4 Strategic Bets Every CMO Should Make in 2026

Loading player…

The short answer

Most annual marketing plans chase every trend at once. Mandy makes the case for four deliberate bets instead. In this solo episode she walks through the four she is placing in her own practice and with her clients: channels that build visibility and trust together, going all in on the human experience, operational readiness before more AI, and her own speed of learning as a leadership advantage. She also explains why brand is the output of the four compounding rather than a fifth bet of its own.

Key takeaways

In this recap

Most marketing plans try to answer every trend at once. Mandy Hornaday builds hers around a harder question: if she could only make four bets with her time, energy, and budget, what would they be? In this solo episode, recorded just past the one-year anniversary of Growth Activated and a week after the AI hackathon in Wales she shared in the last episode, Mandy walks through the four strategic bets she is placing in her own practice and with her clients, the data behind each one, and why brand is the output of all four compounding.

Why should a CMO place a few strategic bets instead of chasing every trend?

Because flat budgets and a shifting market punish teams that spread thin, and a small number of deliberate bets concentrates resources where returns compound. Nearly 60% of CMOs say flat budgets are not enough, and the ask keeps growing anyway: more pipeline, more proof of ROI, faster AI adoption, more channels. Mandy's answer is a ritual she runs every January. She forces herself to name where her time, energy, resources, and team are placed, and whether those bets still make sense given where buyers are heading. She narrowed the list to four, chosen because each one feeds the next.

“I'd rather make intentional bets than react to whatever's loudest.”

Which marketing channels build visibility and trust at the same time?

Very few of them manage both on their own, and that is the point of the filter. Paid advertising and SEO-driven content build visibility without much trust. Email newsletters and gated white papers build trust with the people already in the room without making a brand discoverable. Meanwhile the buying process has moved out of view: 61% of it happens before a first conversation with sales, and 70% happens in channels marketing cannot track, from Slack groups and communities to AI search and peer conversations. So Mandy's filter asks one question of every channel: does this investment make us both visible and trusted at once?

“So if you're not known and trusted before the evaluation starts or even the sales process starts, you've already lost in most cases.”

Where do LLM optimization, YouTube, and LinkedIn fit in a CMO's channel bets?

They are the three channels Mandy picked because each one passes the visibility-plus-trust filter. LLM optimization comes first on the data: 89% of B2B buyers now use AI as a research tool, per Forrester, and visitors arriving from LLMs convert at 4.4 times the rate of traditional organic traffic, a sign they show up already trusting the brand. Her plan starts small, with an LLM optimization agent to get moving before she invests in dedicated resources.

Second is the YouTube-first podcast, the bet closest to home for her. Growth Activated just passed its one-year anniversary as an audio-first show, and her research kept pointing the same direction: YouTube works as a search engine and a trust builder at once, video podcasts see up to 47% higher engagement and grow two to three times faster than audio-only shows, and 51% of B2B buyers research purchases on YouTube. It is the same case Tom Hunt made in his conversation with Mandy on B2B podcast strategy, where a show becomes a pipeline engine instead of a side project. Third is LinkedIn personal branding, her top channel, where she posts consistently, engages with others, and coaches her clients' executives and sales teams to build the same presence.

Why does the human experience matter more as AI content scales?

Because every company can now produce infinite content, and the one thing that cannot be scaled or faked is being in the room with people, solving real problems together. The market is moving the same way. Small in-person events are growing 34% year over year while large events fell 12%, a shift toward more intimate, intentional gatherings.

For her clients, Mandy is going all in on small regional events, meetups, and hosted dinners that put current clients, late-stage prospects, and people who do not know the brand yet in the same room. For Growth Activated, the human bet is smaller and more personal for now: one-on-one conversations with listeners who reach out, answered individually, while a community and masterminds stay on the long-term list. She puts the stakes plainly, “as AI makes content infinite, human attention becomes finite and precious.”

What does operational readiness mean for a marketing team?

It means being prepared to launch and sustain a new system or process so it works from day one, and Mandy argues most marketing teams are missing it long before AI enters the picture. Teams buy technology without an owner, launch programs without a plan to sustain them, and then layer AI on top of workflows that were already broken, which just automates the breakage. McKinsey's research backs the diagnosis: workflow redesign is the single biggest predictor of AI success out of more than 25 attributes, and high performers are three times more likely to have redesigned workflows than to have layered AI on top of old ones.

