An ICP like that leaves too much room for interpretation. Marketing, sales, and ops start working from different definitions of the right account, and the business keeps chasing customers that look right on paper but don’t behave like winners. 

In this episode, Drew talks with Drake Lenhan, Sitecore’s Sr. Director, Global Market Intelligence & Portfolio Strategy, about what it takes to turn ICP into a source of focus that the whole business can work from. 

Drake walks through the progression from validating where you actually win to building a scoring model, securing cross-functional buy-in, and creating a system that stays steady as the market shifts. 

What You’ll Learn: 

• How to spot gaps between assumed fit and actual fit
• How to turn raw account traits into a practical ranking system
• Why use case fit matters as much as segment fit
• How to keep ICP from going stale after launch

If you’re a B2B CMO ready to revisit your ICP with win data, sharper focus, and stronger cross-functional alignment, this episode gives you the blueprint. 

The post The ICP Blueprint appeared first on The Drew Blog.

Geoff Woods is looking past the tool and straight at the leader holding it. In the right hands, AI becomes a force multiplier for strategic thinking, stronger decision-making, and a completely different idea of what’s possible at the top. In this episode, Drew sits down with Geoff, the author of The AI-Driven Leader to talk about what it actually means to own this moment as a leader. The best ones are using AI to think bigger, move their organizations faster, and build in ways that simply weren’t possible before. 

Three Leadership Mistakes with AI: 

1. Treating AI like an IT job 

1. Using AI on low-value work 

1. Treating AI like an answer machine 

What You’ll Learn: 

• How Geoff’s CRIT Framework turns AI into a stronger thought partner 

• Why AI’s first answer should be treated as a draft 

• How to find the AI use cases that matter most 

• What it takes to make AI a standard in the company 

If you’re a B2B CMO looking to become a more effective AI-driven leader, this episode is worth your time! 

The post The True AI-Driven Leader appeared first on The Drew Blog.

But constant change is pushing a different kind of leader to the forefront. The system designer. A leader who puts more energy into workflows, decision paths, and team rhythm so fewer hard calls boomerang back to them. 

In this episode, Drew talks with Dan Lowden (Blackbird.AI), Katrina Klier (Sage Strategy Group), and Chris Pieper (ADP) about why this new model of leadership matters now. With AI reshaping marketing and the pace only getting faster, teams need more than a smart CMO in the middle of everything. They need a way of operating that can keep up. 

In this episode: 

• Dan shares how his team turns expert insight into a steady stream of high-value content, helping a five-person team operate at scale.
• Katrina breaks down how leaders now need to think across people, tech, and AI while building systems that keep learning and improvement in motion.
• Chris explains how operating rhythms, sprint structures, and team health checks make strong execution more repeatable.

Plus: 

• How better operating rhythms turn learning into a team advantage
• Where AI should augment the system
• How to spot work that still depends too heavily on the leader

If you’re a B2B CMO whose marketing team still depends too heavily on your decisions, this episode will help you rethink leadership, system design, and how to build a team that scales. 

The post The New CMO Superpower: System Design appeared first on The Drew Blog.

Experimentation got marketing teams started, but it won’t take them very far on its own. The payoff starts when teams stop treating AI like a side experiment and start using it in ways they can repeat and build on. 

In this episode, Drew Neisser talks with Nicole Leffer, one of the most practical voices in B2B AI adoption, about what it takes to make AI use more consistent and scalable. After working with more than 100 companies, Nicole has a clear view of what separates teams that stay stuck in trial mode from teams that build a repeatable advantage. 

Three AI Mistakes Marketers Make: 

1. Relying on back-and-forth prompting instead of building reusable workflows 

1. Underestimating what their core AI tool can already do 

1. Falling for hype cycles and constantly switching platforms 

In This Episode: 

• How to build workflows that save real time 

• The hidden cost of tool sprawl 

• Where AI security risks are showing up now 

• How to build AI capability across the team 

If you’re a B2B CMO working to build stronger AI habits across your team, this episode will give you plenty to work with!

The post From AI Curiosity to Capability appeared first on The Drew Blog.

Claims like “customer-centric,” “trusted partner,” and “AI-powered” don’t do much when buyers hear them everywhere. True differentiation is bold, precise, and hard to confuse with the rest of the category. 

