Where to Learn AI Marketing Without Breaking the Bank

If you’re new to AI, the best way to learn is to use the tools. It’s remarkable that something so powerful, and potentially life-changing, is free to try. But once you’ve experimented, you’ll need a plan.

Chasing every new update won’t take you far. To make a meaningful impact on your business, you need structure. That’s where training and certifications can help.

Some universities offer in-depth courses that cost thousands of dollars. But if you want to start small, there are excellent, lower-cost options that provide a solid foundation in AI, particularly as it applies to marketing. These may not go deep in every area, but they’re more than enough to help you start formalizing your AI roadmap.

This isn’t a comprehensive list, just my take on the resources I’ve personally explored and found useful.

OpenAI Academy

Cost: Free

To get started with the basics, OpenAI Academy from ChatGPT is a great entry point. It’s completely free and was launched in March with the mission to:

“Support AI literacy and help people from all backgrounds access tools, best practices, and peer insights to use AI more effectively and responsibly.”

The focus is foundational literacy. While there’s not yet much specific to marketing, you can start learning about:

• Prompt engineering
• Multimodal capabilities
• Market research fundamentals
• Intro to strategic planning with AI

Marketing AI Institute: Piloting AI for Marketers

Cost: $299
Certification Included

If you’re in marketing, follow the Marketing AI Institute. Their blog, podcast, and training programs are insightful, strategic and thought provoking. They've significantly influenced my thinking.

Their "Piloting AI for Marketers" course is a structured, 8-hour, on-demand learning path designed for all levels, from interns to CMOs. It includes video lessons, quizzes, worksheets, frameworks, and real-world use cases.

Part 1 walks you through AI fundamentals and helps you identify and evaluate use cases to build your own AI framework. It’s the nudge many marketers need to move from experimenting with tools to planning strategically with them.

Part 2 explores AI applications across specific marketing functions, introducing use cases and relevant tools,some AI-native, others integrating AI into their platforms. The course doesn’t go deep in each area, but it’s designed to get you off on the right foot with some tools to work with. You’ll earn a certification upon completion and passing the quizzes, which you can add to your LinkedIn profile.

University of Virginia: Generative AI in Marketing Specialization

Cost: $49/month Coursera membership
Certification Included

Coursera has a lot of AI courses.  I found this series from the University of Virgina Darden School worth some time.  This is a 6 hour specialization that includes four courses across marketing: 

• Content Marketing Using Generative AI
• Advertising in the Age of Generative AI
• Customer Service in the Age of Generative AI
• Building Generative AI Capabilities

Instructor Rajkumar Venkatesan delivers short, manageable video lessons, each just a few minutes long, with transcripts and downloads included.

The series offers a good marketing-focused overview of AI, but don’t expect a deep dive into execution. For example, the advertising course focuses on building brand essence statements and logo design, and not media planning and campaign management.

Each course includes quizzes and access to a learner community for feedback and discussion with other students. I found the forum discussions more fun than I expected.

University of Virginia: Artificial Intelligence in Marketing

Cost: $49/month Coursera membership
Certification Included

This course is a great introduction to AI in marketing. It starts with the basics: machine learning, deep learning, and algorithms, and then connects those concepts to real-world applications.

You’ll explore three key forces behind AI: algorithms, networks and data. These elements come together to create what the course calls AI Relationship Moments, opportunities to build smarter, more personalized customer connections.

The course features case studies and interviews from Ford, Netflix, and the Washington Post, showing how they’ve used AI to reinvent their businesses. It’s not overly technical, but it does a good job showing how AI works behind the scenes and why it matters for marketers today.

These programs offer a mix of hands-on practice, strategic frameworks, and marketing-specific applications to help you move from curious to capable. The key is not just learning the tools, but learning how to think with them.