“If you can't describe what's happening, AI cannot improve it.”

Readiness does not mean every SOP is documented before anyone touches AI. It means clarity on strategic priorities, a map of how campaigns move from strategy to execution, clean handoffs, a framework for saying no, and a team with the capacity to absorb change. It is the same pattern Nicole Leffer described in her look at what CMOs are building with AI: the leaders getting results built the operating foundation first. For her own solo practice, Mandy is documenting workflows and standard operating procedures now, so that when she expands her team, the system is ready before the hire.

Why is a CMO's own learning velocity a competitive advantage?

Because senior leadership ownership is the number one predictor of organizational AI success, a CMO's personal fluency sets the ceiling for the whole function. The numbers on moving fast are hard to ignore. Research Mandy cites shows AI-forward leaders posting 1.7 times revenue growth, 3.6 times shareholder return, and 1.6 times EBITDA margin compared with laggards, and companies most mature in AI have been growing 4.7 times faster year over year since 2022. The divide she sees forming has little to do with team size.

“It's fast teams versus slow teams. And speed without systems is chaos. And systems without speed is stagnation.”

Mandy is treating her own learning velocity as the bet, with a weekly AI learning plan, hands-on time building agents and workflows, and a guest calendar booked six weeks out with AI-forward leaders, because the people doing this work are in demand. It is the same shift Liza Adams mapped in her conversation on the mindset shifts behind CMO AI transformation: the leaders who change how they think, and how fast they learn, pull ahead of the ones who wait.

How do the four strategic bets compound as one system?

Each bet feeds the next. Channels that build visibility and trust together make a brand the pre-contact favorite. The human experience builds the deeper trust digital channels have a hard time replicating on their own. Operational readiness gives a team the foundation to execute all of it consistently without burning out, and speed compounds the advantage quarter over quarter, widening the lead the longer it runs. Mandy weighed a fifth bet on brand, because the pendulum is swinging back toward it, and decided the first two bets already build brand by design. A separate line item would add a label without adding a strategy. The through-line underneath the four is systems, and she is direct about why they matter.

“And not because systems are exciting, but because systems are what connect our bets into something that actually compounds.”

That conviction is why she is building the CMO Operating System, what she calls the operating system she wishes she had when she first stepped into the CMO seat, and why each of these bets shows up inside it as a system a marketing leader can run.

How can a marketing leader start placing her own strategic bets?

Mandy's starting point is the question she forces herself to answer every January: where are her time, energy, resources, and team placed, and do those bets still make sense given where buyers are going? From there the moves map to the four bets. She runs every channel through the visibility-plus-trust filter and cuts what passes only half the test. She picks one or two human experience formats that fit the business and does them exceptionally well. She audits operational readiness before every new AI initiative, and she puts learning time on her own calendar and treats it as a leadership investment. She is open that she does not know whether all four bets will pay off exactly as she expects, and that is her case for placing them deliberately, because a named bet can be measured and adjusted while a reactive plan never gets the chance to compound. Her invitation to fellow marketing leaders is to pressure-test these four against your own market, keep the ones that hold, and name the ones you would place instead.

Chapters & timestamps

Common questions

What separates a strategic bet from a marketing trend?

A strategic bet is a deliberate commitment of time, budget, and team energy to a place where returns compound, and it holds even when attention moves on. A trend is something a team reacts to. Mandy's filter is simple: if an investment cannot build visibility and trust together, or feed one of the other bets, it does not make the list.

Do marketing teams need every process documented before adopting AI?

No. Mandy is direct that waiting for perfect documentation is a trap, because ready never fully arrives. What a team does need is clarity about strategic priorities, how work flows from strategy to execution, and who owns each handoff. If you can describe what is happening, AI can improve it. If you cannot, it compounds the confusion.

Is an audio-only podcast still enough for B2B content?

