Resources

What we learn buying ads across five platforms.

Small business marketing, AI marketing agents, and where an ad budget actually goes. From the team building Blackbox, the AI CMO.

Five rows labeled write, schedule, optimize in one platform, report and plan across channels, each marked with who makes the decision, you or the tool, and only the last row marked "it proposes, you approve"
Marketing strategy

AI marketing tools for small business: what each kind does, and who makes the call

Every AI marketing tool either asks you to make the call or makes it for you. Five kinds of tool, what each asks of a small business owner, and three questions to pick yours.

6 Nov 2026 · Blackbox Team
A one-page marketing plan shown as five numbered answers (what you sell, why you, where you show up, three moves, how you will know) with a check on day 90
Marketing strategy

Marketing plan for small business: five answers and a check, on one page

Most small business marketing plans fail because they are twelve sections long. Here is the one-page version you can fill in by hand this afternoon, with a worked example and a check on day 90.

6 Nov 2026 · Blackbox Team
Four numbered week cards for a month of small business marketing. Week one, posts from your own website. Week two, one small campaign. Week three, a dated moment and a gap. Week four, call back the leads.
Marketing strategy

Small business marketing ideas: four weeks, in the order that works

You do not need fifty small business marketing ideas. You need to know which four go in which week, why, and what each asks of you. Here is the month.

6 Nov 2026 · Blackbox Team
Three columns labeled fractional CMO, agency and AI CMO, each showing which of four jobs it covers (the plan, the month, the change, the approval), with the approval row filled only under AI CMO
Marketing strategy

Fractional CMO, agency, or an AI CMO: what a small business actually gets

A fractional CMO gives a small business a plan and a monthly steer. Most small businesses are missing a Tuesday. What each of the three shapes of marketing help does, asks of you, and how to choose.

5 Nov 2026 · Blackbox Team
Three stacked layers labeled native automation, rules-based tools and AI agents, all enclosed inside a boundary marked "inside Google", with four other ad platforms sitting outside it in the dark
Advertising

Google Ads Automation Tools: What They Do, and the One Thing None of Them Can

Three kinds of Google Ads automation, what each is genuinely good at, and the blind spot all of them share — none can tell you when Google is the wrong place for your next dollar.

10 Aug 2026 · Blackbox Team
Five ad platform dashboards side by side, each reporting a small gain, with TikTok up 61 percent and a dashed arrow curving from Meta across to TikTok labeled "the call no platform will make"
Advertising

AI Media Buying: Who Does the Agent Actually Work For?

Every ad platform has an AI optimizing your campaigns. None will tell you to move budget elsewhere. That cross-channel call is worth the most money, and no platform's AI is built to make it.

5 Aug 2026 · Blackbox Team
An agent proposal card on a dark interface, recommending a budget move from one ad platform to another with its reasoning listed beneath, and Approve and Reject buttons waiting at the bottom
Marketing strategy

Why We Built Blackbox

It started with one question no ad platform would answer, where next month's money should go, and grew into an AI CMO for small businesses that proposes every change and waits for your yes.

3 Aug 2026 · Blackbox Team