Marketing Beyond with Alan B. Hart

What happens when a retailer builds its omnichannel marketing and retail media strategy in reverse?

In this episode, Tony Rogers, SVP and CMO at Dollar General, shares how the company took an outside-in path to omnichannel growth—building its retail media network offsite and audience-first, before launching an e-commerce business.

Tony explains how an innovative approach that integrates marketing, digital commerce and retail media can help retailers better connect customer needs, advertiser investment and enterprise priorities around shared business goals. He notes how that thinking can also enable teams to respond more quickly to advertiser feedback and advance technology priorities.

He emphasizes that challenging conventional assumptions about how retail media networks should be built can drive incremental reach, business growth and customer loyalty. For marketing and retail leaders, this episode offers a practical case study in rethinking the usual playbook: starting with audience and purpose, organizing around the customer journey, and harnessing the powerful collaboration of marketing and retail media to enable channel growth and deepen loyalty.

In this episode, you'll hear:

How uniting marketing, digital, and retail media can accelerate decisions and align teams around the customer

The value of an offsite-first marketing approach to capture incremental reach and strengthen customer loyalty

Strategies for integrating app, website and delivery experiences that can turn retail media into a growth engine

Key highlights:

[00:38] Introduction

[01:55] A recent golfing snafu

[03:05] Tony's path to Dollar General

[07:50] Dollar General's delivery launch

[10:55] Scaling e-commerce operations

[13:25] A different kind of retail media network

[16:45] Past experience that defines you: An impactful family funeral

[19:10] Advice to your younger self: Do less people-pleasing

[21:00] A topic you're trying to learn more about: AI-driven personalization

[24:11] Latest curiosities: Overcoming divisiveness

[26:33] Largest potential threat: Only focusing on marketing in the short-term

[28:30] What AI cannot do: Human empathy

Resources mentioned:

Dollar General

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What separates a good idea from good creative work?

For Jo Shoesmith, chief creative officer at Amazon, it's curiosity—the willingness to look again, to find the idea within the idea and recognize potential hiding in plain sight.

In this episode, Jo draws on her agency experience and her current role leading Amazon's creative organization to explain how leaders can operate as both builders and curators—building systems that can help a global brand move with speed and continuity, then applying judgment and taste to determine which ideas best represent the brand and which stories are worth telling. This balance can give teams room to experiment while preserving brand continuity.

Jo's instinct to look past the obvious and find what resonates comes through in her work on Amazon's iconic 2023 "Joy Ride" advertisement. Her team recognized genuine chemistry among its three stars and trusted their unscripted joy to carry a story with no spoken dialogue. The result was a simple, emotionally resonant portrayal of friendship and aging that connected with people far beyond its intended audience.

To help bring other great ideas to life, AI can help curious creatives remove friction, but acting on every idea isn't the goal. Human judgment and taste still determine which ideas to pursue, and which will resonate.

For creative and marketing leaders, Jo's lesson is clear: Curiosity is key to identifying an idea's potential, building systems that help it grow and knowing when it is right for the brand. As AI makes it possible to explore and execute more possibilities, those human capabilities become even more important.

In this episode, you'll hear:

How curiosity can help creative leaders recognize potential and build on areas others might overlook

Ways marketing teams can use AI to expand creative possibilities without replacing human judgment and taste

Strategies to build and curate brands that move fast, feel human and make a lasting emotional impact

Key highlights:

[00:20] Introduction

[01:50] Growing up in rural Australia

[03:00] Jo's path to Amazon

[06:30] The scope of the CCO role at Amazon

[07:35] Being both a builder and a curator

[09:25] Embracing AI as a creative

[12:50] Making Amazon's iconic 2023 "Joy Ride" ad

[15:35] Past experience that defines you: Growing up with a strong single mother

[16:50] Advice to your younger self: Become a builder

[18:05] A topic you're trying to learn more about: Role expansion to media and production

[18:40] Latest curiosities: Identifying small, simple ideas for new creations

[19:35] Largest potential opportunity: Everyone is a business owner

[20:50] What AI cannot replicate: Strong internal company culture

Resources mentioned:

Amazon

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How can brands preserve what sets them apart as AI transformation brings more speed and scale to marketing content production, The answer starts with smart parameters and guardrails that keep human insight and creativity at the center.

