The CMO at the fork in the road

Automate or orchestrate. David Billings and Alex van Gestel discuss the question shaping the future of marketing

Mar 13, 2026

Alex van Gestel, VP, Head of Benelux and Consumer & Services EMEA
London
David Billings, Chief Strategy Officer
London

Big budgets, bigger hype ... yet 95% of AI pilots never touch ROI. With a sobering opener like that, this episode of Beyond the Echo Chamber brings a reality check. CMOs are wrestling with two revolutions at once. Internally, every function is chasing efficiency. Externally, the entire demand-and-discovery landscape is being rewritten by generative AI.

It’s a CMO conundrum that these industry veterans know all too well. And while it feels like a tricky fork in the road, guests Alex Van Gestel and David Billings bring pragmatic advice on how to orchestrate both.

In this ‘survival guide for CMOs’, learn how you can use technology to elevate your marketing, up your craft and unlock new revenue streams. More than that, we get real about how you can design AI for adoption (not just deployment), how to decide when to build, buy or integrate, and how to stay true to your brand roots.

Listen to the full episode here.

Contributors in this article

Alex van Gestel
VP, Head of Benelux and Consumer & Services EMEA , London
David Billings
Chief Strategy Officer , London
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