David Campbell

The test they apply is whether a non-specialist can follow the argument; explaining AI in everyday terms is offered as the reason for optimism. The same instinct shows up elsewhere in the posts, which frame AI in terms of pricing, headcount planning, and ROI rather than models or architecture.

The clearest statement is the opening of the procurement-agent post: "The reason I'm long on AI is because my mom understands it.

• Software was about making work easy; AI is about doing work for you."
• An event promotion applies the same plain framing, describing a session on AI's effect on software pricing, headcount planning, and ROI measurement.

Read original · Original 2

The sequence is consistent: name the specific jobs first, widen to the market argument, then close with evidence and a link. The evidence comes from buyer research, not adjectives about the technology.

The agent post enumerates five jobs: streamlining purchase requests and initiating and tracking them automatically, enforcing spend policies automatically, pulling information from documents with plain-English questions, benchmarking the price on every purchase request, and matching invoices to contract terms automatically. It then cites a survey in which 66% name operational efficiency as their top reason to invest in AI, and points readers to the full survey results.

Read original

The session they highlighted was a debate with Justin Etkin on when it makes sense to automate and when it makes sense to hire.

• Campbell presents that as a live tension in boardrooms with no tidy answer, and describes the goal as defining where AI belongs, where people matter most, and how to move forward responsibly.
• The post does not quote Etkin's positions, so ask for the event recording before attributing a view to him.

Campbell writes that "anyone pretending there is a simple answer probably hasn't lived with the consequences yet," and invites readers to join live, get the recording afterwards, or message with questions.

Read original

The post commits that customers who bought services will keep them, describes more self-serve and AI-enabled options coming, thanks the people affected, and asks hiring managers to contact Campbell about those who were let go. The post also makes clear that the customer demand behind the AI product is presented as the reason for the job cuts, rather than separating the product story from the layoff.

"We have always built in public at Tropic, and we will do that today," followed by the reduction, the explanation of the shift, the commitment that "we will continue to offer services to every customer who has bought them, now and forever," and a closing offer to connect hiring managers with the people affected.

The pivot is described as running over roughly two years, from a services business to an AI-powered procurement solution. Two later posts show where that leads: a named set of procurement agents and an event about automating work versus hiring for it.

Read original

This post explains Tropic’s shift from a services business to an AI-powered procurement product and shows how they discuss a hard internal decision in public rather than behind a press release.

Campbell says Tropic has cut 40 employees because customer demand has changed.

• Over two years, the company moved from a services business toward an AI-powered procurement solution, and customers increasingly want data and technology to manage spend and procurement themselves.
• The post says existing service customers will still be served "now and forever," while more self-serve and AI-enabled options are coming.
• Campbell thanks the people affected and offers to make introductions for anyone hiring.

For brands planning a campaign

A product marketing leader who can write a candid, specific change announcement is useful during a repositioning. For the AI product marketing brief, use this as an interview exercise: ask the candidate to rewrite it for a launch audience and see whether they retain the plain language and concrete reason for the change.

It answers "what does the product do?" in a short list and shows how Campbell translates an abstract category into named jobs.

Campbell announces an "AI workforce of procurement agents" and lists their tasks: streamlining and tracking purchase requests, automatically enforcing spend policies, answering questions about documents in plain English, benchmarking prices on purchase requests, and matching invoices to contract terms.

• The post opens with a consumer-level explanation—software made work easier; AI does work for you—and cites a survey finding that 66% of respondents name operational efficiency as their top reason to invest in AI.
• It closes by pointing to the full survey results.

For brands planning a campaign

The post uses a claim, five concrete tasks and a supporting statistic. That structure is directly reusable in product launch copy and suits the repeated writing a founding AI PMM hire would be expected to produce.

It reveals what Tropic discusses with buyers and finance leaders, and sets out a genuine tension rather than a sales pitch.