In this episode, Meghan Gendelman, chief marketing officer (CMO) of business-to-business (B2B) at Canva, explores how marketing teams can use AI while prioritizing and protecting what technology cannot create: authenticity. Human marketers bring a genuine understanding of what their customers know, feel and believe about a brand. Meghan emphasizes that by first establishing clear, human-led guardrails and parameters such as brand systems, kits and templates, teams can harness AI more effectively to deploy creative, engaging marketing content at scale.

Meghan further shares how Canva's B2B offerings help businesses put this authenticity-first approach into practice. By making it easier to adapt, localize and customize content at scale, Canva allows marketing teams more freedom to focus on customer relevance and brand expression. Meghan also discusses how leaders can help teams adapt as AI changes marketing work by:

• Challenging existing processes and rethinking how work gets done

• Testing new possibilities with a beginner's mindset

• Turning innovative ideas into action with practical boundaries

By balancing freedom and discipline when using AI, your brand can stay authentic while meeting growing content demands.

How can a brand stay distinctive globally, while earning relevance in each individual market it serves?

Consistency is only part of the challenge. Because local presence shapes global perception, brands should strive to understand local customers, respond to market conditions and provide value to communities.

In this episode, Mastercard's Rustom Dastoor, executive vice president and head of marketing and communications for the Americas, draws on his experiences marketing across four continents to explore what it takes to build and sustain a global brand.

He explains why the strongest global brands don't simply operate in local markets—they invest in them. By using local insight to inform decisions, collaborating with regional ecosystems and investing in talent, brands can contribute to communities, rather than extract from them, to demonstrate their distinct values.

Rustom also offers behind-the-scenes insights into what has kept Mastercard's "Priceless" campaign relevant worldwide for nearly 30 years: He believes in maintaining the universal insight—"there are some things in life money can't buy"—while adapting how it shows up across markets, cultures, channels and more. In other words, "Priceless" stays timeless by refusing to stand still.

For marketing leaders, this conversation offers a valuable perspective on earning local relevance and strengthening global distinction.

In this episode, you'll hear:

Strategies for deploying brand experiences that can flex across countries and cultures

How to keep a long-running campaign fresh without losing its core value

Ways marketing can turn customer understanding into better business choices, from offerings to pricing

Key highlights:

[00:30] Introduction

[01:30] A pit stop in Zurich

[02:30] Rustom's path to Mastercard

[04:00] Marketing on multiple continents

[06:00] Driving B2B2C excellence at Mastercard

[08:00] The evolution of global brands

[09:45] Mastercard's iconic "Priceless" campaign

[10:55] Strategies for successful localization

[14:50] Past experience that defines you: Living across multiple cultures

[16:20] Advice to your younger self: Release control

[17:20] A topic you're trying to learn more about: Squash and swimming

[18:05] Latest curiosities: Humanity's perseverance

[19:10] Largest potential opportunity: AI's impact on marketing

[20:40] What AI cannot do: The value and impact of people

Resources mentioned:

Mastercard

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How can marketing leaders balance rapid change, emerging technology and brand purpose to drive lasting growth and loyalty across a portfolio of iconic brands?

Anton Vincent, president of Mars Snacking North America & Global Ice Cream, shares what it looks like to lead with purpose across a suite of powerhouse brands spanning confections, pet care and food. He discusses how Mars balances ambitious growth with a real commitment to responsibility, ensuring that business success and positive societal impact go hand in hand. Anton also underscores the strategic value of developing talent and enabling people to move across different business areas to encourage agility and fresh thinking.

He shares why creativity remains essential for brands—especially as technology and analytics redefine what's possible—and highlights the discipline required to uphold quality and brand integrity in a crowded, fast-moving marketplace. Throughout the conversation, Anton stresses that enduring relevance and brand loyalty come from continuous learning and a clear understanding of both consumers and culture.

In this episode, you'll learn:

Why centering business growth with real purpose can create a lasting impact at scale

How ideas supported by data and fueled by originality can capture and hold people's attention in today's crowded market

Ways to build agile teams and nurture authentic brands to stay relevant in a constantly changing world

Key highlights:

[00:00] Introduction

[01:30] Basketball talk

[04:30] Anton's path to Mars

[08:00] The scope of Mars

[10:20] Alan's love to Hubba Bubba

[12:20] Scale versus independence of brands

[14:05] The Mars talent strategy

[15:40] Navigating the evolving marketing ecosystem

[18:20] Marketing that adapts to change

[20:30] Notable recent work

[22:05] An experience that defines you: Top Secret Popcorn recall

[26:00] Advice to your younger self: Slow down

[28:30] A topic marketers need to learn more about: Connecting creativity with technology

[33:45] Largest opportunity or threat to marketers today: Constant learning

Resources mentioned:

Mars Snacking

SNICKERS NFL Bedtime with Josh Allen

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How can a well-known B2B brand move beyond what customers think they already know?

