Ad Age Marketer's Brief

Replacing a campaign that's still driving sales can feel like the bold move, but evolving it is often the harder job. Drew Panayiotou, chief marketing and innovation officer at Keurig Dr Pepper, inherited Fansville, Dr Pepper's long-running college football ad series, and kept it going by changing the storytelling around the idea rather than the idea itself. He explains how new characters, personalization and fan data from media partner Disney keep it fresh each season.

He also says what would make him retire it. Dr Pepper has always ranked first for relevance among college football brands in a Disney survey, he says, and a slide to fifth through eighth would tell him something is wrong. Panayiotou also explains why he backed featuring Lane Kiffin in this season's ads despite questions inside the company, and why he treats creative risk as part of the job.

Dig deeper:

~Dr Pepper's college football marketing playbook includes mixed reality, AI and Pat McAfee

~Dr Pepper turns viral creator TikTok jingle into a CFP National Championship ad—behind the strategy

~How 20 years of Dove's Campaign for Real Beauty have changed marketing

~Inside McDonald's global marketing playbook—how CMO Morgan Flatley is scaling 'fan truths'

~MasterCard CMO: How We Keep 'Priceless' Fresh After 17 Years

Saying yes to a content idea that looks nothing like what your audience expects from you is a risk. About 95% of what the Chicago Cubs make is about baseball, so a scripted TikTok romance series in the style of a microdrama (short, cliffhanger-driven vertical video) was a long way from the usual feed.

Jen Martindale, the Cubs' executive VP of marketing and communications, says she weighed three things before approving it: how it would land with core fans, what it would cost and how fast the team could move. She explains why she saw her job as giving the approval and then getting out of the way, how the team rooted the story in the Wrigley Field tradition of fans meeting their partners in the bleachers and how it worked with TikTok on targeting so the series reached the audience it was built for.

The 17-episode series, produced largely in-house on what she calls a shoestring budget, drew about 7 million views. Roughly 70% came from women ages 18 to 34, and more than 70% of viewers weren't already following the Cubs. Martindale also explains why the team has no long-term ambition to become a microdrama studio and what she'd tell marketers weighing their first content series.

Dig deeper:

~How to build a branded microdrama—the CMO playbook from Marc Jacobs, Crocs and more

~How microdramas are influencing ad strategy—media lessons marketers should know

~NHL's failed romance campaign shows sports marketers the dangers of misreading fan culture

~Inside the ad model behind Issa Rae's microdramas—and why Poppi and Sol de Janeiro are buying in

Marketers who want to move at the speed of culture still need a reason for customers to show up and come back. Jesse Johnson, VP of marketing at Chili's Grill & Bar, explains why the casual dining chain got away from limited-time offers and built around a single value offer customers can count on. The "3 For Me" has run for nearly four years amid steady same-store sales growth.

Johnson says the approach lets marketers do more with less and spares restaurants constant change. He describes a rotation in which the value offer gets people in and the restaurant experience brings them back. That dependable baseline gave his team room for bigger creative swings, which he credits to pairing the offer with fixing the restaurant experience. Those are the "hard yards" Johnson says a lot of brands skip. His bar for a culture-led idea is whether it gets customers to come in and make their own content.

Johnson also explains why traffic is the measure he trusts over sales, how positive buzz among Gen Z tracked with the chain's sales peak and what he'd tell marketers who are tired of talking about value.

Dig deeper:

~Chili's is a beacon of creativity with results to prove it

~How George Felix became Chili's 'turnaround king'

~CMO turnover in the restaurant industry—why marketing leaders are under pressure

~Inside fast food's big bet on experimental restaurant concepts

An initial public offering (IPO) moves fast, and much of it is handled by bankers, lawyers and others who do it for a living. For Erika White, chief marketing officer at Navan, the risk for a CMO is getting so caught up in the checklist that marketing misses its chance to make the moment count. Having been through IPOs at Affirm and Navan, she uses the moment to set the company apart, treating it as a signal of staying power to enterprise customers, who buy on reputation. White explains why she expects every marketer to know the business metrics in the company's S-1 filing and earnings reports, and why any marketing activity that can't be tied to one of them needs a conversation. She also discusses why a public company's marketing team needs both early employees who believed in the mission and people who have operated at scale, and why close partnership with the founder matters when positioning is effectively "on file forever." Plus, how she defends experimentation once budgets face more scrutiny and her advice for CMOs heading toward an IPO: learn the company's story and love it, because they'll be telling it a lot.

Dig deeper:

~The strategic branding lesson hidden inside SpaceX's IPO

~Performance marketing vs. brand-building—how the best brands weave them together

~The Ad Age CMO Survival Guide

Companies facing a major technology shift don't need to be scared into it or buried in product specs, says Ada Agrait, SAP's global chief marketing officer. They need a partner that will see them through the transformation. And even when a sale runs through a buying committee, marketers are still selling to people. Agrait says SAP's own customers have moved past fear about AI and are asking which partners can help them transform, and she explains how that insight shaped SAP's recent campaigns with BBDO New York.

She also breaks down how SAP is adapting to AI-driven search. That includes answer engine optimization (AEO), generative engine optimization (GEO), Google AI Overviews and AI Mode, and a pilot of advertising in ChatGPT. For CMOs who feel out of their depth on AI, her advice starts with the data layer. Of roughly 100 AI pilots SAP's marketing team has run, about 40 have worked.

Agrait also explains why mid-size companies want enterprise-grade solutions and why SAP's 50-plus years of running finance, HR and supply chain processes is an asset rather than baggage. Drawing on 17 years at Microsoft, she shares how she brought a consumer marketing mindset to business-to-business marketing, including humor, clear value propositions and treating customers like humans.

