By no means earlier than has the CMO place been extra advanced—or extra important to driving enterprise outcomes. The mark of success for any chief marketing officer is their impression on the long-term trajectory of a beloved model.
So, what does that appear like in a 12 months as chaotic as 2025, the place there’s been on-again, off-again tariffs, large holding company mergers, and the continued rise of AI across the board?
I reached out to CMOs from Hinge, McDonald’s, Crayola, State Farm, and Kraft Heinz, 5 advertising and marketing leaders working on the top of their game, navigating the chaos, and getting outcomes. We talked about what classes they’ve realized from the previous 12 months, points they’ll be dealing with within the coming 12 months, and what they anticipate to be the largest shift entrepreneurs and types can anticipate in 2026.
Right here’s what they needed to say…
What was your most vital lesson or perception of 2025?
“Put money into listening and studying! Outstanding technique and inventive work are all the time grounded in true perception and unique concepts. Listening to your core viewers, and their wants, have to be central to the way you do the work. Realizing which audiences are a very powerful to middle, and be taught from, can be vital. Having a various, empowered staff is a brief lower right here, for positive. At Hinge, our worker base mimics our person base. That could be a highly effective benefit.” —Hinge CMO (now CEO) Jackie Jantos
“The tempo of change is overwhelming for everybody (each our followers and our groups). Our most vital job is to take care of human connections and be a spot of pleasure for our followers.”—Morgan Flatley, McDonald’s International Chief Advertising Officer & Head of New Enterprise Ventures
“The very best model moments can’t all the time be deliberate. They arrive from groups that keep agile, take good swings and might transfer in actual time. Our resolution to launch our Batman vs. Bateman spot in March was rigorously thought of. We may’ve launched it wherever, however the alignment with faculty basketball—the place our model is powerful and the viewers overlap is actual—made the story land greater. We stored our Tremendous Bowl-level techniques throughout the whole marketing campaign—together with cross-channel build-up and sneak previews, fan giveaways, top-tier expertise, and it grew to become one in all March Insanity’ top-performing campaigns. It’s vital to construct the muscle to maneuver with audiences, present up with authenticity and add worth in actual time.” —State Farm CMO Kristyn Cook dinner
“2025 has been a whirlwind. Shoppers and corporations the world over have seen loads of challenges and uncertainty. In these moments, I’ve realized it’s extra vital than ever to give attention to what’s inside your management. Specializing in model superiority, the position our manufacturers have to play of their respective classes and the enjoyment they bring about to shoppers. It’s not the time to sit down again; it’s the time to focus, spend money on manufacturers, and execute flawlessly.” —Kraft Heinz chief progress officer Diana Frost
“A very powerful lesson this 12 months, once more, is that manufacturers can’t simply present up in tradition, they should create and contribute to it in ways in which really feel genuine and join individuals. For Crayola, that meant adopting a extra expansive model narrative that reinforces our deep cultural roots and underscores our function: championing creativity as a lifelong ability. It’s not solely about merchandise, experiences, and content material that carry creativity to life, it’s about being acknowledged as an advocate for creativity as important to progress and wellbeing.” —Crayola CMO Victoria Lozano
How did the position of promoting change essentially the most in 2025?
“Entrepreneurs have loads to contribute throughout the entire enterprise. They need to affect progress and enterprise technique, product growth, and information organizational tradition. Hinge’s aim is to get daters off the app and into nice dates. Delivering on this deeply human mission requires deep and nuanced understanding of core audiences and their relationship wants—and loads of creativeness round which challenges we will tackle, and the way we will be in service of individuals. That is the place advertising and marketing’s contribution will be profound.” Hinge CMO (now CEO) Jackie Jantos
“Advertising is central to our enterprise progress, and this 12 months we made some huge bets that paid off. Check out Minecraft, the place we introduced collectively two iconic worlds that invited followers of all ages to play, eat, and construct collectively. We proved that after we mix real ardour for an thought, the facility of our model voice, and a killer fan fact, we will do unbelievable issues for the enterprise. This partnership elevated visitors to our eating places, fan pleasure throughout practically 100 markets, and success for the film on the field workplace, too.
We’ve additionally gotten significantly better as a system in sharing and scaling nice concepts. Campaigns like The Grinch Meal and Menu Heist are examples of how fan-centered concepts can cross borders whereas adapting to native nuances and flavors. Typically, essentially the most highly effective model asset you’ve got is your product.”— Morgan Flatley, McDonald’s International Chief Advertising Officer & Head of New Enterprise Ventures
“Each firm is exploring how AI can sharpen their advertising and marketing. Whereas AI is boosting the scientific facet of promoting, the true energy comes from balancing science with ‘artwork’—intuition, human connection, and, most significantly, creativity. Creativity stays the last word differentiator for manufacturers—it’s the drive multiplier that permits the whole lot else. In case your creativity doesn’t seize consideration or cease the scroll, none of it issues.” —State Farm CMO Kristyn Cook dinner
What would be the largest distinction between 2025 and 2026?
