I built a career by figuring things out—and saying what I actually think.

Philadelphia, PA

The current marketing mindset is very limiting, especially around AI, layering the technology into the same old playbooks we've used for years. These playbooks were broken in the first place, undermining marketing's overall value and making us reactive instead of proactive in aligning business value to customer requirements. We forfeited true strategic guidance and instead measured leads and clicks.

Now, the attribution models we relied on to justify our existence are completely broken. Digital marketing isn't working the same way; marketers are flooding the market with AI-generated garbage; we rarely talk to customers to understand what matters and pretend that silicon sampling counts as true strategic insight. We're still trying to work in a system that was busted in the first place, which is why marketing has always been the executive function that has to keep justifying our existence and budget.

On paper, we should be the most important function in an executive team. We have a unique perspective that no one else has in an organization, because we see across all functions: sales, product, customers, HR, investors, etc. We should use AI to make us stronger and give us the power to create authentic, compelling work; instead, we keep worrying about how to game the system, trading lasting impact for quick wins. Our work is now created for algorithms, not people.

Marketing is at an inflection point. Founders are cutting back on CMO hires. Some are splitting it up between product and revenue officers. AI can either make us stronger or speed our demise. That's really up to us.

Crystal