It builds trust with the audience a show already has, and that is its limit. Apple and Spotify offer little discoverability, while YouTube works as a search engine and a trust builder at once. Video podcasts see up to 47% higher engagement and grow two to three times faster than audio-only shows, and 51% of B2B buyers research purchases on YouTube.

Are small regional events worth more than big conferences?

The momentum favors small for most teams. Intimate in-person events are growing 34% year over year while large events fell 12%, and the shift rewards meetups, regional gatherings, and hosted dinners where buyers, clients, and prospects talk with each other. The trust built in those rooms is hard to replicate through any digital channel.

Is brand worth a standalone investment right now?

Mandy weighed making brand a fifth bet and decided against it. The pendulum is swinging back toward brand, and the first two bets already build it: channels that pair visibility with trust, and human experiences that deepen it. Brand is the output of the four bets compounding, so a separate line item adds a label without adding a strategy.

About the guest

Show full transcript

Mandy Hornaday: If you've been feeling the pressure to be everywhere, do everything and somehow make it all work with the same budget and half the clarity, this episode is the conversation I wish more marketing leaders would be having out loud. Hey everyone, welcome back to Growth Activated. I'm your host, Mandy Hornaday, and today we're gonna be talking about something I do at the start of every year.

Mandy Hornaday: So each January, I force myself to answer one question honestly. Where am I placing my actual bets with my time, my energy, my resources, my team? And do those bets still make sense given where the landscape is heading?

Mandy Hornaday: And this year, that question felt more important than usual because the landscape isn't just shifting, it's splitting. The way buyers find us is changing. AI is rewriting the rules faster than most of us can keep up. Our budgets are flat and nearly 60% of CMOs say it's not enough. And yet we're being asked to do more, drive more pipeline, prove more ROI, adopt AI faster, show up on more channels.

Mandy Hornaday: So instead of adding more to the list, I did something different. I asked if I could only make four bets this year, four strategic investments of my time, energy and resources, what would they be? What are the bets where the returns compound? Where one investment feeds the next? So that's this episode, four bets, not trends, not predictions. These are the strategic decisions I'm actually making in my business in 2026 and with my clients.

Mandy Hornaday: As both a fractional CMO and someone building a coaching platform for marketing leaders. I'm going to walk you through each one, why I believe in it, the data behind it and what I'm specifically doing about it. So here's the preview. Bet one, I'm only investing in channels that pass one specific filter and I'll walk you through what it is and how I'm using it. Bet two, I'm going all in on human experiences because in the world of infinite AI content, Real connection is becoming the scarcest resource. Bet three, I'm betting that operational readiness, not AI tools, is what separates the CMOs who thrive from the ones who spin. And bet four, I'm treating my own speed of learning as a leadership advantage because the data on what happens to the leaders who move fast versus the ones who wait, the gap is bigger than I expected. And at the end, I'll share the thread that ties all four together. and why I think it's the most important strategic conversations CMOs should be having right now. Let's get into it.

Mandy Hornaday: Okay, so bet number one is something that's been on my mind for a while and that I've been sort of ideating around. And that's this idea to prioritize strategies that build both visibility and trust together in the same strategy, in the same channel. So in terms of why I feel like this matters and why it's been something that's been on my mind is Not only does it feel like we are constantly being charged to do more with less in our marketing organizations, but I'm also a fractional CMO that is a solopreneur with limited time. And so I've been really forced to focus my time and my energy and make investments in what is going to have the most compounded effect. And if those two things alone weren't enough to require my sharp focus and prioritization, which I would even argue that they are, the buyer journey has also fundamentally changed. And our marketing strategies need to catch up. So something I thought was really interesting is that 95% of winning vendors within B2B are already on the buyer's day one shortlist.

Mandy Hornaday: 80% of the deals won are the pre-contact favorite. So if you're not known and trusted before the evaluation starts or even the sales process starts, you've already lost in most cases. And that to me is fascinating. And the other thing that's just sort of another important stat to underscore that is that 61% of the buyer's journey happens before the first seller contact. And 70% happens in channels we can't even track as marketers. So think Slack groups, communities, AI search, peer conversations. And so it's more important than ever, in my opinion, that we are thinking about both visibility and trust. And of course, trust equaling brand is becoming even more important.

