AI Is Eating Sales and Marketing — $7.5 Billion Says So

Entrepreneurs building sales, marketing and customer-service software have raised $7.5 billion so far this year across 830 deals, according to Crunchbase. That's a lot of money — but notice something odd. The number of deals is falling for the fourth year in a row, while the cash keeps flowing. Investors are placing fewer, bigger bets. They're picking winners instead of spreading chips across the table.

Where is that money going? Mostly to AI. Companies that use AI to analyze marketing data, write pitches or talk to customers are grabbing a far bigger share of funding than in past booms. The biggest single raise came from AppsFlyer, which pulled in over $1 billion from backers including Google and Meta, and is now valued at $2.7 billion. Its AI helpers dig through marketing numbers and do the boring analysis automatically. Another example: Parloa, a Berlin company whose AI agents answer customer phone calls, tripled its value to $3 billion after raising $350 million.

For you, this means the ads, emails and customer-service chats you encounter are increasingly written and handled by machines. That can be good — faster answers, less time on hold, offers that actually fit what you want. It can also mean more relentless, more personalized persuasion, and fewer humans to appeal to when something goes wrong. When an AI decides which discount you see or whether your complaint gets escalated, it's harder to know why.

One honest catch: this isn't a boom on the scale of 2021, when the sector raised nearly $41 billion. And spending on AI marketing tools doesn't guarantee they work. Companies are still watching budgets closely — they just believe AI is the safest place to put their money. So expect the pitch to get slicker. Whether it gets better for you is a separate question.