Cynthia Ferngren
Fractional CMO, Brand Strategist & Founder of Brandsol AgencyBrandsol Agency
Skills
About
Twenty-five years later, I’ve done it for IBM, Dell, Listerine, Band-Aid, and Botox. And for more than 1,000 startups nobody had heard of yet. Here’s what I believe, and it’s the opposite of what most marketers will tell you. You cannot target your way into being loved. Demographics aren’t insight. “Women 25 to 44” never bought anything. A feeling did. Brands that chase an audience stay externally focused forever and never do the internal work to find out what they stand for. The brands people fall for did the reverse. They got specific about their own conviction, and the right people recognized themselves in it. That work has a name. I call it excavation. Two forces have to meet: what moves culture, and what moves you. Dig down through one, dig up through the other, and where they intersect is brand soul. Everything after that, the story, the system, the revenue, is engineering. Most founders treat brand as the thing they’ll get to after growth. That’s backwards. Performance marketing rents attention. Brand is the only thing you own. When Dell couldn’t get IT pros to notice its software division, we didn’t add features. We found what those people were really craving and built “Expect More” around it. A Stevie Award, a 30% lift in unaided awareness, 3:1 ROI. I came up the hard way. Working-class kid. A dad who gave a company everything and got laid off anyway. I started Brandsol with no safety net and a refusal to blend in. It took me years to learn the thing I now teach founders: you don’t get chosen by chasing. You get chosen by letting people see who you actually are. Today that’s a Forbes Council seat, 12 industry awards, and a spot in the top 1% of strategic consultants worldwide. I work with founders who are done sounding like everyone else. Some start with a one-week Clarity Audit. Some want me in the room every week as their outsourced CMO. Some want the full agency. They all want the same thing: to stop chasing trends and start creating culture.
Cynthia Ferngren
Published content
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
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
AI has become deeply embedded in day-to-day work, but the productivity payoff isn’t automatic. A 2026 Stanford survey of global executives found that about 70% of firms are actively using AI, yet the same survey found more than 80% of firms reported no impact on productivity over the previous three years. For marketing leaders under constant pressure to leverage AI to move faster and accomplish more, that gap is troubling enough. But they also have to navigate an additional challenge: keeping AI from diluting or damaging their brand’s voice.Efficiency isn’t just about producing something faster. Especially when it comes to marketing, AI should free people to spend more time on work that benefits from human judgment, creativity and connection. That’s an outcome that aligns with what workers themselves say they want from workplace AI: a collaborative relationship where they retain agency and oversight, rather than having AI encroach on the parts of their work that require human judgment.Members of the Senior Executive CMO Think Tank are experienced marketing leaders with expertise spanning brand storytelling, digital advertising, customer engagement, influencer marketing and the growing role of AI in marketing. Here, they discuss ways marketing teams can inadvertently create more friction with AI and share practical approaches for using the technology to make work simpler, clearer and more valuable instead.
Company details
Brandsol Agency
Company bio
At Brandsol Agency, we don’t just craft strategies—we uncover your brand's authentic soul and turn it into culture. Rooted in a unique blend of Malibu’s laid-back inspiration and New York’s refined sophistication, our approach blends art, anthropology, and business to help visionary founders build brands that lead rather than follow. Founded by Cynthia, a cultural strategist and entrepreneur inspired by art galleries, dawn fishing, and cross-industry insights, Brandsol is more than an agency — it’s an experience worth remembering. We believe breakthrough brands are built on three foundations: Soul + Story + System. Our mission is simple: help ambitious brands create cultural movements with authentic purpose and lasting impact. We guide you from uncovering your unique worldview to crafting compelling narratives to building systems that turn cultural insight into measurable growth.