Why marketing leaders must build AI-literate teams
Our Chief Revenue Officer, Erin Mastel attended the ANA Measurement & Analytics Conference in Chicago. She shares her thoughts on the key insights from the event, and why now is a critical point for marketing leaders to be building teams proficient in AI.
As everyone in marketing is acutely aware, the marketing landscape is experiencing a seismic shift. When in attendance at the recent ANA conference one message came through loud and clear: we are moving from an era of dashboards to an age of intelligent decision-making.
For forward-thinking leaders, this transition presents both an opportunity and an urgent mandate that the time to build AI-literate teams is now.
Marketing Analytics Has Reached an Inflection Point
As Andy Hasselwander, Chief Analytics Officer at Marketbridge noted, quality analytics must be truth-seeking, challenging assumptions rather than validating them. AI is becoming the catalyst that makes this possible. It is democratizing analytics in the same way Excel did to finance.
AI is not a future possibility; it is already reshaping how marketers operate. Consider the groundbreaking work highlighted by Nielsen and Realeyes, where AI predicts sales based on emotional response data. This is not just technology at work. It is a reimagining of how we understand and connect with customers.
The New Marketing DNA
The ANA conference underscored a critical shift: the emergence of a new kind of marketer. Tomorrow’s talent must be part strategist, part analyst, part storyteller, and part AI-native operator. These professionals do not just consume reports. They collaborate with AI to generate insights, forecast outcomes, and make empathy-driven decisions.
Several forces make AI literacy an immediate strategic priority:
AI enables faster yet more rigorous modeling and scenario planning, driving competitive advantage.
Will Post of Measured reminded us of Dan Pink’s famous words: “There is a great mismatch between what science knows and what business does.” AI-literate teams close that gap.
Embedding AI fluency across teams removes bottlenecks, accelerates decision-making, and keeps insights close to the customer.
The Talent Challenge
At the heart of AI-literate teams, the real differentiator will not be AI tools, it will be talent. Organizations need people who can blend technical fluency with creativity and empathy. These are professionals who understand not just how to operate AI tools, but how to apply them to ensure results or outcomes are still people-centred.
Marketing leaders should look to implement the following:
Seeking candidates who demonstrate comfort with AI tools and data-driven thinking.
Investing in AI training to augment existing expertise.
Creating hybrid structures with embedded, AI-literate practitioners across marketing.
Fostering experimentation and encouraging teams to explore AI applications in their current roles.
The organizations that will win in the next decade will not simply be those with the most advanced AI technology. They will be those with the most AI-literate teams.
The transformation from dashboards to decisions, from data to empathy, requires human intelligence supported by artificial intelligence. Leaders who act now in building AI-literate teams will set their organisations up for future success and lasting competitive advantage.