Campbell promotes a virtual learning event on AI’s effect on software pricing, headcount planning and ROI measurement, with speakers from GTM, finance and procurement.

• They and Justin Etkin will debate when it makes sense to automate and when to hire.
• The post says there is no simple answer and that anyone claiming one probably has not lived with the consequences.
• It invites readers to join or get the recording and offers to answer questions by message.

For brands planning a campaign

An open question with a stated tradeoff makes a stronger content hook than a definitive claim. It also suits a launch that must address buyer anxiety about headcount and offers a co-marketing template: a named counterpart, a scheduled format and a recording as the follow-up asset.

The pitch closes with evidence rather than adjectives, citing a survey in which 66% name operational efficiency as their top reason to invest in AI, and a plain-language test: “The reason I'm long on AI is because my mom understands it. Software was about making work easy; AI is about doing work for you.”

Names a short list of concrete tasks, widens to the market argument, then shares a survey link and a launch call to action.

For brands planning a campaign

A company launching a defined AI product or feature set can use Campbell for launch messaging that pairs a named list of capabilities with buyer research. Brands selling a broad AI platform without specific tasks to demonstrate have less to work with: the post's credibility rests on the enumerated jobs.

Examples: Source 1

The highlighted session was a debate with Justin Etkin on a live tension: when does it make sense to automate, and when does it make sense to hire? Campbell resists a clean answer — “anyone pretending there is probably hasn't lived with the consequences yet” — and frames the discussion around where AI belongs, where people matter most, and how to move forward responsibly.

A structured debate between two named practitioners, with recorded access for people who cannot attend.

Campbell leaves the invitation open, presenting the automate-or-hire question as genuinely unresolved rather than leading to a product answer.

For brands planning a campaign

Suited to brands selling into finance, GTM, or workforce planning, especially those whose buyers are weighing headcount economics. A balanced debate is the natural format; a hard product pitch would sit awkwardly against Campbell's framing.

Examples: Source 1

The post explains the two-year shift from a services business to an AI-powered procurement solution, attributes the change to customer demand for data and technology that lets buyers solve spend-management problems on their own, and commits to continuing services for customers who bought them. It closes by asking hiring managers to contact Campbell about the people who were let go.

Campbell ties the product story to the layoffs: the same demand trend that motivates the AI product is presented as the reason for the job cuts.

For brands planning a campaign

Relevant to brands whose message involves change management, category transitions, or operating in public.

• The demonstrated format is a candid operator update, and Campbell also uses the audience to help people externally.
• Ask how partnership content would be handled alongside sensitive company news.

Examples: Source 1

A webinar about AI and headcount is described as “a fly on the wall” conversation that will “get trippy,” while the serious point is no simpler than it looks. Analytics, policy enforcement, and invoice matching are named as tasks, not technology.

Plain analogies and conversational asides carry the argument, while technical claims are delivered as concrete outcomes.

For brands planning a campaign

Useful for reaching procurement, finance, and operations buyers who need the business case before the architecture. Brands targeting developers or ML practitioners should ask for a different messenger; these posts don't show deep technical explanation.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

They also promote a Tropic virtual event on AI's impact on software pricing, headcount planning, and ROI. The posts don't state their job title; ask for confirmation before describing their role.

View example

In a post comparing AI buying with buying steel, Etkin connects volatile usage and pricing to forecasting and procurement’s role.

Etkin writes from the buyer’s perspective about sourcing and negotiations; Campbell’s selected posts focus on Tropic’s product direction and the implications of company change.

Read original · Original 2

Lester’s examples include a vendor pricing bundle and a CFO facing sharp month-to-month swings in AI costs.

Lester’s posts evaluate pricing and spend from a finance perspective; Campbell’s selected examples explain a product launch, an event, and Tropic’s shift in direction.

Read original · Original 2

Barnard describes how software buying can become a bottleneck or an uncontrolled expense as a company grows.