In this episode, Drew Neisser brings together Scott Morris (Sprout Social), Gary Sevounts (Netris), and Lesley Davis to explore what real differentiation requires in B2B. They get into how companies clarify their story, align internally, and carry that differentiation from product to pitch to customer experience. 

In this episode: 

• Scott explains why strong positioning only works when the product actually delivers on the promise, and how Sprout is building its brand around “social intelligence for breakthrough brands” 

• Gary shares how a shift from selling “just another fraud tool” to an “identity trust network” transformed growth, increased deal size, and helped drive a major acquisition 

• Lesley breaks down how differentiation shows up in a services business, especially in RFP-driven categories, where the real win comes from understanding the problem behind the problem 

Plus: 

• Why pipeline without differentiation leads to smaller deals 

• How strong positioning starts with customer frustrations 

• The difference between bold positioning and empty promises 

• Why differentiation only works when the whole company reinforces it 

If you’re a B2B CMO trying to differentiate your business and make your brand impossible to ignore, this one’s worth your time! 

The post Differentiate or Die: Winning in a Sea of Sameness appeared first on The Drew Blog.

David C. Baker would disagree. 

In this episode, Drew Neisser sits down with The Business of Expertise author to unpack what really separates thriving expert firms from struggling ones. From positioning and pricing power to the myths of growth and creativity, this is a candid, no-BS look at what it actually takes to build a successful expertise-based business. 

If you’re a B2B CMO trying to sharpen your company’s positioning (and prove marketing’s impact on the business), this one will hit home. 

Key Mistakes: 

• Staying a generalist instead of narrowing your positioning

• Assuming talent or creativity alone will drive success

• Chasing growth without understanding the tradeoffs

What You’ll Learn: 

• Why saying no is the real starting point for positioning and pricing power

• How to tell if you’re acting like an expert or just an order taker

• Why most firms overestimate creativity and underestimate discipline

• What AI is actually changing—and what it’s not

• How to build demand so you’re not forced to take every client

One idea to stick with:

If clients can easily compare you to alternatives, you’re not positioned.

If you want to go deeper, David shares more at punctuation.com—but fair warning, he might tell you to stop reading business books altogether.

The post The Business of Expertise: Why Positioning Beats Talent Every Time appeared first on The Drew Blog.

Most leaders default to staying “professional” and miss one of the simplest ways to build connection and improve communication.

In this episode of Renegade Marketers Unite, Drew Neisser talks with Jan McInnis about how leaders can use humor effectively—without telling jokes or trying to be someone they’re not.

The conversation reframes humor from something perceived as risky to something practical: A tool leaders can use to make teams more comfortable, conversations more effective, and workplaces a little more human.

What You’ll Learn: 

• Why humor can make leaders more human and approachable

• Why humor makes leaders more approachable

• How humor can acknowledge tension without derailing the moment

• When humor helps, and when it can backfire

• How small moments of levity can improve communication across teams

The takeaway: Humor isn’t about being funny. It’s about being human.

If your meetings feel a little too stiff—or your communication isn’t landing the way it should—this episode offers a simple place to start.

The post Humor as a Leadership Tool appeared first on The Drew Blog.

The search runs longer than expected. A role looks right on paper, then gets murkier as the conversations unfold. The company says it wants growth, but the real issue may be churn, product, or a CEO still figuring out what kind of marketing leader the business needs.

That’s what makes this market hard.

You are not only trying to tell a strong story about yourself. You are also trying to judge whether the opportunity in front of you is one you can win in.

Executive recruiter Erica Seidel, founder of The Connective Good, has a front-row seat to how CMO hiring is working right now. In her conversation with Drew, she gets into what CEOs say they want versus what they are really hiring for, how to frame your story when growth is hard to prove, and how to spot the signals that a role may be shakier than it first appears. 

What You’ll Take Away: 

• Why every hire is a set of tradeoffs and how to position yourself 

• What CEOs mean when they ask for a “growth partner” 

• Why business context matters as much as headline results 

• How AI fluency is showing up in CMO hiring 

• How to shape your story before others define your narrative 

Signals to Read: 

• If the role is built for growth or cleanup 

• What a CEO’s reaction to pushback reveals 

• If the job spec reflects reality or an “11 out of 10” wish list 

• If the company can make tradeoffs 

• How culture and pace show up before day one 

If your CMO job search has you questioning your story, your fit, or your instincts, this episode will help you get more confident on all three. 

