So as I said, my name is Stephanie Nastu. I have been, in the B2B and B2C enterprise space for over twenty years now.Really working on transforming marketing into a commercial engine. I'm also the author of rule breaker mindset, which is about how to rewrite the rules and push against the status quo to deliver results. And today I'm gonna talk to you a little bit about not just digital transformation, but how AI is also impacting that transformation and, and and I'll go into more detail on that. So today I'm gonna focus on, giving you some key strategic pillars for success. But I think in addition to that, as we go on this journey of transformation, change management, across your team and across the organization is so critical to ensure that everybody is bought into that transformation.

So I'm gonna talk a little bit about that, and then I'm gonna go through some tools and use cases, that you can very quickly utilize out of the gate, to drive that digital mindset across your organization. And hopefully, you will leave here today with a bit of a blueprint, for how to scale your digital marketing strategy, some actionable quick wins, that you can immediately, take part in with AI and strategies that help lead that change to upskill your team. So the change is now. CMOs are continuously being asked to, to do more with less and are under tremendous pressure to deliver against growing targets. And traditional models, around campaign delivery and manual processes is no longer, no longer, able to get people there. So AI automation, AI and automation are no longer an option, but they're absolutely essential levers to drive that productivity, and competitive advantage. So it's no surprise that Gartner, you know, is saying that CMOs are being held, accountable for profit and performance and not just brand.

And so it's really important to start to leverage, the systems that we can with AI to drive, to drive that scalability and productivity. However, I do wanna caution. I know that as marketers, we have heard this statement a lot, can't you use AI for that? And I do wanna caution, everyone that regardless of, yes, AI is really important and can absolutely help us scale and drive that productivity, but you still need a human touch to power that strategic storytelling. So it's true that we're using AI, and it's revolutionizing how we create content and how we optimize campaigns and how we boost overall productivity, but we should really embrace and we should really embrace this. But strategic marketers still need people who can build a brand narrative, craft a point of view, and interpret those insights, and guide AI to scale the right message to the right audience at the right time. So I think it's really important that we educate, people in our organization and, and especially, I would say our executive teams so that they understand that yes, AI is a very powerful tool and we can be leveraging it many different ways, but you still need people that really power, a lot of, a lot of that, point of view and underpinning of the brand narrative.

And as we, as we move forward, I think there are four key strategic pillars that help the CMO evolve their role from a brand builder to an AI orchestrator. And, one of the pillars is leading with AI integrations. I think that marketing plays a critical role because we are very often the very touch point for customers and prospects, through their digital journey. We all know that 80% of buyers are online doing their research, educating themselves on brands, and really that touch point, is usually, you know, our storefront or it could be SEO, through search. So marketing really needs to lead the conversation when it comes to AI integration and strategy. And that AI strategy really needs to be aligned with those corporate objectives and KPIs.

And I strongly recommend that, you lead a cross functional AI council so that everybody is aligned on not just what marketing is doing, but obviously a lot of the other stakeholder groups across the organization are also leveraging a AI. And I believe there's a lot of synchronicity that you can build, based on, what other teams are using. So, it's a, it's a really important strategic pillar to get AI off the ground, but also to make it, you know, a mindset, around continuous innovation, which we'll talk about in a moment. I think the pillar is really shifting from a campaign centric approach to a data centric mindset. And, you know, I know we are inundated with data. You know, most marketing organizations have disparate systems. We're dealing with, you know, the ability to the challenge to bring them into a unified kind of marketing data layer. But this is becoming even more increasingly important as we utilize, different AI platforms.

So really unifying that data and interpreting the data so that we can action AI driven insights is is critically important. And I think an important element of that is how to actually train the team to interpret those insights, which I will get to a little later. So really shifting that mindset to a data centric approach is is also quite critical. The pillar is leveraging AI for insights and personalization at scale. As we know, you know, even the largest organizations are reducing their marketing teams and we have, you know, much smaller teams and we have to reach, a much larger audience in some cases. And, so the only way that you can create that personalization, at scale is to leverage AI. So understanding, how you're gonna do that, and do you have the right components in place to be able to do that and and reach those audiences in real time dynamically and be able to personalize that content, where the customer is in their journey, is is is definitely a critical pillar.

