Boris Dzhingarov

expert panel

Marketing leaders are often urged to let data drive their decisions, particularly when budgets are tight and the stakes are high. But a new Journal of Business Research paper suggests there’s another variable that dashboards can’t capture: What’s happening in a CMO’s personal life may affect the way they approach marketing strategy, from planning and product development to communications and channel management.That doesn’t make data-driven leadership less valuable. It does, however, underscore its limits. Data still has to be interpreted, trade-offs still have to be weighed and decisions still have to be made by people whose judgment, energy and perspective don’t exist separately from the rest of their lives. Stress combined with time pressure can impair decision-making, affecting attention and making people more likely to overlook beneficial options. That makes the support surrounding senior leaders more than a matter of workplace well-being. What should companies be doing to help CMOs make sound decisions when personal pressures inevitably arise? Below, members of the Senior Executive CMO Think Tank share their perspectives on the human limits of data-driven leadership, how organizations can build stronger support around the people making high-stakes marketing decisions, and how life experiences can expand a marketing leader’s creativity and impact.

expert panel

For years, search marketing has been built around a familiar goal: earn enough visibility to get a customer to click. AI-generated search results are changing that equation. For example, a 2025 analysis found that Google users clicked traditional search results in just 8% of visits when an AI summary appeared, compared with 15% when it didn’t—suggesting brands may have fewer opportunities to speak for themselves on their own turf.When an AI system becomes the layer between a company and a prospective customer, brand reputation isn’t shaped only by what the company publishes. The system may synthesize information from a range of sources, and that synthesis isn’t guaranteed to be accurate. Widespread problems, from speculative answers to fabricated links, have been found with the ways generative search tools retrieved and cited source material. For CMOs, that makes the broader information ecosystem surrounding a brand a more immediate marketing concern, since an incomplete, outdated or inaccurate answer can influence perception before a customer ever reaches the company’s website—if they reach it at all.As AI changes how customers discover and evaluate companies, marketing leaders need to rethink what it takes to earn authority when they may not control the first—and sometimes only—description a buyer sees. Below, members of the Senior Executive CMO Think Tank, a curated group with expertise in brand storytelling, digital advertising and the rise of AI in marketing, discuss how CMOs can approach brand authority, message consistency and reputation in an AI-mediated search environment.

expert panel

Values-based marketing can create a meaningful connection between a brand and its audience, building longer-term loyalty than simple price- or product-forward messaging. But it’s not necessarily a slam-dunk strategy: Americans are evenly divided on whether companies making public statements about political or social issues is important to them. And when companies weigh in on social causes or emotionally charged issues, the message itself is only part of what people are evaluating. Audiences are also asking whether the brand’s position feels credible—and whether the company has earned the right to speak.Once a brand does choose to engage in values-based marketing, credibility becomes critical. Recent consumer research found that, across age cohorts, Americans consider honesty to be the most important brand value; simply taking a stand carries less weight. For marketing leaders, that raises an important question: Is the company expressing a value it demonstrably lives by or simply borrowing the language of a cause?So how can CMOs recognize when values-based marketing is crossing into performative compassion, and how can they ensure their messaging remains credible and ethical? Below, members of the Senior Executive CMO Think Tank share the warning signs to watch for and how to approach cause-related marketing with greater care.

expert panel

A rising conversion rate is the kind of metric that can make a leadership team feel good about growth. Customers are moving through the funnel more efficiently, acquisition costs may be improving and marketing can point to a clear return on investment. But there’s a critical question hiding behind those results: Is the business actually creating more demand, or simply getting better at converting the demand that was already there?That distinction matters because efficiency can improve even as a company’s future growth potential weakens. A business can become highly effective at reaching people who already know the brand, have an existing need or are close to making a purchase without expanding the pool of potential customers. Research from the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising reinforces the importance of balancing short-term sales activation with longer-term brand building, noting that sustained investment can contribute to growth over time.For marketing leaders, the challenge is to make that difference visible inside the organization. Members of the Senior Executive CMO Think Tank bring deep experience in brand storytelling, digital advertising and customer engagement to this challenge. Here, these marketing leaders explore how to tell if a business that is turning interest into revenue today is also creating the conditions for more customers to enter the market tomorrow.

expert panel

expert panel

Advertising on streaming platforms is no longer at the margins—it’s squarely in the mainstream. As of March 2025, streaming accounted for 43.8% of overall TV time in the U.S.—an increase of 10 points over two years. Meanwhile, linear TV’s primetime ad sales continue a gradual decline—2025-26 primetime ad sales were down 2.5% from the previous upfront, dropping by $1.2 billion since 2023-24 upfronts.For brands, this shift is driving a full-scale reevaluation of media strategy: where to reallocate budgets, how to measure results and how to avoid wasted spend in new formats. Members of the Senior Executive CMO Think Tank—a curated group of marketing leaders with deep expertise in brand storytelling, digital advertising and more—discuss how the shift to streaming media should influence advertising investment decisions, where the biggest opportunities lie in connected TV, and how to spot and manage risks.