“Getting individuals off the app and into nice dates stays core to the whole lot we do at Hinge. When daters have higher outcomes their belief in Hinge grows, as does our enterprise—organically. However many rising instruments and applied sciences aren’t constructed with long-term person outcomes in thoughts. In 2026, we’ll see a fair sharper divide between manufacturers that use know-how guided by a set of values—that put individuals’s wants and wellbeing first—and people who don’t. And younger individuals will discover and care. Purposeful know-how will more and more grow to be a differentiator.” —Hinge CMO (now CEO) Jackie Jantos
“Whereas the tempo of change feels sooner than ever, the basics gained’t shift as a lot as we expect they are going to. Expertise and media are evolving, however the energy of storytelling, killer creativity, and human connection stay fixed. I learn a putting factor at the beginning of this 12 months: that TV is the most well-liked gadget for watching YouTube on, greater than a cellphone or desktop. So, when individuals discuss concerning the ‘loss of life of TV,’ it’s not the loss of life of watching issues on a TV, in your lounge, usually with family and friends. It’s simply the place that content material got here from and the way it was served to you. That’s an vital distinction. Our job is to navigate via the change, whereas not forgetting what’s most vital and significant to our model and our followers.”—Morgan Flatley, McDonald’s International Chief Advertising Officer & Head of New Enterprise Ventures
“It’s my perception that 2026 can have loads of continued themes from 2025. That stated, the tempo of AI-powered advertising and marketing will proceed to speed up. AI-powered advertising and marketing will permit entrepreneurs to have a sooner path than ever earlier than to insights and analytics, model co-pilots, innovation, content material and recipe formulation. That stated, it would by no means substitute human curiosity, connection, and model authenticity. Entrepreneurs require the flexibility to stability AI scale with human credibility.”—Kraft Heinz chief progress officer Diana Frost
What would be the most vital shift or problem for entrepreneurs in 2026?
“We’re getting into a second the place know-how and AI can meaningfully add worth, however may also convincingly mimic empathy and easy the friction that truly helps us develop as people. That creates a brand new accountability and accountability for entrepreneurs. Human relationships are advanced, imperfect, and deeply vital, and the merchandise and messages we introduce into the world form how individuals join.
So the important thing query for entrepreneurs in 2026 will probably be: Who’s our work actually serving? What are we contributing to tradition and neighborhood? To remain related and construct belief, manufacturers might want to construct with intention and repeatedly design for extra optimistic human connection.”—Hinge CMO (now CEO) Jackie Jantos
“Constructing the muse with Gen Alpha. All the model financial system has been centered on Gen Z. We’re taking a look at what’s subsequent; how we earn a spot on the earth of our future prospects so after they’re prepared, we already really feel acquainted and trusted. They aren’t ‘youthful Gen Z.’ Gen Z grew up digital, and Gen Alpha is rising up algorithmic. They anticipate content material to know them, adapt to them and evolve with them in actual time. We’re doing our homework now—learning how they stream, the platforms they’re native to and the way they wish to have interaction with manufacturers.
Platforms like Twitch and the streamers main the dialog are shaping Gen Alpha’s style. Group is essential – area of interest fandoms, creator-led ecosystems, gaming environments will all matter greater than broad channel attain. We have to construct belief early on with moments and experiences they really need, and create a world the place content material is hyper-personal, participatory, and all the time evolving.” —State Farm CMO Kristyn Cook dinner
“Advertising is evolving from omni-channel storytelling to related ecosystems in an AI-mediated world. However in a world of massive knowledge and superior language fashions, essentially the most highly effective insights nonetheless come from actual, human experiences. What scales isn’t the broadest message—it’s essentially the most genuine one. Listening to prospects issues greater than ever; the position of influencer content material to drive choice is rising. In a panorama chasing ‘excellent’ data, creativity, empathy, and humanity aren’t simply nice-to-haves—they’re what set manufacturers aside. The way forward for advertising and marketing isn’t about chasing each channel. It’s concerning the small, private observations—the little particulars about how individuals really dwell and behave—and creating related experiences that really feel seamless, even when the ecosystem isn’t. Shoppers anticipate manufacturers to satisfy them in these micro-moments with relevance and function, not noise.”—Crayola CMO Victoria Lozano
“Our position as entrepreneurs is to grasp client habits and use these insights to maneuver individuals to interact with our manufacturers. It’s an artwork and science and there are key abilities and capabilities required to try this now and sooner or later. As entrepreneurs, creativity and innovation are crucial on this second. AI supercharges typical knowledge; inventive drawback solvers are the current and future of promoting. It has by no means been extra vital to be knowledge proficient. We’ve got extra knowledge than ever at our fingertips however utilizing it to energy insights and execution is essential. How shoppers uncover, join and transact with manufacturers continues to evolve. Those that can finest perceive and breakthrough within the new client journey will win.“ —Kraft Heinz chief progress officer Diana Frost
