The May 2026 MarTech conference gathered a panel of marketing leaders to address the tension: maintaining authentic storytelling in an era shaped by AI and data.
In the session, “Marketing Time: Rediscovering the power of story, fueled by data and AI,” moderator A. Lee Judge, founder and CMO of Content Monsta, led a discussion with Dale Bertrand, Melanie Deziel, Lexie Haggerty of Braze, and Jordache Johnson.
The reality of modern marketing is that audiences are increasingly skeptical about whether a person or a machine is behind the screen. Deziel said trust will depend less on polish and more on light. “People will look for those signs of trust,” he said, noting that brands must provide insight “behind the scenes” to prove that real people are driving the messages.
When AI-generated audio becomes mainstream, personal storytelling becomes a differentiator. Johnson urged the vendors to rely on the conviction. “Stand on something that has value,” he advises, arguing that tension and vulnerability are specific signs of human involvement that machines cannot replicate.
The panel also explored how to use data without letting it stifle the creative spark. Bertrand explained that data should support storytelling rather than replace it, using customer intent analysis to understand audience needs. He shared how his agency analyzed sales calls to measure the impact of competitors’ negative messaging, revealing an estimated $12 million in revenue at risk.
For these leaders, the greatest value of AI lies in improving workflow and revealing hidden information. Bertrand described sales recordings as a “cheat code” for finding out what customers really care about, while Judge noted that AI can reveal patterns that sales teams might otherwise overlook.
Successful scaling requires a process foundation over plugins. Johnson stressed that organizations often rush to tools while ignoring the systems needed to implement them.
“Context is more important than anything else you’re going to put into an AI tool,” he said. Deziel emphasized this, warning that applying AI to a disorganized workflow only creates “chaos and miscommunication at scale.”
On the topic of personalization, Haggerty pointed out that the obstacle is not a lack of data, but silos that prevent its use. He emphasized using real-time behavioral data to create useful, non-obtrusive experiences. “It’s 2026,” he said. “We know that personalization is not the same as dropping the first word in the subject line.”
Looking ahead, the panel warned of the pitfall of over-development. Johnson criticized the tendency to “worship speed over brilliance,” while Deziel reminded the audience of a human audience at the end of an automatic series. “You’ve made a lot of content successfully and nobody’s hearing anything,” he said. “That’s not the goal.”
The way forward is clear: AI must augment, not replace, human strategic thinking. Success in this emerging global industry is for brands that combine data-driven insights with the kind of authentic storytelling that audiences really remember.