And finally, aligning with the CIO to ensure AI readiness and governance. And I think this is probably one of the most important pillars as we, embark on this, fast moving AI journey. We are seeing that, you know, new technologies are emerging, daily. And so really aligning with your CIO and the team to ensure that you are following the proper governance, that you are explaining to them why it's important and why, you need to adopt these specific tools, I think is, is really, important to your overall journey. And they frankly should have a role on the AI council as well so that, you're sharing these ideas as you as you go through this transformation. And as you go through the transformation, I I I can't stress enough that, you know, it is not easy to lead through change.

And, you need to develop a change management and team enablement playbook to bring the team on the journey with you. And, and here are three key ways of how you can do that. So creating a culture of experimentation, I can't emphasize this enough. There are a number of champions on my team that are continuously bringing new innovation, new solutions to the forefront and showcasing, how we could potentially use them. So I think creating that culture of experimentation and encouraging team sprints and pilot programs, are just key ways to learn, to learn what works and what doesn't work and to be able to iterate really quickly. The stream is around communicating the why behind AI. I think it's not just communicating the why behind AI for your team so that you can inspire buy in, but also other stakeholder groups really need to understand how AI is, is enhancing the overall digital journey, what it means to how we engage with clients and accounts.

And, and when I say other stakeholders, I think sales is a core part of that. Sales plays a big role obviously in in in aligning and working with marketing. So, you know, really explaining to them why, why we're using certain platforms and how it enhances, their role as well is is an important, wave for change management. And finally, I I think investing in AI and automation training and making this successful to your team is is very important. And it's not a one size fits all. I I think you have to really look at this as a tiered, learning path and be able to provide something for everyone, but to continuously offer, learning and and encouraging learning and recognizing and celebrating people who are completing those certifications. Because the more we can, educate the team on the different tools and the way, to utilize AI and automation, I think is just going to make the team stronger and be able to deliver, you know, against those, the productivity and the efficiency that we're trying to gain with some of these methods.

Here is a proven five phase blueprint for digital marketing transformation that I have actively used, across many different organizations. I won't go through all the detail on the slide. I'm sure that I'll be sharing all these slides with all of you today. But I just want to kind of pick out a few, a few of the key phases. So I can't stress enough the audit and align phase. It is the foundation for everything that you do. So really understanding, you know, where you are in your tech stack journey, auditing all the different solutions and understanding how they kind of underpin and align to those corporate objectives is really key to being able to build on that. So, I think that this is probably the most important phase so that you can actually build out your overarching strategy, understanding where the gaps are and aligning, how to fix those gaps to be able to fulfill the business goals and understanding the stakeholder groups in your organization and where those gaps are as well.

So really taking the time to interview them and understand their, ability to utilize AI or their perception of AI in the business, I think is really important. And then that is really the foundational layer that's going to help set you up for success. I would say really establishing what those quick wins look like is also an important part of the journey. Not everybody is sold on different facets of technology that you wanna bring into the business. So it's important to show, the results. And, some of the best ways to do that is pick something very small, pick a pilot, region, and, and test it, and then showcase those results to, your team, other stakeholder groups and your executive team so that they can see the power and the art of the possible. And, and upskilling and enabling the team is, is really an important part of the journey, because if you don't have, you know, the team upskilled and understanding how to use the technology, how to interpret those insights, It doesn't matter how strong your foundational layer is, because the people are really powering, all the technology that you're investing in and the systems that you are trying to build.

So five key phases, audit and align, developing those quick wins, upskilling and enabling, activating and orchestrating everything, and then finally, that optimizing and scaling. And that is a continuous process. So continuously looking at how to refine the model, how to iterate, how to how to scale further with different, different channels and and and different types of technology, so that you can continuously be innovating. And I would, I would suggest that you pick kind of two or three big projects that you can track across the course of the year that will definitely have monumental change. And, and I think that that is what creates the buy in across your organization. So, really there are three key levers to driving that kind of sustainable transformation. And it really is around people, process, and technology.

