# AI Marketing Agents / "AI Employee" Category — AirOps vs Relevance AI

Research date: 2026-07-07. **AirOps** = agentic content/SEO growth engine (marketer-facing). **Relevance AI** = build-your-own AI workforce (enterprise, sales-heavy). Neither runs a whole SMB marketing department at a low monthly price — deptmatic's opening.

## 1. Positioning
**AirOps** — repositioned around AI search visibility.
- Hero: *"The growth platform for AI Search — Google, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude, ChatGPT."*
- Loop: **"See it. Ship it. Measure it. Then do it again. Better."**
- Agent **Quill**, an "AI agent captain" — watches signals, drafts briefs, executes; **requires human approval.**
- Proof: Webflow "+500% AI-attributed signups," Chime "3x AI search citations," Angi "+79% conversion."

**Relevance AI** — a workforce you build.
- Hero: *"Specialist agents for every task."* — "Built and customized by your team."
- Promise: *"Your first team of agents creating impact, in six weeks or less."*
- Flagship agent **Bosh** (AI BDR): "Booking meetings 24/7." Employee framing: *"an employee that sits in a seat… follows your processes… except infinitely scalable"* under **"Grow your business, not your headcount."**
- Proof: Qualified "$7M pipeline in 6 months, 35+ agents"; Canva, KPMG, Databricks logos.

## 2. Pricing
**AirOps** (task/usage-based): Free (1,000 tasks), **Solo ~$200/mo**, **Pro ~$2,000/mo** (unlimited seats), Enterprise custom. **Big $200→$2,000 gap** with nothing between (a weakness). Tasks (500–800/article) get expensive at scale.

**Relevance AI** (Actions + Vendor Credits): Free ($0, 200 Actions), **Pro $19/mo** (2,500 Actions), **Team $234/mo**, Enterprise custom (Bosh is enterprise-only). Vendor Credits = prepaid model usage at cost, roll over; **bring your own API keys**. Pitch: separating work (Actions) from model cost (Credits) keeps the bill predictable.

## 3. Key features / AI
**AirOps** (review-gated): Workflow Studio + Power Steps; deep editorial briefs; Brand Kit; two layers — Insights (continuous AI-visibility audit: citation frequency, share of voice, competitor displacement) → Action ("answer-first, schema-ready content at scale," native CMS publishing). Human-in-loop: "built-in review checkpoints," "last-mile reviews before publishing."

**Relevance AI** (multi-agent orchestration): named role agents (Lead Research, Bosh BDR, Support, Email Triage) each "owns one narrow task" on "the cheapest model that passes"; multi-agent workforces; three build modes (Invent/drag-drop/MCP via Claude); **Evals** (experts define pass/fail; "96.4% eval pass rate"); monitoring dashboard tagged "Escalated/To review/Errored/Complete"; **"set approval gates on any action."** Governance: RBAC, audit logs, PII masking.

## 4. Content & SEO strategy
- **AirOps eats its own dog food** — AEO content hub ("Complete Guide 2026," "AEO Audit Checklist: 48 Critical Factors," "Schema Markup for AEO," "Best AEO Tools 2026" ranks itself); pushes FAQPage/HowTo/QAPage/Product/Author schema; free tier + templates.
- **Relevance AI** leans on a massive agent/template library; Bosh as a hero brand with its own microsite. Sells *building* agents over SEO thought leadership.
- **Category context:** Gartner's "agent washing" skepticism — buyers want proof a system can execute real workflows and "prove every decision with evidence." Winning framing: *"marketing teams aren't replaced by AI — they're orchestrated by it."*

## 5. Design & messaging
- **AirOps** makes agents tangible via the visible loop + hard outcome numbers on real logos + named agent "Quill" + live dashboards.
- **Relevance AI** makes agents tangible by **naming them and giving jobs** (Bosh the BDR), "Escalated/To review" task-queue screenshots, live counters (1.24M tasks/mo, $0.09/task, 96.4% eval pass). Employee metaphor makes it legible to headcount-thinkers.

## 6. Top 6 lessons for deptmatic
1. **Name your department's agents and give them job titles** — a named cast (SEO Auditor, Content Writer, Social Scheduler, Email agent) as a **team org chart** on the homepage. Your advantage: you're a whole *department* — show the roster.
2. **Sell the review queue as the product** — a visible **"Approve / Edit / Ship" inbox mockup** with drafts awaiting one-tap approval. For SMB owners, "nothing goes live without your OK" is reassurance — make it the hero screenshot.
3. **Win on price clarity** — both rivals are weak ($200→$2,000 gap; Bosh hidden behind sales). Publish **one honest price** ("whole department for $X/mo — no per-seat, no per-task, no sales call") vs models that "punish you for shipping more."
4. **Do your own AEO like AirOps** — publish an **"AI Marketing Department Playbook / SMB Growth Checklist"** hub with FAQPage/HowTo/QAPage schema so answer engines cite *you*. The site itself demos the SEO work you'd do for a client.
5. **Lead with outcomes on real SMB proof** — SMB-scale before/after tiles ("local X: 0→40 indexed pages, first-page for 12 local terms, 3 hrs/week saved") + a "time saved / tasks shipped" live counter. Frame "grow your business, not your headcount."
6. **Counter "agent washing" with audit-first proof** — a **free instant site audit** as the front door (mirrors "Insights before Action"): show a real, specific audit of the visitor's own site before asking for money — proves the agents actually do the work.

## Sources
- https://www.airops.com
- https://www.airops.com/platform
- https://www.airops.com/pricing
- https://www.airops.com/blog/aeo-answer-engine-optimization
- https://relevanceai.com/
- https://relevanceai.com/bosh-sales-agent
- https://coldiq.com/blog/relevance-ai-pricing
- https://coldiq.com/blog/airops-pricing
- https://www.vellum.ai/blog/best-ai-employees
- https://mightybot.ai/blog/ai-automation-agents-market-maps-gone-wild/