Kai Marketing OS: Claude Code Skills For Growth Work

Kai turns a product repo into a marketing workspace. It gives Claude Code a marketing team, a source-aware brief, channel playbooks, policy references, quality gates, approval rules, and memory so the next run starts smarter.

Use it when you want an AI operator to create growth plans, landing pages, emails, ads, SEO/AEO work, audits, content calendars, SDR handoff, or repurposed assets from the same files your product team already uses.

The only requirement is Claude Code (or Cursor/Codex) already running. No SaaS account, no API keys, no config files. If your terminal can run /kai-start, you have the whole system.

Built by Connor Gallic — follow on LinkedIn for more agentic marketing systems.

Try Kai In 60 Seconds — No API Key

Inside Claude Code:

/plugin marketplace add cgallic/kai-cmo-harness
/plugin install kai@kai-marketing-os
/kai:kai-gate <paste or point at any draft — a landing page, an email, your README>

Kai scores the draft against the Four U's rubric, the banned-word tiers, and platform rules, then returns a scorecard with a pass/fail verdict and specific fixes. Your OAuth session does the judging — nothing leaves your machine, nothing to sign up for.

What The Output Looks Like

Every piece Kai writes must pass the gate before it ships. This is the actual scorecard format, from demo/examples/saas-blog-post/:

Four U's Score: 13/16

Dimension	Score	Reasoning
Unique	4/4	Stage-matched framework (pre-revenue / post-PMF / scaling) not found in any top-10 result. Survey data and switching cost table are original angles.
Useful	3/4	30-minute CRM evaluation checklist is immediately actionable. Deducted 1 point: no downloadable comparison template.
Ultra-Specific	3/4	23 hours migration time, 73% abandon rate, $14,000 switching cost. Deducted 1 point: some claims cite vendor-published data.
Urgent	3/4	Switching-tax framing creates cost-of-inaction pressure. Deducted 1 point: no seasonal urgency hook.

Total: 13/16 — Passes threshold (minimum 12). Banned Words Check: PASS · SEO Compliance: PASS (1 warning)

Three complete worked examples — brief, draft, and scorecard — live in demo/examples/: a SaaS blog post, a law-firm landing page, and an e-commerce product page.

What You Get

• 47 public /kai commands for strategy, distribution, content, ads, SEO, CRO, lifecycle, SDR, launches, and analytics.
• 52 kai-* skills with triggers, inputs, outputs, gates, provenance, and failure modes.
• A real knowledge base: 67 playbooks, 36 checklists, 33 frameworks, 26 channel guides, 8 personas, platform policy references, and 33 skill contracts.
• Guardrails built in: Four U's scoring, banned-word checks, SEO lint, policy references, provenance lint, privacy scanning, and mutation-risk lint.
• Local-first by default: use it inside Claude Code from your repo before wiring live channels.
• Approval-led automation: dry-run first, review the artifact, then approve external actions.

Quick Start: From Install To Growth Plan

The plugin install above ships every skill plus the knowledge base they run on (frameworks, checklists, channel guides, policy references, quality gates — ~7 MB) and keeps them updated. Then open any product repo and run:

/kai-start
/kai-growth-plan

/kai-start reads your repo, plays back what your product is, and writes MARKETING.md — once, in about 2 minutes. /kai-growth-plan turns that context into a stage-specific plan, recommended workflows, metrics, budget notes, and anti-patterns.

Prefer a shell one-liner? Same result:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cgallic/kai-cmo-harness/main/install.sh | bash

Want the short setup guide? Read Quick Start. Want to watch the whole pipeline run as a script (research → brief → write → gate → scorecard)? python demo/demo.py --url "https://yoursite.com" --keyword "best crm for startups" does it in ~60 seconds with one free Gemini key.

Useful First Runs

What Makes Kai Different

Most AI marketing tools are either a blank chat box, a narrow content generator, or a dashboard that cannot understand your product repo. Kai does the opposite. It runs where your product already lives — the terminal — and starts from the repo: product docs, code, routes, pricing, examples, claims, and marketing memory.

That means the system can:

• create a brief before it writes
• choose the right channel playbook
• trace claims to evidence
• block risky copy before it ships
• route live actions through approval
• remember what worked after results come back

Kai makes marketing behave more like engineering work: source-aware, inspectable, gated, and repeatable. It is built for founders, indie hackers, SaaS teams, agencies, and product engineers who want Claude Code to help with actual growth work instead of generic copy.