The post Finding and Winning Your Next CMO Role appeared first on The Drew Blog.

Amy Edmondson argues that not all failures deserve the same label. Some are preventable. Some come with complexity. Then there is intelligent failure, the kind that comes with thoughtful experimentation in new territory and produces the learning that moves innovation forward.

In this episode, Drew Neisser brings in Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmondson, author of Right Kind of Wrong, to look at what leaders need to do if they want teams experimenting and learning in unfamiliar territory. For Amy, that starts with a clear goal, a bet no bigger than necessary, and the kind of questions that create enough psychological safety for people to share what they’re seeing early. So even when the result falls short, the learning is still useful. 

What You’ll Take Away: 

• The difference between preventable, complex, and intelligent failure 

• Why intelligent failure belongs in new territory 

• What makes an experiment smart, small, and worth running 

• Why high achievers often need a better frame for failure 

• How playing not to lose distorts innovation 

What This Asks of Leaders: 

• Stop treating every miss as proof someone messed up 

• Make the goal clear before the experiment starts 

• Keep the bet no bigger than necessary 

• Ask questions that invite candor instead of caution 

If your team needs a smarter way to think about failure, risk, and learning, this one is worth a listen. 

The post Failing Well: Smart Risks and Psychological Safety appeared first on The Drew Blog.

In this “Drew-on-Drew” episode, host Drew Neisser pulls together what surfaced in recent CMO Huddles Strategy Labs around Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) and focuses on the questions marketing teams are already starting to wrestle with.

Which buyer questions should be turned into structured Q&A first? Which strong existing pages are worth updating before you create anything new? And does this sit with SEO, or is AEO becoming part of a broader content conversation? If you’ve been hearing more about AEO and trying to figure out what deserves attention now, give this one a listen. Drew lays out what’s changing, what teams should look at first, and how to get moving! 

Where To Start: 

1. Identify the buyer questions already shaping search behavior 
2. Turn those questions into structured Q&A on pages that already perform 
3. Add schema before you spend on anything more elaborate 
4. Let SEO lead the first pass, then expand if the test shows promise 

What You’ll Take Away: 

• Which questions belong on your site first, including comparisons, “best tool for X,” and “how does this work?” 

• Why this is still early, and why benchmarking now matters 

• Why your SEO team can likely own AEO too 

• How to start with strong existing pages instead of building from scratch 

The post AEO, SEO, and the New Fight to Shape the Answer appeared first on The Drew Blog.

Together, they unpack what customer-centric leadership looks like in practice—from retention programs and executive briefings to listening to real sales calls and turning customer signals into action across the business. 

The result is a more operational view of customer obsession, one where the voice of the customer shows up not just in dashboards, but in meetings, decisions, and everyday habits.

The big idea: Customer centricity becomes powerful only when it shows up in everyday habits—meetings, messaging, and decisions. If you want to move from customer-aware to customer-obsessed, this episode delivers practical strategies you can apply immediately. 

What You’ll Learn: 

• Why customer obsession must show up in company habits, not just strategy decks 

• How marketing leaders are using customer voice to shape planning and priorities 

• Why stories and quotes from customers often move teams faster than dashboards 

• How narrowing customer centricity to a clear job-to-be-done makes it actionable 

• Why customers should appear in all-hands meetings, planning sessions, and executive briefings 

• How marketing teams can turn customer conversations into a repeatable growth engine 

Three perspectives on Customer-Led Growth: 

JD Dillon: Make Customer Commitment Visible 

JD shares how combining marketing and customer experience leadership helped Tigo Energy tackle its biggest challenge—retention. One result: the Green Glove Service, a hands-on installer support program that improves outcomes while reinforcing a customer-first culture across the company. 

Carlos Carvajal: Build the Customer Habit 

Carlos focuses on turning customer listening into a marketing habit. From direct conversations with customers to executive briefing programs that bring prospects into deeper dialogue, he shows how consistent exposure to customer stories strengthens messaging, improves win rates, and builds alignment across teams. 