Mandy Hornaday: So when we take a step back and we think about, well, Mandy, aren't all strategies and channels accomplishing both visibility and trust today? And if that's something you're thinking, that's not true.

Mandy Hornaday: So when you think about some channels that might be visibility only and not necessarily establishing trust with your audience, think about paid advertising, whether it's Google search or whether it's on paid social or LinkedIn. Think about SEO driven content. So those how-to blogs and a lot of us maybe aren't doing pure SEO content anymore as we're shifting to AI search optimized content, but still. it's not necessarily content that's building trust. It's content that's built to build visibility, right? But on the flip side, when you think about channels or strategies that might only be building trust and not necessarily be building visibility, a great example of this is actually an audio only podcast, like Growth Activated. This is part of what I've been thinking about. I've learned a lot about how Apple and Spotify aren't necessarily great for searching, for searchability and discoverability, whereas YouTube accomplishes both, it's a search engine as well as building trust. Email newsletters, great at building trust, not great at building visibility, right? You could also argue that gated white papers are a great example of this because they build trust, but they're not necessarily driving a ton of visibility. It's the other channels that you are getting people to the white papers that are building the visibility.

Mandy Hornaday: So when I personally think about where I should be spending my time for not only Growth Activated and the sake of building Growth Activated, but also making sure that my clients are taking advantage of strategies that accomplish both of these, there's three things that I'm really leaning into this year. And maybe they're obvious and you are too, but maybe you haven't necessarily thought about it from the perspective of achieving both visibility and trust in the same strategy. So the first pick and certainly something that's probably on a lot of your lists is LLM optimization. So 89% of B2B buyers are now using AI as a research tool, which is three times the consumer rate. And that's according to Forrester.

Mandy Hornaday: So not only are the majority of our buyers leveraging the LLMs in some way to do their research, but LLM visitors actually convert at 4.4 times the rate of traditional organic.

Mandy Hornaday: And that's why they are more willing to convert at 400% versus organic traffic that's just searching.

Mandy Hornaday: So if you don't already have your team focused on LLM optimization, I would certainly start now. If you're like me and most of my clients have evolved their SEO resources and teams into focusing on AI search as a whole, just keep in mind that if those team members aren't upskilling and learning and in the pursuit of understanding how the LLMs optimize content because it is different than just pure SEO and even AI search. When you think about the AI search that shows up in the boxes, we've had a lot of experts come on and talk about this. We're gonna have more experts come on this year and continue talking about it as we learn more and more about the algorithm. And of course, the algorithm is constantly changing in terms of what it's prioritizing as well. You probably remember Wikipedia used to be incredibly important months ago, and now Wikipedia as a source is dropping in terms of its relevance and importance. So it is something that is constantly evolving. And what I would challenge you to think about, and what I'm challenging myself to think about is, do I have the right team in place that is on top of these changes and eager to learn and test and experiment? Or do you have someone in place that feels like they know how traditional search works and they're going to be slow to change and to adopt. So just something to think about. It's something I'm actively thinking about and pushing my teams to think about. In terms of Growth Activated, because I am not an LLM optimization expert, out of the three channels, this will probably be my third pick in terms of prioritization. And honestly, I'll build an LLM optimization agent to help get me started, since I don't necessarily want to invest in the resources yet, and will evolve into investing in resources in the upcoming year.

Mandy Hornaday: The second investment I'm going all in on within the trust and visibility bet, strategic bet, is a YouTube first podcast. And this is something that hits close to home for me.

Mandy Hornaday: So as of late, I've been doing a lot of research in terms of how some of the world-class or best-in-class podcasts grow and been consuming information and learning what I can now that we just hit the one-year anniversary of Growth Activated, which is exciting. But all of the research is pointing to YouTube as eclipsing Apple and Spotify and becoming the number one place where people listen to podcasts, which to me is really interesting. But when you pair that with the fact that YouTube is also essentially a search algorithm and therefore you're much more discoverable on YouTube, you're really not only building trust, but you have such a greater opportunity to be discoverable and searchable for new visitors.

Mandy Hornaday: And on top of that, video podcasts get up to 47% higher engagement than audio only podcasts and grow two to three times faster.