In this episode, Kimberly Storin, CMO of Zoom, explains how marketing teams can shift brand perceptions and influence B2B buyer journeys by bringing together brand marketing, demand generation, content, and customer advocacy.

Brand perception takes shape differently today. As more buyers begin their brand research using AI tools and zero-click search, buyers often form preferences and decisions before they ever engage with a brand directly. Marketers today may see only a small portion of the buyer journey and not know when they're under consideration.

For Kimberly, this means brands need to do more than generate awareness and demand: They need to shape how buyers understand the brand, what it offers and where it can create value. As she puts it, "brand equals demand."

Marketers can accomplish this by building trust, showing up in the right places, and answering buyers' questions in the less visible stages of decision-making through efforts such as answer engine optimization (AEO). Kimberly further explores how AI-driven discovery creates distinct purchasing paths for human buyers and AI agents—paths that require different content and experiences designed for each.

This episode offers a practical perspective on how marketers can reshape perception, stay relevant across an increasingly fragmented journey, and connect brand building to business growth—even when buyers form opinions before the brand knows they are in the market.

In this episode, you'll hear:

Strategies to connect brand building with demand generation, so marketing efforts shifts perception and drive action

Why answering buyer questions before sales teams enter the conversation is now a core B2B journey expectation

Ways to widen marketing's view of the buyer journey and shift investment towards what works better

Key highlights:

[00:00] Introduction

[01:05] Growing up with chief financial officer (CFO) and designer parents

[02:15] Kim's path to Zoom

[03:35] Bringing marketing and communications together

[06:40] Keeping up with an evolving buyer journey

[07:30] Why brand equals demand

[10:10] Zoom Ahead's campaign strategy

[13:10] Past experience that defines you: Powerful mentorship

[15:35] Advice to your younger self: Prioritize sleep for health

[16:00] A topic you're trying to learn more about: Pilates

[16:45] Latest curiosities: Balancing AI and human connection

[18:40] Largest potential threat: Inability to pivot as search habits change

Resources mentioned:

Zoom

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The hardest part of marketing today may not be demonstrating value or creating more ideas. It may be knowing which activities deserve your attention.

As Khurrum Malik, VP of business and product marketing at Walmart Connect, explains: more tools, channels, media types and AI capabilities can lead to overemphasizing activity. When teams confuse activity with progress, it's difficult to stay focused on what drives impact.

In this episode, Khurrum shows how the strongest marketing organizations stay focused on what matters: connecting creativity to commerce, creating demand through brand storytelling, capturing it through search and commerce, and proving incremental impact. He also makes the case that customer experience should remain at the center of that work, emphasizing that—as AI changes how marketers operate—trust, human judgment and accountability still matter.

The episode is especially relevant for marketing leaders who want to cut through complexity, keep teams aligned on impact, and lead with transparency and experimentation while fueling durable growth.

In this episode, you'll hear:

Strategies to connect brand storytelling with search and commerce to drive demand

How to keep teams focused on priorities that drive growth

Why leading through change depends on building trust and accountability

Key highlights:

[00:00] Introduction

[01:10] Using AI at home

[02:30] Khurrum's path to Walmart Connect

[04:40] Walmart Connect's scope

[06:25] How advertising platforms are evolving

[12:55] Three core principles of success

[15:00] What's next for Walmart Connect

[17:40] Past experience that defines you: Moving a lot as a child

[18:30] Advice to your younger self: Adopt an editorial mindset

[20:25] A topic you're trying to learn more about: Delivering value across the C-suite

[21:40] Latest curiosities: Balancing AI and human creativity

[23:15] Largest potential threat: Inability to focus as channels expand

Resources mentioned:

Walmart Connect

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Fandom is evolving from passive consumption to active participation, creating new opportunities for brands to connect with consumers in authentic ways.

In this episode, Andrea Hopelain, GM and senior vice president of global marketing at Electronic Arts (EA), shares how brands can leverage fandom by showing up where today's consumers are already creating, connecting, and building community. She explains what marketers can learn from this model and how they can take advantage of this space.

While Andrea believes brand reach still matters, she says meeting consumers in participatory spaces can take the connection to the next level. The conversation also explores how marketing teams can harness live signals, audience behavior, and social interaction insights to create fan experiences that feel more personalized, culturally grounded, and natural to the people they want to reach. Andrea says the biggest opportunities come from building with audiences, not just broadcasting to them.