Nikhil Chawla: Focus Customer Centricity on Real Problems  

Nikhil argues that “customer centricity” becomes powerful only when teams narrow it to specific problems they can solve. At Resilience, that means combining tools like Gong and AI analysis with integrated data pipelines to shorten feedback loops and surface the customer signals that matter most. 

This Episode Is For 

B2B CMOs and marketing leaders who want to move beyond talking about customer centricity and start embedding customer insight into how their organizations actually operate. 

The post The Real Work of Customer Obsession appeared first on The Drew Blog.

In this episode, Drew Neisser talks with Brian Evergreen, author of Autonomous Transformation, about why the AI conversation so often collapses into tools and use cases, and how leaders can pull it back to vision, outcomes, and the kind of alignment that drives transformation. 

What you’ll take away: 

• Why optimization can keep you busy while you stay stuck 

• How to make a future vision concrete enough to act on 

• What “no strategy without vision” means, and how to spot fake strategy 

• Why leaders default to scorecards, and how it stalls transformation 

• How Brian’s “nindrant” separates “we can do” from “we need alignment” 

• Why use case first AI limits gains, and how to shift to value creation

Plus: 

• A simple workshop to surface visions before projects 

• A clean split between what marketing can do now and what needs CRO and CFO alignment 

• How to move AI from tool talk to a value creation leadership conversation

If you are tired of AI conversations that start with tools and end with small wins, listen to this episode for a vision first approach that changes what you do next. 

The post Autonomous Transformation: The Strategy Shift for AI appeared first on The Drew Blog.

In this episode of Renegade Marketers Unite, Drew sits down with Charles Groome (Insightful) and Heather Adkins (Trimble) to unpack what a 2026-ready marketing organization really looks like. 

Spoiler: It’s not built around functional silos. 

Instead, they explore campaign-led team structures, mindset-driven hiring, and operating systems designed for speed, adaptability, and accountability. 

You’ll hear: 

• How Insightful uses an effort + outcomes framework to evaluate performance 

• Why Trimble reorganized around nine global initiatives instead of functional silos 

• The rise of integrated campaign units to tighten alignment 

• How to hire T-shaped marketers who blend storytelling and data 

• Ways to give teams more autonomy without sacrificing accountability 

• How better org design can reduce burnout and increase clarity 

If your team structure hasn’t changed in years, your team may struggle to adapt when the market shifts. 

This conversation will challenge how you think about structure, talent, and what it takes to build a marketing team that can pivot with confidence. 

The post When Org Design Shapes Strategy appeared first on The Drew Blog.

In this episode of Renegade Marketers Unite, Drew sits down with Bob Wright (Firebrick) to break down how B2B CMOs can use positioning to drive growth, shorten sales cycles, and stand out in crowded markets.

They unpack why product-first stories fail, how to get to “one voice” across the company, and what it really means to own a key business problem that buyers care about.

In this episode:

• The three biggest positioning mistakes: product-first thinking, misalignment, and no owned problem
• Creating urgency when “do nothing” is the real competitor
• Why “why you, why now” matters more than “how it works”
• When and how to rethink positioning after PLG, acquisitions, or expansion
• How to stand out in a world of AI sameness
• Building positions that sales actually uses

If your messaging is drifting into “blah blah blah” territory, this episode will help you reset around problems, not products.

The post Positioning as a Growth Lever appeared first on The Drew Blog.

RepuTracker was built to solve that problem. 

Developed for members of the CMO Huddles Leader program, RepuTracker provides a monthly, evidence-based view of your company’s reputation so you can see whether it’s rising, slipping, or holding steady, and why. 

In this episode, Drew is joined by Taran Nandha (Growth Natives) to demo the RepuTracker beta. They show how the tool tracks reputation month to month across multiple signals, then get practical about how to read the output, explain it to leadership, and see whether your moves are showing up in the market.

In this episode: 

• How RepuTracker turns scattered public signals into a monthly reputation score with trends and competitor benchmarks. 

• What it measures across key dimensions: Power of voice, awareness, engagement, perception, and employee sentiment. 

• How sources and weighting work behind the scenes across dozens of platforms. 

• How to use trendlines and recommendations to move from “we dipped” to a clear next step. 

Plus: 

• Why direction over time matters more than one noisy review or spike. 

• How to sanity-check dips using internal context and profile audits. 