Mandy Hornaday: And if engagement alone wasn't important enough, 51% of B2B buyers are now using YouTube to research purchases and 72% say video influences their shortlist. So our buyers are actively going to YouTube. They're there. And if we're not there, not only are we losing an opportunity to build trust and credibility with them, but we're losing the opportunity to be in the conversation and to be discoverable and searchable.

Mandy Hornaday: And so if this is something that lands with you, if you've been evaluating your own content engine and are finding that maybe a blog is not enough, or maybe you don't have a content engine in place, or maybe like me, you've invested primarily in an audio first podcast, even when you think about getting your execs on other podcasts, if speaking engagements has been one of your core strategies, consider going after or prioritizing channels that invest in a video first platform like YouTube. So this is something I'm actively thinking about for my clients. I'm actually coaching a few clients right now that do have audio only podcasts. And we've really talked about shifting to video and making YouTube their primary content engine, because then of course you can distribute the content out across the audio only podcasts. Tons of podcasts do that. But it is an increased level of effort and energy to do video podcasting. So I'm not here to say that it's an easy switch, but it is one that I am personally invested in making both for Growth Activated and recommending it to my clients whenever a podcast is of interest, whenever a podcast is the right strategy for their content engine.

Mandy Hornaday: And third on this list, probably not a surprise for those of you that know me, but LinkedIn personal branding is something that I am doubling down on this year and I'm encouraging my clients to do the same. So LinkedIn, of course, is where you can find and connect with new buyers. They are able to discover you and search for you, but it also builds a ton of trust and credibility with executives. So 75% of executives explored products they weren't even considering after engaging with thought leadership on LinkedIn. And 60% are willing to pay a premium for those services because they trust them. And we've heard from a lot of different guests over the past couple of months, between Gabe Lullo and Erik from Hatch.

Mandy Hornaday: I'll link to those episodes if you want to go check them out. The power of branding on LinkedIn and how much pipeline it is driving for both of them.

Mandy Hornaday: So for me personally, this continues to be my top channel and my main channel.

Mandy Hornaday: And I'm committed to going all in with it, whether it is posting consistently, engaging with others, leveraging InMails for outreach and seeing what it truly yields with my audience.

Mandy Hornaday: Executive branding on LinkedIn is something that I talk to my clients about more often. And my teams are already actively enabling and training sales to leverage LinkedIn beyond just the messaging and Sales Navigator tools that they're used to. So we are, we are leveraging this. Of course, it depends on, how bought in the execs are around you, but I am using myself to lead by example and hopefully build and show what's possible.

Mandy Hornaday: So whether these are the right three channels or strategies for you heading into 2026, only you can answer that. But what I would encourage you to think about is looking and evaluating your strategies through this trust and visibility filter and seeing, are you going after strategies that are going to compound and work double time for you, right?

Mandy Hornaday: Are you adopting and evolving to how the buyer's journey is changing today? And are you making sure that you are in the places where your buyers are at having conversations before they've even reached out to you? So I'll leave you with that, but that is my strategic bet number one, is making sure I go all in on strategies that accomplish both visibility and trust.

Mandy Hornaday: The second bet I'm making is optimizing for the human experience. And of course, this is more important now than ever. We've been talking about this, but every company can now produce infinite content. And so what can't be scaled or faked is the experience of being in the room with people, solving real problems together. Now, as we've talked about on prior episodes, Clay is doing such a phenomenal job with this. It's really incredible.

Mandy Hornaday: But we know, I think we can collectively say as marketing leaders, that a lot of decisions and trust about our brands are being made in rooms with others. So whether it's Slack channels, events, communities, and as a result, marketing leaders are starting to invest and increase their investment in the human experience.

Mandy Hornaday: So a few things that are happening actively right now is that small in-person events are growing by 34% year over year, whereas large events are dropping by 12% year over year. So there's definitely a shift towards more intimate and intentional events and gatherings. And I believe that is driven by what our audience is looking for.

