Disrupt or Be Disrupted: Big Ideas for 2025’s CMOs

Drew: Hello, Renegade Marketers. It’s time for another Drew-on-Drew episode in which I pummel myself with questions and try to provide cogent answers for senior marketing leaders. If you enjoy this episode, do both of me a favor and subscribe. You’ll be helping our quest to be the number one B2B marketing podcast. Okay, Drew, let’s get to this.

Narrator: Welcome to Renegade Marketers Unite, possibly the best weekly podcast for CMOs and everyone else looking for innovative ways to transform their brand, drive demand, and just plain cut through—proving that B2B does not mean boring to business. Here’s your host and Chief Marketing Renegade, Drew Neisser.

Drew: I have five big questions for you that we’ll be wrestling to the ground at the CMO Super Huddle in Palo Alto on November 8th. Okay, can I start with the first question?

Drew: You bet.

Drew: Okay, so the five big questions. Question number one: Where will the economy be in 2025 and what impact should we expect it to have on B2B CMOs?

Drew: Alright, I need to put my thinking hat on for this one, because it is really a tough question. Obviously, I don’t have a crystal ball, but here’s what I’m thinking. Because we’ve seen this before—I do subscribe to The Economist—here’s what they’re thinking: Interest rates can drop another half to a percent at least in the next six months. If that happens, then capital that’s been sitting on the sidelines because it’s been earning, you know, 5-6% is now suddenly going to become available. This increase in investment is going to raise the tide for all of B2B, which, by the way, sunk in ’23 and ’24, so we had a sinking tide. At minimum, we’ll have a flat tide. But ideally, we’re going to see some serious growth in 2025, and that should help a lot of companies that were probably in the nice-to-have, maybe need-to-have, or struggling to get it, where the customer was just not buying at all. Those decisions—CFO might become the CFA—yes. So let’s put a bet on economy as a plus for B2B marketers in 2025.

Drew: Okay, I’ll buy that. I think you’re right, and that probably has implications for B2B marketers, right?

Drew: You’re right, you’re right, you’re right. I’m sorry I forgot to cover that earlier. So if the economy is rising and suddenly you have more business opportunities, and deals are closing faster than they were, what’s that mean for marketers? Well, here’s the thing: you better have your experiments ready so that if the CFO comes to you and says, “Hey, business is good, let’s invest more,” you have the answer to where you can spend your dollars to have the biggest impact. That’s probably the most important thing to be thinking about. And then behind that is, what are the new verticals that you want to target? What are the new products that you’ve been holding back on because you didn’t have budget? Those things, those strategic things, are the opportunities that savvy B2B CMOs can be thinking about.

Drew: Okay, good answer. Alright, let’s move on. So we know the economy is going to get better. That’s going to create opportunities for marketers who are ready to spend in new areas. Okay, big question that we’re going to be talking about at the Super Huddle is, how will AI impact marketing in general?

Drew: Definitely need my thinking cap for this one. Oh my gosh. This is hard. Okay, so how will AI impact marketing in general? All the tools that you already have will be AI-infused. I mean, we’ve got the Future of B2B Tech, we’ll be talking with Adriana Gil Miner from Iterable, we’ll be talking to Paige O’Neill from Seismic. No doubt those two companies specifically will be working on AI integrations. So you’re going to be able to test faster, you’re going to be able to just do a lot more with probably fewer people. And so that will have some implications for staffing, at least when it comes to the tools. Now, I think there is a risk inherent in this that we have to talk about, which is, if everybody’s using these tools, particularly for content or even maybe for strategy, there’s a real risk that this is going to make marketing smaller. And by that, I mean you’re going to test and test and test, and you can come up with 300 different ad iterations, and you can figure out which one of those might get a higher click-through rate. But that’s a problem because nobody—one click doesn’t matter. It’s the 25th cumulative engagement that matters. And often that comes back to the big idea. And in my opinion, the big idea is not likely to come from generative AI. It may help you sort through things, but this is going to come down to you, your brand, your market, and some serious thinking about differentiation. So while generative AI is going to be very helpful, if you’re relying on it to be the source of your differentiation, you may run into problems, because you’re going to make your marketing small.

Drew: Okay, I guess I’ll buy that. I probably have to, but I don’t know. I think there are a lot of folks that are thinking that generative AI can drive strategy. I know that Liza Adams will be joining us, and she’s been using it a lot in that way, so we’ll have to see on that one. But that does have a corollary question, which is, how will AI impact the CMO role in 2025?