• What could come next, from deeper source auditing to tracking visibility in AI search and LLM references.

If you’re curious how RepuTracker works, what signals it pulls from, and how to interpret the output month to month, this episode is the walkthrough. 

The post Making Reputation Measurable (and Defensible) appeared first on The Drew Blog.

To get specific about what to prioritize next, Drew brings together Guy Yalif (Webflow), Andy Dé (Lightbeam Health Solutions), and Kevin Briody (DisruptedCMO). Together, they focus on how CMOs can move from scattered experiments to intentional AI adoption across people, process, and technology, and what it takes to make AI a trusted part of how marketing runs.

In this episode: 

• Guy shares an AI fluency maturity model and explains why the shift to operational excellence is a change management challenge. 

• Andy breaks down agentic AI and workflow automation with examples from CI, outbound, RFPs, content, and AEO, using “why, what, how, so what.” 

• Kevin focuses on the people and platform side, from job anxiety and culture to vendor shakeouts and MarTech-level discipline. 

Plus: 

• Centering AI plans on people and fluency so it feels additive, not threatening. 

• Using councils, fast-track approvals, and guardrails to scale safely. 

• Balancing efficiency with human experience and customer acceptance. 

• Treating AI tools like core MarTech, with scrutiny around contracts, integrations, and vendor longevity.

If you want your 2026 AI plan to feel like a strategic advantage instead of a collection of pilots, this conversation will help you decide what to run, what to scale, and what to skip. 

The post Intentional AI Adoption appeared first on The Drew Blog.

In this episode, Drew sits down with Brent to challenge three big assumptions: That more supplier trust is the answer, that buyers have a neat journey to map, and that customer centricity is always the right north star. 

In this episode: 

• Why decision confidence matters more than supplier trust 

• How shifting from “trust us” to “trust yourselves” reshapes GTM 

• How to rethink buyer journeys through the “never again” and spaghetti-bowl lens. 

• Framemaking in practice, from nudges and checklists to maturity models. 

• The three Es, Establish, Engage, Execute, as a shared marketing and sales playbook.

Plus: 

• Escaping the smartness arms race by editing content to reduce anxiety and build buyer self-confidence. 

• Turning social proof into a confidence engine, using “other customers like you…” stories. 

• Making content supplier-agnostic, helping buyers ask better questions and weigh tradeoffs.

If you want your buyers to trust themselves enough to decide, start here. 

The post The Framemaking Sale: Building Buyer Decision Confidence appeared first on The Drew Blog.

Every marketing team is buried in invisible busywork; a trail of repetitive, manual steps hiding inside every task. So what happens when you take one of those messy workflows, map every step, and rebuild it?

In this episode, Drew talks with Dave Brong (Level Agency) about how CMO Huddles transformed a messy, 10-step post-meeting grind into an automated system that transforms hundreds of conversations into structured insight, searchable intelligence, and real business value. 

In this episode: 

• How a manual, repetitive workflow became an automated intelligence engine 

• How transcripts, metadata, and semantic search unlock institutional knowledge 

• The reality: Only ±10% of the system relies on AI (code does the heavy lifting) 

• When to use low-code tools vs. engineers for reliability, privacy, and scale

Plus: 

• A simple method to audit workflows and spot automation opportunities 

• How to balance build vs. buy for AI workflows 

• How to amplify human judgment instead of replacing it

If you are tired of manual follow-up, underused data, and AI hype without impact, this conversation is for you.  

The post Unlocking B2B Intelligence with AI Workflows appeared first on The Drew Blog.

So the job becomes building a budget you can walk into the room with, own, and defend with conviction. 

To get there, Drew brings together Andrew Cox (Forrester), Lisa Cole (2X), and Alan Gonsenhauser (Demand Revenue). The conversation centers on tying spend to strategy, translating marketing into CFO-ready terms, and giving AI a role in the plan that the numbers can support.

In this episode: 

• Andrew shares Forrester’s view on moving past “last year plus X,” building budgets around corporate objectives and campaigns, and forcing prioritization. 

• Lisa applies a zero-based mindset to business priorities, uses a 70-20-10 program mix for core, flex, and test, and frames marketing as an ATM of Audience, Trust, and Monetization. 