Mandy Hornaday: But in terms of ROI, companies with strong communities are growing over 200% faster and see a 46% higher lifetime value than companies without communities. So if you're interested in communities and events, definitely check out the conversation I did recently with Ridhi where we talked about whether a community-led strategy would be a right fit for you and your company. But whether it's a community or events or Slack channels, doubling down on the human experience is definitely important. And so what this looks like for me, this is really more achievable for me with my clients than it is with me personally. just my own as I'm growing the coaching side of my business as much as I would love to do some masterminds and build a membership and a community that's ultimately the goal in the long run. I just have too limited of resources to do that at the moment. But with clients, I am doubling down on this human experience and really these micro type events. And so I'm really encouraging a lot of my clients to go all in on regional events for when there is a geo-based sales setup. And so when you think regional events, I'm thinking meetups, small conferences, small gatherings, things like that. How do we not only show up and attend, but in the right places sponsor and get in front of those really targeted niche audiences? And then The other type of event we're really investing in this year is hosted events. So think dinners, fun outings, how are we bringing a mix of our current clients, or late stage prospects together with early stage prospects, or people who don't even know us yet? And how are we bringing those audiences and those peers together to have really meaningful conversations in the room and be a part of that?

Mandy Hornaday: So events is personally where I'm doubling down with my clients. And then the human experience is just something that is constantly on my mind as it relates to Growth Activated. And so even being able to do one-on-one conversations with people who message me on LinkedIn and ask to set up time and pick my brain, or responding and engaging to one-on-one emails from some of you that reach out in the community and ask me questions or let me know how you're feeling about the podcast or what you'd like to see next. I'm really trying to prioritize the human element of my persona and my brand and invest in those conversations, even if I'm not to the point yet where hosting events or masterminds feels within reach.

Mandy Hornaday: So regardless of what the right strategy is for you within building the human experience, just remember as AI makes content infinite, human attention becomes finite and precious. And so I would encourage you to pick at least one, maybe even two human experience formats that match your business and do them exceptionally well. And if you're looking for some inspiration, again, I would really recommend going to check out Clay or giving a listen to the community-led strategy episode that Ridhi and I just talked about a few weeks ago.

Mandy Hornaday: Okay, so bet number three, I am investing and doubling down on operational readiness within both the organizations and the clients that I serve as a CMO and my own business. And so if we step back and maybe if you haven't necessarily heard the term operational readiness or you've heard it but you don't necessarily know what it fully entails, operational readiness is essentially the state of being fully prepared to launch and sustain a new system, asset, or process, ensuring it can operate safely, efficiently, and effectively from day one. And so how often do we launch programs and we don't really think about the long-term impact, or we buy technology and we don't actually think about, shoot, who's going to own and manage and leverage this technology?

Mandy Hornaday: Or we invest in paid ads, but we don't actually think about A/B testing and experimenting and putting a system and a process around actually managing these tactics and these strategies and these campaigns. And so to me, I feel as though, and something I've been beating the drum about since the beginning is that most marketing teams already don't have great operating systems in place. I think it's why we're so reactive.

Mandy Hornaday: We don't necessarily all ladder up to core goals and focuses. We have a hard time prioritizing our efforts. And now we're layering AI on top of either not having existing systems and workflows or having broken systems and workflows. And we're starting to automate these broken systems and workflows. And so we're essentially just amplifying what was already broken to start with.

Mandy Hornaday: And we're actually seeing this through teams and companies who are abandoning certain AI projects and realizing that it's just harder for them to go after it than they thought. And actually Gartner predicts that 60% of AI projects will be abandoned through 2026 when unsupported by AI ready processes. And on the flip side, what McKinsey is showing is that workflow redesign is the number one predictor of AI success out of over 25 attributes. And high performers are three times more likely to have redesigned workflows versus layering AI on top. And so what I'm not saying is that we need to have every SOP perfectly documented before you try AI or having rigid processes that you can't evolve or or waiting till everything is quote unquote ready because it will never be. And I find a lot of marketing leaders fall into that trap as well is that we feel like we have to have all these things figured out before we can layer on and test with AI.

Mandy Hornaday: But what we do need to do is be very clear about our strategic priorities and goals. We do need to have really strong clarity about how work flows through your organization, even if it's imperfect. So do you know how your campaigns are moving from strategy to execution? Can you map the handoffs? Does your team have really clear roles and responsibilities and do they know how to work together?

