AI is no longer the disruptor of marketing’s future. It has already changed acquisition and purchasing decisions, and the way organizations assess market opportunities and compete for growth. Despite this, many marketing leaders are still evaluated more on campaign execution than on their ability to lead business transformation.
Gartner’s research shows a surprising disconnect. While 82% of business leaders say their company’s brand and culture must evolve to accommodate AI, only 15 CEOs consider their marketing leader to have strong AI experience. That gap puts marketing relevance at risk just when it should be growing. The opportunity ahead is not to do most of the marketing work yourself. It’s about using AI to build markets, guide strategic decisions, and elevate the brand as a driver of business growth.
AI is accelerating a force that has been building for years. Customers are increasingly relying on generative AI tools to research products, compare alternatives, and generate recommendations internally. As a result, brands are competing in areas they cannot fully foresee, let alone control. At the same time, artificial AI is flooding the market with undifferentiated content, eroding trust, and increasing skepticism.
These shifts threaten traditional marketing playbooks. Channel optimization and creative efficiency are no longer enough to secure relevance or influence. Gartner research found that the average marketing leader has only an 11% chance of exceeding CEO and CFO expectations. That figure shows a deeper problem. Many organizations still see marketing as an operational engine and not as a strategic partner.
Interpret distractions and act with confidence
AI reinforces the need for visionary leadership. Marketing leaders who don’t have the obvious risk of being sidelined as other jobs gain access to AI-powered insights and tools. Those who step into the broader role can help the company translate disruption and act with confidence.
Gartner’s research consistently finds that a specific profile of marketing leaders outperforms peers. They are described as market innovators. They are at the forefront of innovation, positioning, and insight generation, and they adapt their behavior to what the business needs most.
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Market makers excel because they influence how customers perceive value, how leaders prioritize investments, and how an organization deals with disruption. And they lead the pack in AI adoption and profitability. They are already using AI more and across a wider range of use cases than their peers. Most importantly, they use AI for more than just creative productivity or automated work.
They use AI to monitor changing customer needs, integrate disparate signals, and run rapid tests that inform strategic decisions. They translate big signals into decisions about where to compete, how to differentiate, and what innovations to invest in.
Efficiency alone is not enough
Many marketing organizations make the mistake of seeing AI primarily as an efficient tool. Productivity gains are important, but this narrow focus limits the credibility of marketing and leadership by keeping your offerings focused on performance. It also misses a huge amount of AI.
Market leaders are using AI to accelerate knowledge. They use it to understand how customer questions arise, how AI adoption is changing the shopping journey, and where trust breaks down. They use AI to quickly test hypotheses, simulate scenarios, and assess unmet needs before committing to critical services.
That requires more than new technology. It also requires people who are trained to think in new ways.
Gartner’s research shows that teams led by market makers demonstrate superior strategic skills, critical thinking, customer insight, and data literacy. That allows marketers to ask AI better questions, challenge typical results, and turn recommendations into actionable business.
As AI accelerates commoditization and misinformation, brand becomes one of the few levers organizations can use to gain a unique and trustworthy position. Our research shows that companies with effective brand strategies are twice as likely to exceed growth goals. The difference is not high spending. Strong alignment between product and business strategy.
Marketing leaders treat branding as a business discipline. They use AI-generated insights to revise value propositions, guide innovation priorities, and protect trust. Product strategy becomes the channel through which AI-driven insights are translated.
Four important behavioral patterns of market makers
Gartner identifies four behaviors that differentiate market makers, each of which gains speed and accuracy when enhanced by AI:
- Customer advocate: Do what the customer likes by ensuring that the brand remains visible and loyal in the AI-mediated journey. This includes optimizing content for AI detection and using AI-enabled monitoring to detect misinformation early.
- Customer representative: Target business priorities by integrating voice of the customer signals. AI helps integrate direct, indirect, and targeted feedback to keep decisions based on real customer value.
- Market designer: Direct innovation in ideas that reinforce future product demand. Synthetic data and rapid prototyping allow teams to test concepts before scaling investments.
- Market wayfinder: Translate disruptive signals into a coherent business story. AI-powered scenario planning helps leaders anticipate risks and opportunities, while productivity provides a story that aligns action across operations.
Don’t be fooled into chasing every new AI power. Success depends on identifying which market-shaping behaviors are most important and using AI to accelerate them. That means investing in skills like tools, and making sure teams can consult with AI rather than just use it.
It also means redefining success. In an AI-driven world, marketing value is measured not only by campaign effectiveness but also by its ability to guide strategic decisions, secure trust, and shape how a business is perceived in the marketplace.
AI will not diminish the importance of marketing leadership. It will reveal the difference between those who kill and those who create guidance. Leaders who step into a market-shaping role will help their organizations face disruption, guide brand strategy, and unlock sustainable growth in the age of AI.
Sharon Cantor Ceurvorst he is a VP analyst at Gartner Marketing Practicean expert in marketing leadership and brand strategy. Learn more about how to drive AI back at Gartner Marketing Symposium/Xpo, June 8-10, 2026, in Denver.