What This Is Not

Kai is not a prompt pack, a standalone chatbot, or a content spinner. It is a local operating surface for marketing work that needs source context, policy checks, quality gates, and repeatable workflows.

Autonomous campaign management is a guarded phase, not the starting promise. Kai ships the trusted operating layer first: product context, policy constraints, evidence, approvals, memory, and connector health.

Why Not A Blank Chat?

Fair question — Claude is free-form and prompt packs are everywhere. Here is the honest comparison:

The chat box is faster for a one-off caption. Kai is for marketing you have to stand behind: repeatable, source-aware, and checked before it ships.

How It Works

The first time you run a /kai command in a project, Kai:

1. Reads your codebase — CLAUDE.md, README.md, package files, routes, schemas, product docs, and existing marketing notes.
2. Builds a runtime profile — workspace, brand, archetype/module defaults, proof points, channels, and operating constraints.
3. Creates MARKETING.md as a readable export — ICP, personas, brand voice, positioning, value props, landscape, and operating defaults.
4. Runs the workflow — writes, audits, plans, scores, researches, routes approvals, and packages the requested marketing asset.

Every later command runs from the same workspace/brand/module model. Content follows one path:

Research -> Brief -> Write -> Quality Gate -> Approval -> Publish -> Log -> 30-day Check

Install Options

Plugin (recommended — Claude Code CLI or desktop): two lines inside Claude Code. Auto-updating, includes the knowledge base, nothing touches your shell.

/plugin marketplace add cgallic/kai-cmo-harness
/plugin install kai@kai-marketing-os

Plugin skills are namespaced: type /kai:kai-start, /kai:kai-growth-plan, and so on.

Shell one-liner: installs skills to ~/.claude/skills/ and the knowledge base to ~/.claude/kai/. Use this if you prefer un-namespaced commands (/kai-start) or want to read the script first.

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cgallic/kai-cmo-harness/main/install.sh | bash

Repo copy (Cursor, Codex, claude.ai/code web, client repos): these surfaces don't persist ~/.claude/skills, so put Kai in the repo itself. Clone this repo and copy AGENTS.md, knowledge/, harness/, memory/, and scripts/quality_gates/ into your project root — the agent picks it up from AGENTS.md on the next session. Details in Quick Start.

Verify any install from a clone:

python scripts/doctor.py   # confirms referenced files exist, gates run, golden corpus passes

The 47 Public /kai Commands

The tables below list the 47 public router commands plus /kai-start, the onboarding skill that bootstraps every project. These commands work through Claude Code's skill system. They load knowledge files and framework instructions for the LLM. Type /kai for the router and help menu. The public skill manifest documents 45 canonical kai-* skill pages with the same schema: triggers, inputs, outputs, gates, provenance, and failure modes.

Produce marketing assets

Audit and improve

Plan strategy

Research and analyze

What Is Included

Kai ships with a real marketing knowledge base, more than prompts:

• 67 marketing playbook docs — growth loops, growth hacker OS, CRO, pricing, competitive intel, content repurposing, lifecycle marketing, launches, retargeting, ABM, partnerships, and more
• 33 frameworks — SEO rules, AEO/GEO strategy, AI-search optimization, perception engineering, copywriting formulas, quality-rater guidance, query fan-out, and LLM citation tracking
• 36 checklists — technical SEO, ad launches, growth hacker OS, content quality, email, PR, website launches, social audits, creative production, privacy scanning, mutation-risk review, and paid acquisition
• 26 channel guides — SEO content, LinkedIn, Meta ads, TikTok, YouTube, X/Twitter, Instagram, newsletters, podcasts, community, affiliate/referral, and press
• Platform policy references — ad platform policies, organic posting rules, API notes, compliance references, provenance rules, and creator disclosure for every major channel
• 33 skill contracts — output specs for content, ads, outreach, growth-hacker packages, meetings, experiments, clips, podcasts, lead dossiers, and other marketing assets
• 8 audience personas — pains, hooks, objections, emotional drivers, and voice guidance
• Quality gates — Four U's, banned-word checks, proof density, specificity, platform compliance, SEO linting, and AI-slop detection