• Alan outlines the signals of strong and weak budgets, tying the majority of spend to growth campaigns and long-term value plans, and maintaining a year-round working relationship with the CFO.

Plus: 

• Keeping tech spend in check, including guidelines for MarTech mix and contract flexibility 

• Positioning brand and PR in financial terms like pipeline influence, win rates, and pricing power 

• Responding to AI efficiency pressure by fixing workflows first and framing value in utilization, speed, and scalability 

• Why the budget should be the numerical expression of strategy, not a defense of legacy spend

If you want to walk into your next budget review with a clear story, solid numbers, and conviction, this conversation will help you get there. 

The post A Marketing Budget the C-Suite Believes In appeared first on The Drew Blog.

This milestone episode is a celebration of the bold B2B ideas, experiments, and hard-earned lessons that have filled the show from day one. Thank-you to every marketer who has listened, shared, and dared to try something new because of what they heard here.  

Recorded live at the 2025 Super Huddle, Drew’s conversations with Udi Ledergor, Denise Persson and Chris Degnan, and Carilu Dietrich anchor this milestone episode. 

In this episode: 

• Udi shares how Gong pulled off a Super Bowl spot on a regional budget, aimed it at VPs of Sales, and tracked impact in traffic, conversations, and pipeline. 

• Denise and Chris explain how a CMO and CRO stayed aligned through four CEOs at Snowflake and evolved the story from “cloud data warehouse” to “data cloud,” all in lockstep. 

• Carilu shows how Lovable is building a movement with real users as influencers, a CEO who lives on social, and a speed-first mindset tuned to the pace of AI and customer buzz. 

Plus: 

• Why a “crazy ideas” budget creates room for standout plays that still satisfy the CFO 

• How empathy for sales and shared ownership of the number strengthen CRO-CMO alignment 

• How CEO-led social, customer stories, and edutainment power modern B2B brands 

• What it takes to move at AI speed while keeping product value and customer love at the center

If you want a concentrated hit of CMO-level courage, alignment, and playmaking, this milestone episode is your highlight reel. 

The post B2B Marketing Moves from the 2025 Super Huddle appeared first on The Drew Blog.

In this episode, Drew talks with Charles Groome (Insightful), Jamie Gier, and Lorie Coulombe (Equity Shift) about how they decide which events to do, design experiences people remember, and turn field time into pipeline. They cover event portfolios, sales pre-work, and the simple tools that keep everyone aligned before, during, and after the show. 

In this episode: 

• Charles sorts events into three buckets, leans into a listening circuit with smaller meetups, and looks at target-account impact to decide where bigger bets belong. 

• Jamie frames events around getting discovered, creating memorable experiences, and driving deals, with customers on stage and pods focused on key accounts. 

• Lorie sets clear goals for each event, does deep homework on audiences and geographies, and locks in sales pre-work and follow-up expectations.

Plus: 

• Build an event portfolio that blends big shows, listening trips, CABs, and customer moments. 

• Use themes, news hooks, and customer voices to stand out in crowded halls and drive recall. 

• Align sales and marketing via pods, shared KPIs, and simple scoreboards. 

• Tighten spend with regional focus, partner co-hosting, and clear criteria.

If events are on your 2026 budget and you want them to pay in pipeline, this episode will help you pick, plan, and prove them with more confidence. 

The post The Event ROI Reality Check appeared first on The Drew Blog.

Drew talks with Jakki Geiger (Arango), Betsy Daitch (Canoe Intelligence), and Grant Johnson (Chief Outsiders) about what it takes to uplevel AI skills across marketing. They get into hiring for AI-forward talent, picking use cases that matter, and tracking progress so experiments turn into repeatable, results-focused habits.  

In this episode: 

• Jakki hires AI-forward talent, builds digital twins for leaders, and kicks off AI projects from SDR pilots to sales enablement knowledge bases. 

• Betsy uses Gemini, an “Upleveling Marketing Efficiency” tracker, and QBR AI projects to lift adoption across product, growth, and corporate marketing. 

• Grant sets AI proficiency goals, runs workshops, and assigns ownership so each marketing function keeps building capability over time. 

