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The Exit Five CMO Podcast (Hosted by Dave Gerhardt)Conversations about marketing and business. Author: Dave Gerhardt
Conversations about marketing and business. Hosted by Dave Gerhardt (Founder of Exit Five, Former CMO). If you work in marketing check out exitfive.com Language: en Genres: Business, Entrepreneurship, Marketing Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it |
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How CMOs Are Deploying AI Across Marketing
Episode 353
Thursday, 7 May, 2026
#353 | Tara (CMO, Optimizely), Julia (Director of AI Adoption, Optimizely), Lily (CMO, Three Play Media), Pejman (CMO, Menlo Security), and Kevin (CMO, CompTIA) join Dave for a live Exit Five session on how real marketing teams are actually using AI right now. Lily shows how she replaced two BDR headcount with a HubSpot prospecting agent and went from an 18% to 46% response rate on inbound leads. Julia walks through how Optimizely's marketing team embedded AI agents directly into their content workflow, from briefing to brand voice checking to traffic monitoring, without anyone having to leave the platform. Pejman shares the framework his team uses to map workflows and find the highest-ROI AI opportunities, plus a custom brand tone tool that turns hours of manual review into minutes. And Kevin talks through what it actually looks like to lead an AI culture change on a small team with limited resources.Timestamps(00:00) - - Intro (06:55) - - Guest intros: Tara, Julia, Lily, Pejman, and Kevin (12:04) - - Tara on why AI adoption needs an internal owner and how to govern it without squashing enthusiasm (15:02) - - Lily: why their first AI initiative failed and what they did differently (17:15) - - How Lovable kicked off team-wide AI excitement at Three Play Media (19:37) - - Lily's HubSpot prospecting agent: 18% to 46% response rate on inbound leads (23:19) - - Julia: embedding AI agents into Optimizely's content workflow (31:20) - - Using AI to monitor content performance and auto-assign optimization work (33:24) - - Pejman: mapping workflows to find the highest-ROI AI opportunities (35:55) - - Building a brand tone checker that scores and rewrites content against brand guidelines (39:55) - - Kevin: making AI a mandate on a small team and building a culture of learning (44:06) - - Group Q&A: optimizing spend vs. shipping faster, budget shifts, and new KPIs Join 50,0000 people who get Dave's Newsletter here: https://www.exitfive.com/newsletterLearn more about Exit Five's private marketing community: https://www.exitfive.com/***Brought to you by:Knak - A no-code, campaign creation platform that lets you go from idea to on-brand email and landing pages in minutes, using AI where it actually matters. Learn more at knak.com/exitfive, or check out the MCP server by clicking this link. Vector - A contact-level ads platform that lets you build audiences from actual people on your site, clicking your ads, and checking out your competitors. Learn more at vector.co, and get on the waitlist for their new MCP server by clicking here. Compound Growth Marketing - A full-funnel demand generation agency that helps high-growth cybersecurity, DevOps, and enterprise software companies drive more pipeline through AI SEO, paid media, and go-to-market engineering. Visit compoundgrowthmarketing.com and tell them Dave sent you.***Thanks to my friends at hatch.fm for producing this episode and handling all of the Exit Five podcast production.They give you unlimited podcast editing and strategy for your B2B podcast.Get unlimited podcast editing and on-demand strategy for one low monthly cost. Just upload your episode, and they take care of the rest.Visit hatch.fm to learn more
