something. Human columns use public benchmark ranges; AI tool prices are typical list prices in the category.
| VirtualCmo | Fractional CMO | Agency retainer | AI content tools | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost a month | 299 to 2,499 USD billed yearly | 5,000 to 25,000 USD | 3,000 to 15,000 USD | 99 to 899 USD |
| Time on your business | Every day, every connected channel | 1 to 3 days a week | Account team hours | When someone prompts it |
| Accountable to revenue | Scored weekly against your target | Loosely, at reviews | To its own deliverables | No |
| How fast the plan changes | Weekly re-plan, daily pacing | Next working session | Monthly cycle | Does not plan |
| Data access | Read-only to ads, analytics and CRM | Reports prepared for them | Their own platforms | What you paste in |
| Budget allocation across channels | Yes, with guardrails | Yes | Within their channels | No |
| Content and creative volume | Drafts through agents | Directs others | Strong | Strong |
| Brand taste, hiring, relationships | Limited, stays with your people | Strong | Some | No |
Weighing a person against software? Read the fractional CMO alternative and the fractional CMO cost breakdown.
Pick the plan that matches your revenue goal
Yearly billing is half the monthly price. No free plan; the free part is the demo at the top of this page.
Growth
Founder-led companies, 2 to 10 million in revenue.
$3,588 billed yearly, instead of $599 a month
Billed monthly, cancel in the billing portal
- Revenue target to pipeline model and budget split
- 120 CMO recommendations a month with Approve and Auto-execute
- 4 of 7 agents active, 300 agent tasks a month
Scale
RecommendedMid-market teams, 10 to 100 million in revenue.
$11,988 billed yearly, instead of $1,999 a month
Billed monthly, cancel in the billing portal
- Everything in Growth, up to 3 business units
- 500 CMO recommendations a month, all 7 agents
- 1,500 agent tasks a month, unlimited data sources
Enterprise
PE portfolios, multi-brand groups and agencies.
$29,988 billed yearly, instead of $4,999 a month
Billed monthly, cancel in the billing portal
- Everything in Scale, up to 5 workspaces
- 2,000 CMO recommendations and 6,000 agent tasks a month
- Portfolio view across workspaces
- SSO, SCIM and custom roles, unlimited seats
- 99.9 percent uptime SLA, US or EU data residency
Prices in USD. Card payment with 3D Secure. Moving up a plan charges the difference right away.
Questions a CEO asks before buying
More on how it works and security, or write to [email protected].
Frequently asked questions
Can an AI really replace a CMO?
It replaces the planning, budget allocation, monitoring and reporting layer, which is where most of a CMO's weekly hours go. You keep the final say on big calls through Approve, and brand, hiring and key relationships stay with your people.
Will it spend my money without asking?
No. Approve mode is the default. Auto-execute only works inside guardrails you set: a maximum shift per channel, a monthly spend cap and an approval threshold. Everything else waits for an Approver.
How is this different from AI content or ad tools?
Those tools produce output: posts, ads, pages. VirtualCmo decides what to do, how much to spend and whether it is working against your revenue target, then directs seven agents to do the work.
What data do you need, and is it safe?
Your website, plus whatever you connect: GA4, Search Console, Google Ads, Meta Ads, LinkedIn Ads, HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive, Klaviyo, Mailchimp or Shopify. Connections are read-only by default, data is encrypted in transit and at rest, and you can disconnect and ask for deletion at any time. See security.
How fast do we get a plan?
The demo on this page gives you the required pipeline and three recommendations in about a minute. The full strategy, budget split and quarterly plan are ready the same day you connect data.
What if results are bad?
Every week the plan is scored against the pipeline your target needs. When a KPI misses its band two weeks running, the plan and budget are revised automatically and the reason is logged. You see it in the CEO report.
Is it right for a company our size?
Growth fits founder-led companies with roughly 2 to 10 million in revenue, Scale fits mid-market teams up to about 100 million, and Enterprise covers portfolios, multi-brand groups and agencies with up to five workspaces.
Do we still need a marketing team?
Yes, or an agency. VirtualCmo sets direction, splits the budget and briefs the agents, and the agents draft the work. People still approve, publish what needs a human eye and own the brand.
Can we cancel?
Yes, in the billing portal at any time. Access runs to the end of the period you paid for. There is no free plan; the free part is the demo.
See what your revenue target needs from marketing
The required pipeline and three recommendations for your company, in about a minute, without a card.