Plus: 

• How to create a safe space for AI experimentation anchored to clear business goals 

• Ways to narrow use cases so pilots stay manageable and show impact 

• Why documentation, ownership, and simple workflows keep AI programs alive  

• How CMOs can model AI use and report progress in language the C-suite cares about 

Tune in if you are serious about raising your team’s AI game and want practical ways to build confidence, capability, and momentum. 

The post Leading Teams Through the AI Learning Curve appeared first on The Drew Blog.

In this episode, Drew sits down with the globally renowned marketing scientist and author of How Brands Grow to unpack what B2B marketers are getting wrong, what they should measure instead, and why focusing only on in-market buyers is a recipe for decline.

Byron drops truth bombs on:

• Why mental availability drives physical availability (not the other way around) 

• How B2B marketers are shooting themselves in the foot with fluffy brand campaigns  

• What to measure if you want to track real progress 

• Why B2B growth takes time—and how to prove it’s working

Plus, why CMOs should stop pretending that awareness is enough and start earning a place in buyers’ brains before they’re ready to buy.

Whether you’re defending your brand budget to a CFO, fighting for longer-term investment, or just trying to grow your share of voice without blowing it all in Q1—this episode delivers the mental fuel (and science) to make your case.

To hear the rest of this CMO Huddles Bonus Huddle, visit CMO Huddles Hub on YouTube. 

The post How B2B Brands Actually Grow appeared first on The Drew Blog.

To see how this plays out across very different orgs, Drew talks with Dan Lowden (Blackbird.AI), Marni Puente (SAIC), and Amy King (Relias) about the teams they’ve built and the systems that keep them performing. They break down who they hire first, how they set structure and expectations, and how coaching, intelligent failure, and AI-supported workflows help people grow and stay motivated.

In this episode: 

• Dan builds a lean, senior, hands-on startup team and fosters a test-and-learn culture where people move fast, try new things, and learn together. 

• Marni reshapes a communications-heavy function into a modern marketing org, adding commercial and demand capabilities and aligning work to OKRs and transparent dashboards. 

• Amy leads a marketing reset at Relias, rebuilding leadership and structure, positioning marketing with sales and client care, and modeling vulnerability and continuous learning through change.

Plus: 

• Why AI committees, battle buddies, and shared learning loops turn hesitation into confident adoption 

• How OKRs, scorecards, and focused dashboards clarify priorities and tie marketing to revenue outcomes 

• Where intelligent failure helps teams stop low-value work, share lessons, and build trust 

• How competency assessments, surveys, and development plans nurture top performers and future leaders

If you’re building, inheriting, or leveling up a marketing team, this episode gives you a ton of moves to help it perform, grow, and stay together.

The post Teams Built for Growth and Grit appeared first on The Drew Blog.

In this episode, Drew brings together three former full-time CMOs who now serve as full-time fractionals: Alan Gonsenhauser (Demand Revenue), Katrina Klier (Sage Strategy Group), and Marshall Poindexter (yorCMO). They get into what it really takes to succeed in the role, from setting expectations with CEOs and boards to choosing the right clients, managing time and scope, and knowing when the fractional model fits and when it is time to move on.

In this episode: 

• Alan builds trust fast with structured discovery across leaders and the board, using “three magic wishes” to surface priorities before acting. 

• Katrina ties marketing priorities to financial and board targets so strategy supports existing growth and margin commitments. 

• Marshall differentiates fractional work from consulting, using a simple framework and 90-day sprints to drive execution through in-house teams or agencies. 

Plus: 

• Narrowing your niche so you attract clients where you create outsized value 

• How to set scope, cadence, and availability so part-time does not quietly become full-time 

• Using process, sprints, and metrics to stay focused when new requests pop up 

• Planning the transition, from mentoring the incoming full-time CMO to creating a clean off-ramp

Tune in if you are considering going fractional, hiring a fractional CMO, or just trying to understand how this model fits into the modern CMO career. 

The post Going Fractional? appeared first on The Drew Blog.

From rethinking budget architecture to organizing around business outcomes, Craig shares the frameworks that enable CMOs to go beyond justifying their spend—and start leading the strategic conversation with CEOs, CFOs, and CROs. 

Get ready to challenge your assumptions, realign your org, and turn your budget into a true lever for growth. 

