Does AI Have Taste? with Catrina McAuliffe

Does AI Have Taste? with Catrina McAuliffe

August 18, 2026 · 28 min · Episode 177

About this episode

The episode explores the capabilities of AI in evaluating creative quality alongside human evaluators, featuring insights from Catrina McAuliffe on a new framework developed by Marketing Architects.

AI and human evaluators rated the same 20 ad concepts within 0.2 points of each other, across nearly every dimension. So can a machine really judge great creative? This week, Elena and Rob are joined by SVP Brand Strategy Catrina McAuliffe to unpack Marketing Architects' new seven-criteria framework for creative quality. Catrina shares how the framework was built, how it held up against 500 marketing and creative pros, and where AI still falls short. Marketers will get a clearer sense of when to trust AI's creative feedback, and when human debate still wins. Topics covered: [01:00] The seven-criteria framework for creative quality [09:00] Testing the framework against 500 marketing and creative pros [11:00] AI and human scores landed within point-two of each other [13:00] Does AI push ideas toward safe, average creative? [15:00] How the framework differs from ScriptSooth pretesting [16:00] Using AI to sharpen writers, not replace them [22:00] Where pretesting and the framework each fit in To learn more, visit marketingarchitects.com/podcast or subscribe to our newsletter at marketingarchitects.com/newsletter . Resources: 2026 Marketing Architects Research Press Release…

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Hosts: Elena, Rob

Guest: Catrina McAuliffe

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Organizations: Marketing Architects

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