Mike Montague: Use AI Like Iron Man, Not the Terminator

AI gets a "C+" in everything — but the last 20% is still the human job. Mike Montague (Avenue9) on marketing the Iron Man way: augment yourself, don't automate slop.

Jeremy Rivera sits down with Mike Montague — founder of Avenue9 and host of the Human First AI Marketing Podcast (100k+ subscribers) — for a candid talk on using AI to distill your real story instead of manufacturing more noise. They get into why organic traffic is cratering, how to make your online reputation mirror your real-life work, and why "old-school" moves like direct mail are quietly winning again.

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 – Iron Man, not Terminator: human-first AI
2:10 – Why AI only gets a "C+" (and the human 20%)
4:20 – "Claude Hopping" & the slop problem
7:15 – Making boring niches interesting again
11:00 – One winner, or old-school branding
16:40 – Reputation that mirrors real life
23:00 – "Degenerative engineering": distill, don't generate
26:40 – Direct mail as a superpower
31:40 – Entity optimization & the LLM middle
35:45 – Superintelligence & sci-fi futures
44:30 – What Mike actually does (Avenue9)

In this episode
• Why "just make more AI conte
• The one-winner vs. earn-your-reputation split in AI search
• Turning 100+ interviews intoake
• Jeremy's Raven Tools direct-mail test: 10 letters → 10 links
• Entity optimization as core

Mentioned in this episode: PureAire Monitoring — the oxygen-monitor manufacturer behind Jeremy’s B2B cross-pollination example.

Connect with Mike Montague
Avenue9: https://avenue9.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin
Human First AI Marketing Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@Avenue9ai

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Host Jeremy Rivera: https://jeremyriveraseo.com/about/
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