Repository Structure

kai-cmo-harness/
├── AGENTS.md / CLAUDE.md          # Agent entry points (AGENTS.md is the source of truth)
├── install.sh                     # Shell installer: skills + knowledge base
├── .claude-plugin/                # Claude Code plugin marketplace manifest
├── plugins/kai-marketing-os/      # Plugin package
│
├── harness/                       # Operator surface
│   ├── skills/                    # /kai router + 52 kai-* skills + kaicalls-design
│   ├── skill-contracts/           # 33 per-format output contracts (YAML)
│   ├── references/                # Ad policies, organic rules, compliance references
│   ├── voice-gate/                # LLM-as-judge voice-consistency gate
│   └── brief-schema.md            # Content brief template
│
├── knowledge/                     # Marketing knowledge base
│   ├── frameworks/                # AEO/AI search, copywriting, Google Ads, Meta, science
│   ├── playbooks/                 # 67 strategic playbooks
│   ├── checklists/                # 36 validation checklists
│   ├── channels/                  # 26 channel guides
│   ├── personas/                  # 8 audience personas
│   └── people/                    # Cloned-expert knowledge bases
│
├── scripts/                       # Python pipeline
│   ├── doctor.py                  # Preflight self-check — run on every fresh clone
│   ├── harness_cli.py             # Pipeline CLI: brief → write → gate → approve → publish
│   ├── quality_gates/             # four_us_score, banned_word_check, seo_lint, provenance
│   ├── content/                   # Outcome engine (engine.py), briefs, writers
│   ├── publish/ social/ intel/    # CMS publishing, social posting, competitive intel
│   ├── campaigns/ reporting/ ads/ # Campaign planner/tracker, reports, Google Ads API
│   └── knowledge_cloner/          # Expert knowledge extraction pipeline
│
├── kai/                           # Runtime layer: models, state, goals, approvals
├── memory/                        # Git-backed learning: lessons, edge cases, losers
├── agent/                         # Autonomous loop (optional)
├── gateway/                       # FastAPI remote runner (optional)
├── workspace/                     # CMO-agent operating workspace + dashboard
├── demo/                          # One-command demo + pre-generated examples
├── evals/golden/                  # Golden corpus (gate regression cases)
├── deploy/                        # VPS deployment templates
├── docs/                          # QUICK_START, CONFIGURATION, ARCHITECTURE, system/
└── legacy/                        # Retired surfaces kept for reference

Core Use Cases

• SaaS founders: go from "we need marketing" to a concrete plan — landing page, launch content, lifecycle emails, cold outreach, SEO roadmap, paid campaign angles, and AI-search visibility.
• Agencies: install Kai inside a client repo and create repeatable strategy, content, campaign, and audit workflows without rebuilding your operating system for every account.
• Indie hackers: use /kai-growth-plan, /kai-growth-hacker, /kai-landing-page, /kai-cold-outreach, and /kai-content-calendar to create a practical marketing system without hiring a team.
• Local-service businesses: use Kai's business profiling, audits, and proposal ranking to turn a service business website into a prioritized marketing action plan.
• AI-search visibility: use /kai-surround-sound and the AEO/GEO knowledge base to target the questions people ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, and Google AI Overviews when comparing products in your category.

Where To Start

• New launch: /kai-growth-plan → /kai-email-system → /kai-landing-page
• Running ads: /kai-ad-campaign → /kai-cro → /kai-retarget
• Need AI-search mentions: /kai-surround-sound → /kai-competitors → /kai-seo-audit
• Want the full machine: /kai-launch

Beyond Content: The Python Pipeline

Everything below is optional — the skills work without it. The Python layer adds publishing, monitoring, and reporting for teams that want the full loop. All commands run from a clone of this repo.

Publishing

Publishing is truthful and double-opt-in. The content engine never invents URLs: a gate-approved piece either publishes for real — when publishing.enabled plus a publishing.sites.<site>.platform entry are set in config.yaml (env override KAI_PUBLISH_ENABLED) — and logs the URL the CMS returned, or it's logged as approved_unpublished until you publish manually and backfill with content_log.mark_published(entry_id, url). That backfill also arms the 30-day performance check. WordPress publishes are idempotent and default to status=draft.

# Full pipeline with CMS publishing (WordPress, Ghost, Webflow, or static markdown)
python scripts/harness_cli.py run --task blog --site mysite --keyword "ai crm" --publish wordpress

# Social posting
python scripts/social/linkedin.py --content "Your LinkedIn post"
python scripts/social/twitter.py --content "Your tweet"
python scripts/social/buffer.py --content "Scheduled post" --platforms linkedin twitter

Competitive Intelligence

python scripts/intel/competitor_monitor.py --check    # RSS + sitemap scan
python scripts/intel/competitor_monitor.py --diff     # New pages since last check
python scripts/intel/content_gap.py --site mysite     # Keywords they rank for, you don't
python scripts/intel/market_brief.py                  # AI-synthesized weekly market brief

Campaign Management

python scripts/campaigns/campaign_planner.py --goal "product launch" --product myproduct --keyword "ai crm" --type launch --save campaigns/q1/

Generates: landing page, 5-email sequence, social variants (LinkedIn/Twitter/Instagram), ad variants (Meta + Google), content calendar. --save mints a campaign_id that threads through the tracker, runtime artifacts, the content log, and 30-day performance checks.

