AI has made it easier to produce email marketing, but not easier to produce better email marketing. According to a Knak report, 85% of marketing teams missed at least one campaign launch date over the last year because of workflow constraints, while 82% still spend at least half of their time on production rather than planning or strategy. The technology that was supposed to free up time for strategic thinking has instead accelerated the start of a process that remains bottlenecked elsewhere.
Knak Chief Marketing Officer Jennifer Delevante said marketers were promised that AI would give them back time for strategy, but "the data suggests that has not happened yet."
AI speeds up the first draft, not the whole campaign
In the Knak study, 64% of respondents said they use AI to generate first drafts of email or landing page copy. More than half use it to generate or edit images, and 48% use it to produce subject line variations. An initial campaign idea can become copy, imagery, and alternative creative treatments in minutes.
But generating a first draft is not the same as producing a campaign. Someone still needs to review the draft and rewrite it to reflect the brand's voice, customer needs, and campaign strategy. Someone has to design, build, proof, approve, test, and schedule the email. AI may have shortened the first stage of that process, but it has not had the same effect on everything that comes afterward.
The real bottleneck sits in approvals and coordination
The biggest reported delay, according to 47% of respondents, is securing approvals and sign-offs. Design and creative production follows at 38%, and coordination across teams at 36%. Sixty percent of teams need at least four people to produce a single email, and 69% go through two or three rounds of revisions before receiving approval.
These are workflow problems, not copywriting issues. They arise from complicated approval processes, unclear responsibilities, and too many handoffs between people and teams. Using an AI tool at the beginning of that process simply helps reach the bottleneck faster. The hour saved on a first draft can disappear into another revision, approval meeting, or version of the campaign.
More options create more decisions
AI produces considerably more marketing, not just the same amount of marketing faster. Teams that once developed two subject lines and a single creative route can now generate 10 subject lines, five opening paragraphs, and multiple visual treatments within minutes. Every additional option requires another decision.
This opens the door to choice overload. The more alternatives you see side by side, the more likely you are to search for minor differences. AI reduces the time cost of creating options, but it does not eliminate the cognitive cost of choosing among them. The result is not necessarily better marketing - it is simply more marketing to review, discuss, and refine.
The editing burden has not disappeared either. While 70% of teams have deployed AI for Marketing within production, its output still requires moderate or substantial human editing. AI can create the illusion of progress by generating something to look at, but if the strategic thinking has not happened yet, the team could spend three rounds of revisions retroactively applying the strategy.
Deliberate use beats indiscriminate speed
One finding from the study supports the idea that teams must use AI strategically. Teams that can complete an email in around four hours tend to involve fewer people and use AI deliberately rather than indiscriminately. The AI Productivity advantage comes not from merely having access to AI, but from using it in parts of the process that create bottlenecks.
AI cannot repair an inefficient workflow. If teams are still working with fragmented processes, unclear ownership, and excessive approval layers, faster copy generation will not fix those structural problems. When AI shaves minutes off production time, that efficiency becomes the new baseline - and the bonus capacity goes into more campaigns, more variations, and higher expectations.
Why this matters for marketing professionals
AI will keep producing more marketing, not more time, until teams rethink the production workflow. The practical step is to identify where delays actually occur - approvals, handoffs, revision rounds - and apply AI there rather than only at the drafting stage. The teams already seeing results use AI deliberately in bottleneck areas with fewer people involved in each campaign. Without that discipline, faster drafts just mean reaching the same gridlock sooner.
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