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The bottleneck in content operations isn’t content creation. Research from the latest MarTech Intelligence Report on DAM platforms found that as asset volume, personalization demands, and channel complexity continue to climb, the chokepoint is likely in the systems required to manage, adapt, and distribute content at scale. Let’s start with content volume, because it’s at the root …

Read more “Can DAMs keep up as content demands outgrow workflows?”

Marketing operations teams have long carried the weight of the tech stack, keeping systems running and data flowing behind the scenes. But the reality of modern MOps is that “maintenance mode” often consumes the bandwidth needed for strategic contribution. At the May 6th MarTech Conference, the session “The art of doing more with less: The …

Read more “The art of doing more with less: The new marketing operations stack”

I went to a developer conference and, by accident, learned something profound about human nature. It started innocently enough — the “All Things AI Conference” in Durham, NC, had a title too good to pass up.  What I didn’t expect was to be the only marketer among 2,500 developers, nodding along as whurly (yes, that’s …

Read more “Why we trust AI when it makes things up”

Many marketing automation systems have grown from useful tools, designed for easy scaling, into something difficult to maintain or trust. When that happens, stack performance begins to suffer. The solution is a more systematic approach to building workflows and campaigns. Clogged with a jumble of workflows and drafted, but never published emails, the automation environment …

Read more “Your marketing automation isn’t broken, it’s overloaded”

Marketers were among the first professionals to genuinely embrace generative AI. We opened ChatGPT, typed something, and got a result that was kind of amazing. We were among the first to have AI “wow” moments, and started weaving LLMs into our days. By most measures, marketing led the early adoption curve. And then, somewhere along …

Read more “AI moved forward, marketing did not”

SailPoint’s AI agent research found that 80% of organizations report their AI agents took unintended actions. Only 44% have formal governance policies in place. That 36-point gap is not a bug. It is the default operating state of most AI deployments right now. And the fix most teams reach for first makes it worse. Why …

Read more “Delegated authority is the missing layer in the AI martech stack”

Are your team’s high performers disengaged? It could be burnout. But it could also be bore-out. Unlike burnout, which happens when people are over-worked, bore-out is caused by the boring, repetitive tasks that sap purpose and meaning from the work people do.  AI could actually help with both of these issues, for teams that play …

Read more “How to focus marketing on high-impact work”

Salesforce today launched Agentforce Operations, designed to automate back-office processes using AI agents across systems such as email, ERP, and collaboration tools. The release targets a familiar problem. Companies have modernized customer-facing experiences, but those gains often stall when they hit slow, manual processes behind the scenes. Agentforce Operations is supposed to remove that friction. …

Read more “Salesforce launches Agentforce Operations to automate back-office work”

The buy and vibe code approach is generating a lot of buzz. But this strategy raises significant concerns around who’s accountable for maintaining platforms modified via vibe coding.  As software companies consider how to respond to this approach, they should look to proven models. Analyzing how popular open-source communities operate may offer a perspective on …

Read more “What vibe coding misses and what open source gets right”

We’re primed to spot problems and fix them, but we sometimes forget to see what’s going right. Take this example: I watched Janeen propose a new operational process to the marketing leadership team. I was impressed by her clarity, persuasiveness, and how she demonstrated value. Her proposal was unanimously accepted. Afterward, I asked her how …

Read more “Things are not as bad as you think in marketing”