In our tech-powered world, know-how entrepreneurs can’t afford to lose sight of consumer belief. And but, they do. 

On this episode of the Advertising Vanguard podcast, Ariel Kelman, president and CMO of Salesforce, reveals why buyer success storytelling issues greater than ever, methods to floor AI in trusted first-party knowledge, and the important thing methods for balancing AI automation with human creativity. 

What you’ll be taught:

  • How you can floor AI brokers in buyer knowledge to drive measurable outcomes 
  • Why CMO management should pioneer AI adoption earlier than mandating it throughout groups 
  • AI’s productiveness paradox: Why it allows each extra output alongside higher work-life steadiness 
  • How you can place your model’s belief as a aggressive moat within the AI period
  • The framework for balancing centralized model technique with decentralized discipline execution  
  • Why “present, don’t inform” beats feature-focused advertising and marketing when launching complicated merchandise 

Ariel Kelman is the president and CMO of Salesforce, main world advertising and marketing technique throughout one of many enterprise software program trade’s most various and expansive product portfolios. With a background spanning product administration, startup management and tenures at AWS and Oracle, Ariel brings twenty years of experience in B2B tech advertising and marketing, buyer success positioning and AI-driven enterprise transformation. 

His work at Salesforce—from pioneering early SaaS adoption methods to spearheading the AgentForce platform launch—has formed how enterprise organizations strategy AI implementation and buyer engagement at scale, making his POV important for CMOs navigating the intersection of brand name, demand era, and synthetic intelligence.

Episode Highlights: 

[12:54] How Present, Don’t Inform Cuts By means of AI Hype — Ariel highlights that, in crowded AI markets, letting confirmed prospects inform tales is exponentially extra credible than advertising and marketing claims about platform superiority, speeds, or energy — a lesson Salesforce operationalized by way of AgentForce Metropolis at Dreamforce. Reasonably than explaining technical specs, Salesforce constructed an interactive village the place attendees walked into actual buyer implementations: Williams Sonoma utilizing AI brokers for purchasing, and so forth.

This “present, don’t inform” strategy succeeds as a result of many years of tech trade overpromising have made B2B consumers deeply skeptical; solely peer proof shifts notion and choice. This technique transforms advertising and marketing from persuasion to evidence-gathering, dramatically shortening gross sales cycles and enhancing win charges.

[21:50] Management Should Attempt AI Earlier than Anticipating Their Staff To — Ariel identifies the most important barrier to AI adoption in advertising and marketing organizations as psychological resistance to alter, not technological functionality. Assigning groups to “discover one AI effectivity initiative” fails as a result of it ignores change aversion; as an alternative, govt leaders should develop into seen pioneers, experimenting with instruments themselves and sharing outcomes transparently with their organizations.