Podcast Summary: The Agile Brand with Greg Kihlström® — Ep. 772

Guest: Elizabeth Maxson, CMO at Contentful
Date: November 21, 2025
Main Theme: AI-Augmented Human Creativity in Marketing

Episode Overview

This episode explores how artificial intelligence (AI) is changing the role of the modern marketer—not by replacing human skills, but by amplifying them. Greg Kihlström and guest Elizabeth Maxson, CMO at Contentful, discuss insights from a new study on AI’s impact on marketing, the shift towards augmented creativity, the rise of new marketing roles, and futureproofing teams and strategies in an AI-driven landscape.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Introduction & Guest Background

[02:13–03:14]

• Elizabeth Maxson outlines her career journey: Started in agency-side experience marketing, spent over a decade at Salesforce (eventually CMO of Tableau), now entering her second year as CMO of Contentful.
• Personal note: “I also like to joke that I’m a four-time mom, I have four little kiddos all under the age of eight and my family and I live in San Francisco.” (Elizabeth Maxson, [02:38])
• Contentful’s core: A digital experience platform powering apps/websites for 4,200+ brands (e.g., Heinz, KFC, Ruggable), helping them deliver personalized, scalable digital experiences.

2. Reframing AI’s Role in Marketing

[03:56–05:52]

• Rather than triggering replacement fears, AI’s greater value lies in offloading repetitive or mundane tasks—freeing marketers for creative, empathetic, and strategic functions.
• Elizabeth: “The more that AI can handle the mundane tasks that marketers don’t want to be doing, that really gives them that time back to be more human…driving creativity, empathy and even judgment.” ([04:37])
• AI delivers not just end-of-process data, but insights that inform entire campaign cycles, enhancing creativity and impact.

3. Building a Positive AI Culture

[06:24–08:40]

• Mindset shift required: AI isn’t just a tool, but a team enabler and amplifier.
• Leaders should foster an AI-first culture via:
  • Training: 45% of organizations now provide mandatory AI training. “I don’t think anyone should be using AI unless they’ve been properly trained to make sure they are doing that in a safe and ethical way.” (Elizabeth, [06:56])
  • Collaboration/Sharing: Example—Contentful’s “AI Prompt Playground” Slack channel for swapping tips, successes, and failures.
    • Memorable moment: The “NASCAR slide” (customer logos) automation story, illustrating the iterative, collaborative, and sometimes messy nature of AI adoption.

4. New and Unseen Skills for Marketers

[09:09–09:58]

• Hard Skills: Besides prompt optimization, top-ranked marketer skills include data analysis, digital experience design, and personalization.
• Soft Skills: Curiosity, empathy, cultural awareness, and a learning mindset. “Those are all skills that AI will never give you. Bringing your own human element … is really gonna be critical.” ([09:36])
• Implication: Hiring practices and team development should prioritize these traits.

5. Evidence-Based Creativity & the Full-Stack Marketer

[10:31–12:11]

• Evidence-based creativity: Marketers should leverage AI-powered data up front, informing campaign strategies rather than only using data retrospectively.
• “Leaders need to take more risks in experimentation based on data insights … having AI-driven insights at the front of everything… and allowing the humans to really bring the creativity to drive that and really differentiate yourself from this AI slop that is just happening all over the place.” (Elizabeth, [10:45])
• Example: By using web analytics, Contentful identified 23% of web visitors as logged-in customers—triggering more relevant homepage messaging.

6. AI and the (Lack of) Team Size Reduction

[14:33–15:53]

• Despite faster content creation, most companies haven't reduced headcount or dependencies—a so-called “optimization-execution gap.”
• “96% of CMOs are prioritizing AI adoption. However, only 65% are actually putting meaningful investment behind it.” (Elizabeth, [15:03])
• Key challenge: Shifting from experimentation to deeply embedding AI in operational workflows and tech stacks.

7. Evolving Team Structures & New Roles

[16:19–18:16]

• Emergence of hybrid or novel roles:
  • AI engineer: Technical integration and martech enablement.
  • Content Automation Strategist: Term coined by Sydney Sloan, CMO peer, focusing on scaling content/personalization via AI.
• Growing cross-functional collaboration—old silos between content, digital, and data roles are dissolving.
• “It’s a really exciting time to be a marketer… It’s actually new skills and new roles that are emerging across the board.” ([17:22])

8. Future-Proofing the Martech Stack

[18:19–19:49]

• CMOs gravitate toward a “sweet spot” of 6–10 tightly integrated tools.
• Recommendation: Foster a sharing culture and set explicit goals for what AI should achieve (e.g., time savings, insourcing, automation).
• Contentful’s “cloud native, API-first approach” supports extensibility and flexibility for evolving martech needs.

9. Looking to the Next Frontier: Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)

[20:02–21:09]

• Emergent Theme: The rise of “GEO”—optimizing for LLMs (large language models) as new content channels/distribution modes.
• “It’s a huge content strategy shift… a lot of marketing leaders, we’re learning what this means for our websites...It’s almost thinking about leveraging an LLM as it’s a new persona…it’s just a new way of thinking, of getting content out to AI just as you would a person.” (Elizabeth, [20:06])

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On AI Culture:
  “It really starts with driving a proper AI culture. That’s the one thing I don’t think enough leaders are talking about right now.” — Elizabeth Maxson ([06:24])

• On Human Skills:
  “AI will never give you … curiosity, empathy, cultural resonance.” — Elizabeth Maxson ([09:36])

• On Evidence-based Creativity:
  “Allowing the humans to really bring the creativity to drive that and really differentiate yourself from this AI slop that is just happening all over the place.” — Elizabeth Maxson ([10:54])

• On Futureproofing:
  “Proper goal-setting—what is the AI solving for?...There needs to be a much bigger attention around what is the goals that AI is actually trying to solve.” — Elizabeth Maxson ([18:51])

• On Generative Engine Optimization:
  “It’s a huge content strategy shift … it’s almost thinking about leveraging an LLM as it’s a new persona, it’s a new channel.” — Elizabeth Maxson ([20:12])

Timestamps for Important Segments

• [02:13] Elizabeth Maxson’s background
• [03:14] What Contentful does
• [04:37] The positive impact of AI: freeing marketers for strategic/creative work
• [06:24] Building an AI-driven culture (training, sharing, collaboration)
• [09:09] Essential new skills for marketers: hard and soft
• [10:31] Evidence-based creativity, data-driven creativity
• [14:33] The optimization-execution gap; AI’s limited impact on team size
• [16:19] New roles in marketing: AI engineer, automation strategist
• [18:19] Martech stack considerations; integration and goals
• [20:02] GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) as the next big shift
• [21:30] Elizabeth’s “five great characteristics of a marketer”
• [21:44] “Stick it, flex it, push it” content framework

Conclusion

This episode offers marketing leaders actionable insights on harnessing AI to elevate—not automate away—human creativity, empathy, and innovation. Elizabeth Maxson reveals how leadership, intentional culture-building, and a mindset shift are critical for marketing organizations to thrive amidst AI’s rapid evolution. Looking forward, staying agile, focusing on both hard and soft skills, and anticipating new paradigms like Generative Engine Optimization will define the future-ready marketer.