In this episode: 

• The big 3 budgeting mistakes CMOs make 

• Why campaign-based budgeting unlocks strategy 

• Areas of volatility in 2026 

• AI’s Role in Budget Planning 

This is just the first half of one of CMO Huddles monthly Bonus Huddles with B2B marketing strategists. To hear the rest of the conversation with Craig, visit CMO Huddles Hub on YouTube. 

The post Budgeting with Conviction appeared first on The Drew Blog.

Drawing from her CMO+ tenure at Altair, Amy Messano (Thomson Reuters) talks with Drew about how unifying marketing and communications and empowering employees to carry the story from the inside out helped fuel rapid growth and a multibillion-dollar acquisition. She shows how treating earned, owned, and paid as one system and tying internal comms to go-to-market kept everyone aligned on the same promise.

In this episode: 

• Centralizing marketing and communications in an engineering-led company 

• Moving from a house of brands to a branded house built around “Only Forward” 

• Linking a consistent brand to investor confidence and deal value

Plus: 

• Simplifying product architecture and naming through acquisitions 

• Aligning marketing, PR, AR, and internal comms to tell one story 

• Using listening and clear brand architecture to bring cultures together 

• What CMO+ leadership really requires: new capabilities and a close CEO partnership

If you’re stepping into CMO+ or stretching beyond marketing’s lane, this episode’s for you! 

The post Inside CMO+: Marketing, Comms, and a $10B Acquisition appeared first on The Drew Blog.

To turn that into visible progress while keeping the ship pointed at a destination the business recognizes, Drew brings together Chris Pieper (ADP), Putney Cloos (Bombora), and David Levy (Foundever) to share how each leads transformation across differently scaled organizations. From making progress visible to earning belief across the org and sustaining momentum through the messy middle, they show how change takes hold.

In this episode: 

• Chris pilots with sales champions, proves pipeline impact, and turns small wins into momentum. 

• Putney makes the case for change, maps “scrappy to industrial strength” milestones, and scales what works. 

• David runs parallel lanes to protect the core while building the future, aligning his org to work ambidextrously.

Plus: 

• How to make progress visible with simple roadmaps and real milestones. 

• How pilots, quick wins, and pipeline proof bring sales along. 

• Why stopping low-value work frees resources for what matters. 

•  What to hire for in ambiguity: people who try new things and move fast.

Tune in if you are steering big change and want practical ways to show progress, win belief, and keep momentum through the messy middle. 

The post Pilot, Prove, Scale: How CMOs Lead Transformation appeared first on The Drew Blog.

In this special “Drew on Drew” episode, host Drew Neisser recaps the top 10 takeaways from CMO Huddles’ second annual Super Huddle, held in Palo Alto in November 2025. From bold positioning and AI orchestration to CMO-CRO alignment and the power of community, these insights are your roadmap to thriving in 2026.

Favorite takeaway? Drew wants to know—post it and tag @CMO Huddles on LinkedIn!

Resources Mentioned 

• CMO Huddles 

• Super Huddle 

• Books mentioned 

• • Courageous Marketing by Udi Ledergor 

• • Make it Snow by Denise Persson 

• • Scalable Acts of Marketing by Josh Leatherman 

• RepuTracker 

The post Top 10 Countdown: Super Huddle Takeaways for 2026 appeared first on The Drew Blog.

But how do you get everyone aligned — from sales to customer success — without the story getting lost in translation (or buried in features)?

That question sits at the center of this conversation, as Drew talks with Marca Armstrong (Sensera Systems) and Caitlin Cassady (Beyond) about how to build a team of company-wide storytellers. From capturing customer language to coaching teams on how to use it, they reveal how to make your story stick—and scale.

In this episode: 

• Marca starts with a simple headline story (“build with confidence”) and ensures it shows up consistently in every GTM motion. 

• Caitlin turns real customer stories into marketing fuel, using a “so what?” filter to connect features to real outcomes. 

• Together, they treat storytelling as everyone’s job, so marketing, sales, and CX all carry the same story. 

Plus: 

• Measuring story-led work vs. feature blasts 

• Spotting what moves pipeline 

• Keeping language sharp so customer phrasing shows up in deals 

• Making storytelling a team sport across the company

If you want a story your customers instantly recognize—no matter who they talk to—this episode gives you the moves to make it happen. 

The post B2B Storytelling That Scales (and Sells) appeared first on The Drew Blog.