Drew: Really good question. And I think what I’m seeing is savvy CMOs are recognizing that generative AI is less about content development. And I want to pause there for a second because when I say that, I know that a lot of CMOs are using it to help sort through and think through and challenge their content. And that’s fine-ish, but it’s table stakes, and I haven’t seen really amazing content that has necessarily been generative AI-created, at least when I’m talking about the written word. So in my mind, the savvy CMOs are really going to be thinking about how they use generative AI to build things they probably couldn’t do before—they can build them faster and cheaper. I’m specifically thinking about sales enablement tools and all those things that you can anticipate during the sales process. What does the CFO need? What does the CISO need? What does the CEO of your buyer need? For example, I love this concept of speed to hero. Is there a tool that you can develop that can help the buyer, the champion, figure out this is going to help me look good in the company because it’s going to have this ripple effect over time? So speed to hero—can you develop a tool there? Can you use generative AI to enhance your processes internally, so your team is more informed, so your meeting management is better, so your quality control is better? The answer is all of those things: yes. So yeah, you might need a developer on your team to help you think about it and use it. But to just take these tools off the shelf and say, “Oh, we’re going to use it to use content,” would be missing the big opportunity, because everybody can do that. And so, yeah, you know, I mean, it’s not going to help you that much. Importantly, and a point on this I want to make: every CMO, if they start to think of AI as a sparring partner and use it to challenge your thinking, that’s really very helpful, because you may have a hypothesis, and you say, “Hey Claude, challenge this. Hey ChatGPT, challenge this,” or “Hey ChatGPT, Claude just said this. What do you think of that?” And you play each of them against each other. And I think an important part of this is don’t rely on one tool. Some of the folks like Noah Brier, who’s going to be giving a sort of keynote on where he sees generative AI going—and if you’ve never heard Noah speak, you’re going to want to hear him speak. He’s done the Brand X conference, one of the smartest guys in this space. He’s going to be at our Super Huddle, and he’s a big Claude proponent right now. So AI will definitely impact the CMO role, and that’s it. What’s your next question?

Drew: So with all this generative AI and everything else going on, do you see the CMO role getting bigger or smaller?

Drew: Great question. The answer is yes. Alright, what do I mean by that? So, you know, anybody who’s been following along here knows that I’m a big fan of this notion of CMO+—that the way that a CMO can secure their seat at the table is to be perceived as someone who is more than, oh, I hate this term, “just the marketer.” I could do a whole episode on why I hate that term, “just the marketer,” because marketing is so important and touches everything. However, to be perceived as more than just the marketer, you need to own something other than marketing. And so we’re seeing this trend where CMOs like Chris Willis, who was the Chief Pipeline Officer and the Chief Marketer. We’re seeing Chandar Pattabhiram, who will also be at the Super Huddle. Chandar is both CMO and Go-to-Market Officer. A number of the huddlers in our community are CMO and CXO, as in customer experience person. Whatever it is, they’re adding to what we have. Some that are VP of Marketing and Sales. The idea is that you’re a business leader first and a marketer second. That, I think, is the future of the CMO role that will guarantee you a seat at the table, that will guarantee the role gets bigger, not smaller. If, in fact, you are a person who is comfortable being solely focused on marketing, then the role is probably going to get smaller. I’m afraid it will. And this is where, you know, certain things may get automated and people are going to lose confidence in your ability to help drive the company forward. So you need to own something. One question that came up recently in a huddle in London was, well, what about this notion of a Deputy CEO, where you’re really driving strategy? You’re the right-hand person of the CEO? I love that. I think that’s going to happen in startups. That needs to happen in startups. If you’re fortunate that you have a CEO who gets marketing and the power of marketing and why strategy drives everything, then you’re truly a lucky person, and strategy is a great place for you to do it. My last point here on this is, no matter what role you add to what your CMO-plus is, make sure you’re staying close to the customer.

Drew: Alright. Good answer, yep, the CMO role will get bigger and smaller. Okay, makes sense. So let’s get to number five. What is the most significant counter-trend to all this conversation about technology?

Drew: I love this question. Significant counter-trend. So if the trend is generative AI and technology and just the speed of change, the most significant counter-trend is that we as people, as humans, spending so much time on our phones, so much time in sort of virtual meetings, desperately need to regroup and get together. So I believe the counter-trend will be more in-person in 2025. So yeah, you might do more tech, but you’re going to do more in-person. And where that’s going to play out is more in-person with your employees and your staff. You’re going to try to get together. If you got together once a year, you’re going to try to get together twice a year. More in-person with your customers—again, if you have a customer advisory board, and three out of four of those meetings were virtual, I bet two out of four will be in-person in 2025. Partners—really important for a lot of folks. How often do you get to meet with these people? And, of course, prospects, particularly late-stage prospects. All this means a bigger role for events, because at events, at major conferences, you can do all of those things. You can get employees together because they could work at the event. You can bring in customers, you can bring in your partners, and you can even get late-stage prospects. So I see events booming in 2025, which, of course, is why we’re having our Super Huddle on November 7th, where we’re having our reception, and on November 8, where we have a full action-packed day. Really brilliant people, limited to 101 marketing leaders. If you’re a B2B CMO who can share, care, and dare with the best of them, do yourself a favor: Get yourself a ticket for the CMO Super Huddle. And if you can’t make that, be sure to visit cmohuddles.com. Find out where all this goodness is coming from, and how I can come up with these answers on the fly. It’s all about the community of CMOs at CMO Huddles. I’m Drew Neisser. It’s been a pleasure talking to you and Drew-on-Drew. Have an amazing day. Peace out.

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Show Credits

Renegade Marketers Unite is written and directed by Drew Neisser. Hey, that’s me! This show is produced by Melissa Caffrey, Laura Parkyn, and Ishar Cuevas. The music is by the amazing Burns Twins and the intro Voice Over is Linda Cornelius. To find the transcripts of all episodes, suggest future guests, or learn more about B2B branding, CMO Huddles, or my CMO coaching service, check out renegade.com. I’m your host, Drew Neisser. And until next time, keep those Renegade thinking caps on and strong!