I attended the Gartner Marketing Symposium in Denver, Colorado, this past week. I found it curious that none of the presentations I attended mentioned AI at all…. Just kidding. Literally EVERY session either directly focused on or at least touched upon AI and its impact on marketing and society as a whole, both negative and positive.
Here are a few takeaways from the event:
#1 AI is Moving at Lightning Speed (With Mixed Results)
Remember when we were all trying to figure out what ChatGPT was? That feels like ancient history now. Generative AI tools have become part of our daily routine, both at work and at home. The adoption rate has been faster than any tech wave we’ve seen before.
Is this rapid adoption a good thing? The answer is complicated.
On the positive side, AI is incredible at streamlining those tedious, time-consuming tasks we all dread. It’s revolutionizing how we conduct research, analyze data, and create content. Take our friends at Jasper, for example, they offer a suite of AI apps that help marketers build go-to-market assets like campaign briefs, messaging guides, ad copy, and blog posts. Tools like Jasper and others featured at the symposium are designed to eliminate the grunt work, freeing up marketers to focus on what really matters: strategic thinking and creative problem-solving.
But here’s where things get unsettling. AI has a darker, borderline-dystopian side. We’re seeing deepfakes, widespread disinformation, sophisticated cyber attacks, and a concerning trend toward over-reliance that’s eroding our critical thinking skills. During Rahaf Harfoush’s keynote, she showed a clip of Miquela, an AI-generated social media influencer promoting a rehydration powder “for the glow, yeah?” It was both fascinating and deeply unsettling.
For better or worse, AI is here to stay. 88% of business leaders now see AI, data science, or digital commerce as critical for achieving growth.
#2 Agentic AI is Going to be Everywhere
Agentic AI refers to autonomous AI systems that can make decisions and pursue complex goals with minimal supervision. Unlike generative AI, which is reactive to user prompts, agentic AI proactively adapts to changing situations and makes contextual decisions. Using technologies like natural language processing, machine learning, and reinforcement learning, it operates independently in applications such as robotics or virtual assistants.
Agentic AI is now being deployed in several ways to transform customer experiences and improve marketing productivity. Think of some of the things marketers are asked to do:
- Build awareness and generate pipeline: Agents can assist with campaign planning and creation
- Grow customer lifetime value: Agents can autonomously recommend next best action, offer, or product.
- Bring a new product to market: Agents can help by autonomously generating messaging and positioning briefs, collateral, and sales enablement content.
Many of the exhibitors were demonstrating some very cool agentic AI tools for marketers. This next wave of AI will undoubtedly create even more productivity gains for marketers.
#3 It’s Still All About the Data
Nicole Greene, one of Gartner’s AI experts, presented a session entitled “How to Develop an AI Strategy for Marketing.” In the session, she outlined the progression of AI value over the next 5 years
- AI as a Tool – Using AI to reduce the burden of manual tasks. (today)
- AI as an Agent – Using AI to support the delivery of better customer experiences. (18-36 months)
- AI as an Influencer – Enabling AI to make decisions more autonomously, requiring less human oversight. (3-5 years)
In each phase, she stressed the importance of having your data house in order. Feeding high-quality data into your AI models has the following benefits.
- Performance: Dirty data creates unreliable, inaccurate AI systems that make poor decisions.
- Legal Compliance: Data protection laws like GDPR require explicit consent for using personal data in AI training, with severe penalties for violations.
- Trust: Proper consent builds public confidence in AI systems by respecting privacy and individual autonomy.
This is why solutions like Tealium’s AIStream are critical for feeding clean, consented data into AI models to optimize their performance and value.
The Bottom Line: Embrace the Change, But Do It Right
The Gartner Marketing Symposium made one thing crystal clear: AI isn’t just transforming marketing—it’s fundamentally reshaping how we work, think, and connect with customers. From streamlining mundane tasks today to autonomous decision-making tomorrow, we’re witnessing the most significant shift in our industry’s history.
But here’s what separates the winners from the rest: it’s not about jumping on every AI trend or tool that emerges. Success comes down to building a solid foundation—clean data, clear strategy, and a commitment to doing AI right from the start. The marketers who invest in proper data infrastructure and thoughtful AI implementation today will be the ones reaping the biggest rewards as we move through Nicole Greene’s progression from AI as a tool to AI as an influencer.
The future of marketing is being written right now. The question isn’t whether you’ll use AI in your marketing—it’s whether you’ll be ready to harness its full potential when the next wave hits.