Key highlights:

[00:00] Introduction

[01:20] Leadership lessons learned on the soccer pitch

[02:30] Andrea's path to EA

[04:45] The evolution of fandom

[07:05] Brand marketing opportunities in fandoms

[08:45] EA as a platform

[10:20] Live data integration in gaming

[11:45] Past experience that defines you: Moving a lot as a child

[12:50] Advice to your younger self: Understand the bottom line

[14:50] A topic you're trying to learn more about: Nurturing plants

[15:45] Latest curiosities: Balancing AI and human judgment

[17:10] Largest potential opportunity: Community and belonging

Resources mentioned:

EA

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How are the expectations for CMOs evolving?

In this episode, Richard Sanderson, Spencer Stuart's marketing, sales & communications officer practice leader, returns to the podcast to discuss how CMOs and other marketing leaders can address the growing pressure from boards and CEOs to demonstrate clearer business impact.

Richard breaks down the competing forces that are shaping and amplifying that pressure:

• The expectation to connect their work more directly to enterprise value

• The need to align structure, scope and skills to specific business challenges

• And the expectation to deliver growth, efficiency, brand, trust, and customer experience.

He dives deeper to discuss how AI is reshaping the marketing function—especially in larger companies, where executives and stakeholders are growing impatient to see experimentation turned into measurable results. Richard provides experience-based recommendations for how CMOs can harness AI for a positive impact on both their department's efficacy and the customer experiences they deliver.

Richard also reveals the qualities he sees that set stronger marketing leaders apart, including an enterprise-wide perspective, close collaboration with CFOs and hands-on AI literacy. This episode offers practical strategies to help marketing leaders navigate and satisfy these changing expectations.

In this episode, you'll hear:

How CMOs can tie marketing more directly to enterprise value

Why marketing teams may want to embrace AI-driven change at the infrastructure level

What sets CMOs apart in a rapidly changing business landscape

Key highlights:

[00:00] Introduction

[02:00] Turning 50

[03:40] Today's C-suite hiring trends

[05:05] What CEOs look for in a CMO

[07:15] Balancing growth and efficiency, with AI

[15:50] How a CMO's scope has changed

[21:05] Chief marketing officer, or chief customer officer?

[25:10] What separates a thriving CMO from a struggling CMO

[28:45] Leading while being a teammate

[29:10] What CMOs need to study right now: Organizational design

[31:15] How CMOs can tackle AI-driven change

[34:20] Largest potential opportunity for CMOs: Embracing transformation

Resources mentioned:

Spencer Stuart

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How can you deploy an end-to-end CRM strategy that keeps pace with complex, evolving customer journeys?

In this episode, Ford Motor Company Consumer CRM Lead Kim Reedy explains why she views CRM as an end-to-end capability that connects a businesses' strategy, creative, execution, analytics and internal stakeholders. Kim reflects on her path from marketing to agency work and then to the client side, and how those experiences shaped her strategic approach to automotive CRM transformation: Start by tackling smaller, specific opportunities to improve dynamic elements of the customer journey, rather than trying to overhaul everything at once.

Kim discusses her view of AI as a practical assistant for targeting, timing and creative scale, while emphasizing the need for ongoing human oversight and talent upskilling. Her key insight for marketers: When teams align the right data, process, technology and operating model around a clear business objective, they can create more relevant, impactful customer experiences, even in a market where loyalty is under pressure.

In this episode, you'll hear:

How deeply intentional, collaborative, end-to-end CRM transformation can have a big impact

Why customer engagement journeys are no longer linear, and how marketing can adapt

Ways AI can help marketing teams target better, move faster and scale personalized content, but only when the right people and processes are in place

Key highlights:

[00:00] Introduction

[01:15] Being a dance mom

[02:45] Kim's path to Ford

[04:10] Moving from agency side to client side

[05:00] What CRM at Ford looks like

[07:00] Automotive CRM transformations over the years

[11:00] The evolving impact of AI

[13:25] Keeping humans at the helm

[16:50] A shift in the loyalty paradigm

[22:00] Advice to your younger self: Do things that are uncomfortable

[22:50] A topic you're trying to learn more about: Automating daily tasks

[24:45] Latest curiosities: AI and creativity

[28:20] Largest potential opportunity: Rethinking organizational processes

Resources mentioned:

Ford

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