Dig deeper:

~How CMOs are building AI-ready teams without burning out Gen Z

~How CMOs should navigate AI opportunities and risks

~Raja Rajamannar on why CMOs must become enterprise growth leaders

~Meet 13 B2B creators brands are betting on in 2026

~7 standout B2B campaigns from 2025 that prove the space doesn't have to be stodgy

Firehouse Subs is the fourth-largest sub chain in North America, competing against rivals with bigger media budgets and a larger share of voice. Its guests visit for occasions rather than out of habit, anywhere from once a month to three times a year. For Carolina Berti, chief marketing officer for the U.S. and Canada, growth means more visits, not bigger checks.

Berti explains how the 1,500-unit chain pairs linear TV for awareness in newer markets with a heavier bet on social media. Its core guests are families and sports fans 35 and older, but Gen Z already makes up about 9% of customers, a share she wants to grow. As Firehouse plans to add more than 100 stores a year, local marketing teams work with franchisees to build demand before each opening. She also describes drawing on the media, technology and purchasing scale of parent company Restaurant Brands International while resisting a one-size-fits-all corporate playbook.

Berti discusses why Firehouse picked Camp+King as its new creative agency and how its first national partnership, with Major League Baseball, combines national awareness with a youth program that brings the brand into local communities. She also shares how revamping the steak and cheese melt brought guests back more often and why a firefighter heritage, backed by more than $112 million in foundation donations to first responders, gives Firehouse something bigger rivals can't copy.

Ally Financial underwent a major reorganization in the last year to support its strategic pivot toward positioning the consumer bank as an everyday banking brand, while also speeding up decision-making and reducing unnecessary processes. Chief Marketing and PR Officer Andrea Brimmer breaks down the overhaul, which was designed to embed AI use across the organization. The Detroit-based company aims to use the tool not just for efficiency, but as a fundamental consideration in how consumers discover and interact with the brand.

The resulting structure brings together teams spanning brand, data and analytics, go-to-market and media, design and digital ecosystems and communications and CMO operations, giving marketing oversight of the customer journey and making Brimmer solely responsible for any issues.

She discusses the dynamics of the new structure and what it means for Ally customers, and also talks about the evolving nature of the CMO role and where it is expected to go in the future.

Dig deeper

How CMOs should navigate AI opportunities and risks

How CMOs can become CEOs—advice for those seeking the top C-suite job

Ally Financial looks to add an agency to its roster

Coterie has surpassed $200 million in annual sales while taking a deliberately selective approach to growth. The baby care brand has expanded beyond its direct-to-consumer roots into retailers including Whole Foods Market and Wegmans, while treating store shelves as marketing opportunities—what Lindsey Kling calls a "giant billboard." Kling says 43% of Coterie's new customers now come through word of mouth.

Kling, Coterie's senior VP of brand marketing, partnerships and business development and one of Ad Age's 2026 Mid Size Brand Leaders, joins the Marketer's Brief podcast to share lessons from Coterie's growth. She discusses why "more is not more" when expanding into new categories, how the brand balances measurable returns with longer-term brand building, and how Coterie is trying to preserve its agility after being acquired by Mammoth Brands.

Dig deeper:

Lindsey Kling leads DTC babycare brand Coterie's charge into retail

Introducing the 2026 Ad Age Mid Size Brand Leaders

Why CMOs need a system for continuous self-improvement—and how to build one

Brands struggle with purchase consideration amid economic pressures

Most marketing leaders get involved after a product is built. SharkNinja Chief Brand and Experience Officer Michelle Crossan-Matos says her role exists because that's too late—she now oversees creative, marketing and customer experience under one roof, with her team co-creating alongside engineers and product teams from the earliest stages of development.

The reasoning is growth, not just structure: Crossan-Matos says double-digit quarterly growth only comes from focusing on the full consumer experience, which is why one person now owns every touch point rather than splitting it across departments. Crossan-Matos also details the AI Jailbreak Hack Week that produced an internally built tool for predicting which product features will drive sales and five-star ratings—part of how her team stays involved upstream in product development, not just downstream in marketing it.

Dig deeper

~How SharkNinja became a viral marketing machine—and what new hires from Ikea and Ulta Beauty signify

~How Claire's reorganized to meet Gen Alpha demand—starting with squishy hunting for viral NeeDohs

~Raja Rajamannar on why CMOs must become enterprise growth leaders

~The Ad Age CMO Survival Guide

~What CMOs should do in their first 100 days on the job

Saint James Tea Co-Founder and CEO Brad Neumann says a single packaging switch—from cardboard cartons to resealable aluminum bottles—nearly tripled the three-year-old, better-for-you iced tea brand's sales velocity overnight. The bigger signal: Saint James sits in less than 17% of possible retail doors, yet has ranked as the country's fastest-growing iced tea brand in every four-week SPINS reporting period for almost two years.

Why the switch worked: it solved a consumer complaint (the old packaging didn't keep tea cold), and opened channels, including convenience stores, that the old packaging couldn't reach.

The bigger philosophy: build the brand first and let distribution follow. "Our strategy from day one has always been: focus on the brand. Distribution and sales will come," Neumann says. He also details how Saint James uses Costco to drive volume in-store while boosting sales in other retail channels, discusses high-profile brand collaborations including "The White Lotus" and Juicy Couture, and explains how the brand's growing in-house marketing team is helping it compete against much larger companies.

Dig deeper

~5 food and beverage marketing trends to watch in 2026

~ Why the drinks people carry matter more to marketers now

~How this protein soda is marketing to everyday consumers in the GLP-1 era

~How Coca-Cola interns started Sprite + Tea, a new TikTok-friendly variety

~Honest Tea founder on what its shutdown means for purpose-based brands