Mandy Hornaday: Or do you constantly have bottlenecks and work getting stuck? Right? If you can't describe what's happening, AI cannot improve it. And if anything, it'll make it more confusing for your team.

Mandy Hornaday: Do you have a decision-making framework of how you prioritize new efforts? How do you say no to the organization? How does your team know what matters this quarter? So AI is totally a shiny thing. It can help us execute faster, but it cannot tell us what to execute on without strategic clarity.

Mandy Hornaday: And something else to consider in terms of operational readiness, honestly a huge factor, if not one of the biggest factors with some of the organizations I work with, is your team and your organization's capacity and ability to absorb change. So when you or your teams roll out new things, is the organization actually adopting and implementing those changes? What about your own team? Is your own team adaptable and flexible to change? Can they absorb new ways of working?

Mandy Hornaday: Are you investing? Do you have a plan to invest and help them adapt to these new ways of change? Do you have a change management program? Right? So the key thing here, I think, is that AI, as everyone knows, as so many of us who are experimenting know, it can be really powerful, but it can also make things a lot more messy. And so think about having everyone on your team experimenting with AI. They're using different documentation. They're referring to different brand standards, or maybe you don't have brand standards or a brand voice or some of this core documentation that should be keeping the output aligned and top notch, right? And so I personally think operational readiness is a huge pain point. I think this has always been a problem for a lot of marketing teams. And now with the acceleration and the adoption of AI, I just think it's getting worse. So what am I doing about it? Well, for clients, I am specifically adding and auditing operational and organizational readiness as a part of every strategy, plan, and initiative that we consider. So even just thinking about it, asking yourself those questions around is the organization or is my team ready to embrace this strategy or this tactic or this workflow? Do we have what we need in place in order for this initiative to be successful? honestly is not a question I had been asking myself with everything I was doing. And that is something I'm going to start doing with clients. And the second thing is really ensuring that change management is considered and built into every plan and roadmap.

Mandy Hornaday: In terms of Growth Activated, this is where I'm placing one of my biggest bets. It's where I'm building a product. Essentially, the big product I'm building and launching this year is a CMO operating system.

Mandy Hornaday: And I really believe that you can be a brilliant CMO, you can be a brilliant brand leader, you can be a brilliant demand gen leader. But where I see so many CMOs really struggle is that they don't have a solid operating system in which they approach their work and in which their team approaches their work. And it's the operating system I wish I had when I first stepped into the CMO seat. So this is something that I am doubling down on. product-wise and also with my clients. And the second thing I'm doing for my own business as a solopreneur is I'm documenting as many of my workflows and standard operating procedures as I can.

Mandy Hornaday: And I'm doing this with the hopes that I'll be able to expand the resources on my team at some point in the near future. And I know that before I can even outsource anything, I need to know what the proper workflow is, how it fits into the overarching strategy, what the documentation is that's going to be needed in order for a new hire or a new resource to be successful. So that's personally how I am preparing and investing in this idea of operational readiness.

Mandy Hornaday: And the fourth and last bet I'm making this year is that speed will become a leadership advantage.

Mandy Hornaday: And we're already seeing this and we all can agree that AI is speeding things up. It speeds up our work. Now the quality and the output is up for discussion. Of course, if you think about operational readiness, that's where operational readiness comes in. If you've got everything really clearly documented and outlined and you know exactly what your goals are and your priorities and you're feeding the system with the right things, it can be really powerful.

Mandy Hornaday: Regardless, the CMOs that are AI forward, that are really adopting and leveraging AI, are going to beat the rest of us who don't on speed alone. And I am doubling down personally on this bet. I think I believe this to my core. I'm starting to see it and I don't want to be left behind.

Mandy Hornaday: And the data is already proving that AI forward leaders are seeing nearly 200% revenue growth. It's 170% to be exact. They're seeing over 3.6 times shareholder return, over 1.6 times EBITDA margin versus people who are lagging on their use and leverage of AI.

Mandy Hornaday: And since 2022 through now, companies that are highly mature in how they are leveraging AI are growing 4.7 times faster year over year than the companies who are least mature in AI.