And I said earlier, people are really the the ones that are powering and aligning, to the AI technology that you're putting in place, and they're powering it, with the process. And so their understanding also of the process, is critically important to change everything from a linear process to a more agile sprint. And this is something that will take time. I don't think this is something you can rush. Again, I think it's very iterative, and you have to work closely with the team and other stakeholders to ensure that you are building on that process as you go. And finally, just identifying the technology and where AI can play a role in the digital journey and enhancing the overall brand experience, is another important component of driving that change, but then really also understanding how, that change is being interpreted by other stakeholder groups.

So really being transparent across your organization, and explaining how all those key components are working in unison and synchronicity to drive, that change to scale. And one key example I will tell you, from us utilizing this formula is we have been able to cut our campaign launch time from twelve weeks to four weeks, with agile sprints and utilizing AI tools in the workflow. And and and that is tremendous results. And and this is something that my team is extremely proud of. But it did take time to get there. It wasn't something that happened overnight. We really had to try different models and different ways of working and different types of platforms to be able to get to this, to this level of, time frame. And so we continuously, focus on iterating against that.

I have a I have one poll in my, in my presentation because I wanna get a sense of the audience here and what you are using AI tools for today. If you scan that QR code, you'll have access to this, and then I'll be able to see whether you're using AI tools for content development, predictive media buying, personalizing communication, or developing campaign creative, or it could be all of the above. And let me see if this actually worked. Okay. I guess it hasn't. So I will move right into, some use cases for AI. So there are some practical use cases that I think you can really leverage, right out of the gate. One is around content development. I I know as marketers, a lot of you are probably already using a number of AI tools to establish content. One of the key things that we have done as an organization is, work on, utilizing a platform called Macaw that has scaled our SEO content, optimization.

And it has really been a game changer for us. We've been able to increase overall, content, inbound traffic rather, by 300% just by elevating our overall SEO strategy and being able to utilize, AI tools to do that. Now I will say you still need a writer to ensure that, you are, drafting the content around tone of voice, point of view, but it does help you, build content quickly, at least outlines for content and then being able to really scale that. And three other core areas are really around media campaigns and sales enablement, I think, which, you can certainly leverage a number of AI tools to, start to kinda showcase that efficiency. There are some quick wins, as I said, that you can put into place right away. I think there's, you know, within ninety days, there are some key things that you can do around establishing audit, audit around your tech, really showcasing and aligning those KPIs with your tech audits.

And that could be through a number of different things like automated reports and introducing AI prompts for campaign ideation. And then there's also running a few smaller AI pilots that immediately showcase success. Success. And I think SEO content generation is the perfect example of that. You can literally take your SEO strategy from zero to a 100 in just, in just a few months. And, and then I would I would strongly recommend that you roll out, you know, one kind of lighthouse initiative with clear success metrics that you can share with everyone and really celebrate the success around that, but also educate your senior management team on what that is and why it's important and why you need to keep investing on different types of tech to get there.

So I will end with kind of some final takeaways here. So creating an AI center of excellence, and and having marketing lead, that is a great way to get all different stakeholders on the same page. Embedding that continuous learning, so that you are looking at, quarterly AI capability reviews and driving that team certification and really celebrating the success of how the team is moving forward on that and measuring your success. It's not just about looking at outputs, it's the overall enhanced brand experience, that you are also creating as well as the impact you are having to revenue growth. And then, of course, continuous innovation. Be open to testing new tech. Really try to drive that innovation mindset across your organization because as we start to hear about more AI agents and and new AI platforms, it's really important that you're continuously testing and seeing what works for you and what works for your organization.

So I will end with this. The future focused CMO is no longer just a storyteller. They are a systems thinker, a data strategist, and an AI orchestrator driving growth at scale. So it's really important for us to embrace this change, drive the change through our teams and our organization. And I think we are positioned, really well as marketers to be able to do that. So thank you for joining my session today. Appreciate everyone being.