Growth Stories #26: How to Market in the Age of Physical AI

TL;DR: The next marketing revolution won’t happen on screens.

As AI becomes physical (robots, sensors, and embodied assistants), growth will shift from clicks to conversations and from pixels to presence.

Hot take: your next brand ambassador might have a charging port.

Last week, Jay reminded us that "trust is the only yield that compounds." This week, I'm thinking about where that trust gets built next.

For the past two decades, marketing has lived behind glass. Every marketer has spent years optimizing pixels, headlines, or funnels.

But we’re now standing at the edge of a new era, one where the medium itself becomes alive.

To put it bluntly, AI is leaving the browser.

Last fall’s unveiling of Figure’s 03 robot raised the bar for what’s coming: a future where intelligent machines enter our personal spaces at a rapidly decreasing cost.

And with that, a completely new interface - one through which we’ll be marketed to and influenced in ways we’re only beginning to imagine.

This edition, I share my take on what marketing in the age of Physical AI could look like - and how you can stay ahead of the curve while we’re still early. As always, feel free to book a 15-minute 1:1 call for deeper dives on AEO or physical AI marketing

… and if you're experimenting with AI in physical spaces, hit reply and tell me about it.

What Is “Physical AI”?

Physical AI is what happens when large language models merge with robotics, sensors, and real-world agency.

Think about it:

• Humanoid robots like Figure, Agility Robotics, and Tesla Optimus are starting to enter factories, retail environments, and logistics hubs.

• AI-driven brand experiences from Coca-Cola’s generative vending machines to Kia’s robot showrooms are turning interaction itself into the new marketing touchpoint.

• Interface miniaturization is accelerating. OpenAI’s partnership with Jony Ive to build a new generation of AI-powered devices, alongside Meta’s Ray-Ban display glasses, is bringing AI into a completely new form-factor, shrinking intelligence into everyday presence.

For marketers, that means we’re no longer simply designing messages anymore, but moments of interaction like the tone of a robot’s greeting, the rhythm of a conversation, the emotional texture of a brand that can quite literally look you in the eye.

From Attention → Participation → Interaction

Let’s trace the evolution:

Marketing used to stop at the call-to-action.

But now, a physical AI agent can ask, remember, and adapt - turning every customer into a unique data point and every real-time conversation into live brand research.

The New Marketing Stack: From Analytics to Embodied Data

Physical AI introduces entirely new types of data, and with them, new levers for growth.

Soon, I believe that brand analytics will include physical metrics: tone of voice, gaze, posture, and reaction sentiment.

AI agents will also learn from emotion data, which means growth teams will need a new kind of specialist - AI behavior designers - to shape the personality, timing, and ethics of the brand’s robots and assistants.

What Growth Looks Like in the Physical AI Era

Let’s imagine a few real examples and how they’ll reshape marketing playbooks:

1. AI Brand Ambassadors

We’ve already seen glimpses of this during Tesla’s Robotaxi event last October, where several Optimus robots - though not yet fully autonomous - interacted with guests through teleoperation. 

This hints at what’s coming: brands deploying physical AI representatives at events, stores, and showrooms - humanoids that greet customers, demonstrate products, collect feedback, and make the experience memorable.

• Growth loop: each interaction trains future campaigns.

• Metric: repeat conversation rate.

2. Ambient AI Advertising

Imagine walking into a gym where smart mirrors recognize your form and, in real time, recommend a supplement brand that sponsors the workout AI.

• Growth loop: contextual placement.

• Metric: engagement-to-purchase ratio.

3. Physical Experience Funnels

Instead of Click → Sign Up → Buy, it becomes:
See → Talk → Try → Buy → Share.

Every layer is both marketing and product experience.

The Emotional Layer: Marketing That Feels Human Again

Ironically, Physical AI might make marketing more human.

After years of automating content to exhaustion, the pendulum is swinging back toward presence, empathy, and dialogue.

Great marketers in this era will decide how their AI looks at you, pauses before answering, and mirrors your tone.

All to build the new currency of modern marketing: trust.

What to Expect Next

In the next 3–5 years, expect to see:

• AI-native experiential agencies building robot activations for brands.

• Metrics for “brand embodiment” - how believable, kind, or creative your AI feels.

• Hybrid events where physical AI agents greet attendees while human hosts broadcast online.

• Partnerships between hardware + identity protocols (think: your wallet connecting to a physical robot concierge).

✍️ PS

Next week, I’ll break down “How To Turn From Marketer to Marketing Engineer.”

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