Mandy Hornaday: And to just sort of underscore this and wrap this part up, the number one predictor of organizational AI success is senior leadership ownership. So if we as the CMO aren't fluent, our organizations won't be either.

Mandy Hornaday: And so this is personal, our own learning velocity, not just our organization's adoption curve, our own learning velocity is directly impacting our organization's adoption curve to AI.

Mandy Hornaday: And so I'm personally taking this very seriously.

Mandy Hornaday: If you had a chance to listen to my AI hackathon in Wales episode last week, I would highly recommend checking it out if you haven't. But I'm diving in.

Mandy Hornaday: As someone who has leveraged AI for the last year and a half, predominantly as a strategic partner, and not much more than that, I am going all in on really trying to understand and learn and build agents and workflows and agentic teams, because I understand that that's where the best in class marketing leaders are using and tapping into AI. And so I'm building my own AI learning plan. and setting aside time each week to really focus and continue to sharpen my AI skills. I'm bringing on more AI forward guests for myself to learn from and for each of us to learn from. I've got several booked out for the next six weeks or so, and I'm really excited about who we have coming on. And I'm modeling speed for my clients.

Mandy Hornaday: And for my clients, I am tapping into what I'm learning on my own, where I can. Of course, clients have AI policies. Not every client is the same in terms of what you can or can't do, and the enterprise tools that they have available. But I am doing my best to make sure that, within my control, I am leveraging AI for CMO level activities, and showing that and bringing my team alongside of me to make sure that they know how I'm leveraging it. And so I'm already thinking about doing an episode in the upcoming weeks about some of my favorite ways I'm leveraging AI as a CMO, outside of all of the exploring and testing I'm doing for Growth Activated. And I'll make sure to bring you guys along on that journey.

Mandy Hornaday: But I think the biggest takeaway from this section is that the divide that is being created right now between teams is not big teams versus small. It's fast teams versus slow teams. And speed without systems is chaos. And systems without speed is stagnation. So really we need both. We need strategic bet number three and we need strategic bet number four and we need them working together.

Mandy Hornaday: And so this really wraps up the four major areas of strategic bets and investment I am focused on this year and doubling down on. And I'm not going to lie, I almost made a fifth bet on investing in brand as its own standalone because the data does support it. The pendulum is shifting back to brand from demand or at least getting somewhere in the middle.

Mandy Hornaday: But the reality is, is that our first two bets all point to the importance of brand. When you think about trust and credibility and making sure that we do that in tandem with visibility, that is building your brand. That is making sure you have a strong brand show up in the places and you're not just thinking about visibility. The idea of the human experience and running events or building a community or Slack channels or masterminds, that's all about building brand as well and getting in front of your audience. I didn't feel the need to call out or create a fifth just for the purpose of it. But I will share with you that we are seeing holistically that the importance of brand is making a comeback and continuing to get stronger and stronger.

Mandy Hornaday: And so as we close out this episode, I want you to step back and think about these four bets being tied into a system. They're not four separate strategies.

Mandy Hornaday: They all sync together. So while visibility and trust channels build the brand awareness that make you the pre-contact favorite, the human experience then builds the deep trust that digital channels can't replicate on their own. And operational readiness or bet three gives you the foundation to actually execute on all of this consistently with quality, without burning out yourself or your team.

Mandy Hornaday: And speed, bet number four, compounds your advantages quarter over quarter. So the faster you learn and adapt, the wider your lead amongst other teams.

Mandy Hornaday: And all of this to say, this is why I'm investing in creating the CMO operating system. And this is why I'm investing in these strategic bets with my clients. And not because systems are exciting, but because systems are what connect our bets into something that actually compounds. And so I'll be sharing more on that soon. If you're interested and I've caught your attention, please do go fill out the wait list for the CMO operating system. If you go to growthactivated.com, you'll find a tab where you can sign up.

Mandy Hornaday: And ultimately, I don't know if all four of these bets will pay off exactly how I expect, but I'd rather make intentional bets than react to whatever's loudest. And I would really encourage you to take the time to think about your own strategic bets and your own point of view for where you're doubling down on this year in order to be successful in your role and to help your business and your team be successful.

Mandy Hornaday: And with that, I'll see you next time.