Barnard focuses on internal finance workflows and cost visibility, while Campbell’s selected work centers on AI procurement tools and communicating organizational change.

Read original · Original 2

Both posts tackle the audience's own problem.

• The first argues that buying AI resembles buying steel: token spend moves daily, pricing shifts every few months, and an annual commit can be consumed in three months.
• Procurement, they say, is best placed to connect usage, forecast and price.
• The second walks through a live negotiation: a vendor stopped moving, the team read that as a tactic rather than a limit, and Carta found 21% more savings.
• The post names the risk in both directions: pushing a vendor who is genuinely maxed out burns goodwill, while failing to push one with room leaves money behind.
• It closes with a buyer quote about finite capacity.
• That completed example teaches the audience, a strong fit for an education-led launch.
• Etkin is also the counterpart named in David Campbell's event post, so a two-person live format is already a documented pattern for this pair.

The tradeoff is message ownership and register.

• Their posts explain how buyers should negotiate with vendors, including how to tell when a rep is digging in.
• In a launch for procurement agents, that framing can leave the audience in a negotiating posture toward the brand announcing the product.
• Their concrete examples also belong to another vendor's platform and customer, so a different brand would be borrowing the shape of the story without the underlying deal.
• At the same event as David Campbell, they would split attention with the person already carrying the product story; in Campbell's place, the campaign would lose the plain-language list of jobs the agents take over.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

They write from inside that seat.

• One post takes a vendor's pricing change, acknowledges the instinct to read it as a pure pricing play, then challenges that view with detail about payment-processing costs and Lester's experience running those operations as a CFO.
• It ends with the question finance readers have to consider: whether a bundle is genuinely better or revenue protection dressed as product logic.
• The other gives a specific AI-spend problem: a vendor bill swinging from $2K to $20K month to month, described as a faster version of the zombie renewal, with a 40% over-pace commitment and three named tools as the response.
• It is the sharpest available framing for an AI consumption or spend-oversight launch because it starts with the pacing surprise, not the feature list.

The tradeoff is commercial position and density.

• Both posts are built around announcements from their employer, and the pricing post explicitly promotes a free insights resource from that employer.
• A different brand asking for the same treatment is asking them to adapt a format designed to announce their company's tools, which the audience can recognize.
• The prose is also pricing- and finance-dense, closer to a CFO memo than the one-sentence, non-specialist opening that worked in David Campbell's agent launch post.
• Choose them when the room is finance and the decision concerns oversight of runaway AI spend; they are a weaker fit when procurement practitioners need to repeat back what the product does, or when the campaign centers on the automate-or-hire tension rather than budget control.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

Their posts make that case concretely.

• One opens with a question they say they keep getting as a CFO: what is our AI spend, and what do we do about it?
• The honest first half of the answer is that it is usually more than expected and known too late.
• The post defines the job as understanding what drives the number, not shrinking it, and calls for spend tied to teams and commitments in real time, with alerts before a threshold is crossed.
• The other is a clean scale narrative: at 50 people every purchase came through them; at 500, the model broke, with a $5k tool stuck for a day and a $50k commitment made on a corporate card unnoticed.
• More approval gates only move the bottleneck to a committee.
• The fix is to route low-risk requests automatically and flag high-value contracts with context.

The tradeoff is that cost oversight and workflow design work against the debate framing that makes for a strong live session.

• Their posts argue for rules, thresholds and routing logic, which suits a governance or spend-management announcement but leaves less room for an unresolved tension.
• Both are structured as product announcements from their employer and end with a demo or conversation link, so a rival brand would inherit the format but not the proof.
• Lester also writes mainly for finance peers; procurement and operations audiences get fewer of the day-to-day buying specifics Justin Etkin supplies.
• For a live-event format, ask for a sample or proposal.
• Choose Lester when the campaign promises control and predictability; they are a weaker fit when the promise is that AI changes who does the work.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2