Goals & the Weekly CMO Review

python scripts/harness_cli.py goals add --brand mysite --name "Q3 signups" --kpi signups --target 500 --deadline 2026-09-30
python scripts/harness_cli.py goals list   # shows pace vs deadline

Every Monday the agent loop's cmo_review task measures each goal's pace from graded 30-day results, decomposes behind-pace goals into task graphs, and executes them through the normal approval gates. It also runs the 30-day performance check (nightly), weekly pattern extraction, and an hourly editorial-calendar tick — dated content plans become pipeline runs automatically.

Reporting

python scripts/reporting/weekly_report.py --save reports/week.md   # Full weekly report
python scripts/build_dashboard.py                                  # Rebuild the HTML dashboard
python scripts/reporting/ceo_deck.py                               # 5-slide CEO deck

Google Ads

python scripts/ads/google_ads.py campaigns          # Campaign performance
python scripts/ads/google_ads.py keywords           # Keyword data
python scripts/ads/google_ads.py search-terms       # Find negatives + opportunities
python scripts/ads/google_ads_optimize.py --analyze # AI-powered optimization

Read-only pulls are safe to run; anything that mutates a live ad account goes through the approval gate first.

Knowledge Cloner

Extract expert knowledge from YouTube, podcasts, articles, and GitHub repos into structured frameworks:

python -m scripts.knowledge_cloner init "Alex Hormozi" --domain "Business"
python -m scripts.knowledge_cloner discover alex-hormozi --youtube https://www.youtube.com/@AlexHormozi/videos --limit 20
python -m scripts.knowledge_cloner pipeline alex-hormozi --max-cost 10.00

6-phase pipeline: Discover → Transcribe → Extract → Distill → Synthesize → Operationalize. Outputs 5 distilled docs + 4 operational tools + quality report. ~$3.50 for 40 sources via OpenRouter. See scripts/knowledge_cloner/README.md.

Dashboard

Kai includes a single-file HTML dashboard for active goals, tasks, and integrations.

python -m http.server 8000
# then open http://localhost:8000/workspace/dashboard.html

Deploy it by clicking One-Click Deploy in the dashboard (Netlify token required), running ./deploy.sh (macOS/Linux) or deploy.bat (Windows), or pushing the repo to Vercel/Netlify — vercel.json and netlify.toml are included.

Current Status (v1.0.0, updated July 2026)

For the full assessment, see docs/superpowers/specs/2026-04-03-system-current-state-report.md.

Requirements

• Claude Code running. That's the whole list.
• Cursor, Codex, and claude.ai/code work too, via the repo-copy install.
• Optional, only for live data: analytics/ad-platform credentials if you want Kai to pull real performance numbers or publish through connectors.

No SaaS account, no signup, no API key for the core workflow. The harness is local files plus the agent you already run.

Related Links

• MeetKai: the operator layer behind Kai Marketing OS workflows.
• KaiCalls: a Kai-owned AI voice agent product for small-business phone answering and lead capture when the business is phone-led.
• How Kai markets KaiCalls: the dogfooding case study — every KaiCalls marketing decision runs through this repo.
• Connor Gallic: founder building Kai, KaiCalls, and AI automation systems.
• How Kai runs paid ads: plain-English explanation of the paid media workflow.
• System guide: architecture pages, Mermaid diagrams, and runtime schemas.
• Public skill manifest: versioned API-style docs for every canonical kai-* skill.

Related Search Terms

AI marketing agent, AI CMO, Claude Code skills, Claude Code slash commands, Claude Code marketing skills, marketing automation agent, SaaS marketing agent, startup growth marketing AI, local service marketing OS, SEO content agent, answer engine optimization agent, generative engine optimization, GEO agent, AEO agent, LLM citation strategy, ChatGPT search optimization, Perplexity SEO, Claude search optimization, AI Overviews optimization, landing page copy agent, lifecycle email agent, paid ads agent, content calendar generator, marketing audit agent, product launch agent, AI growth marketing assistant.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.