What has been the most significant change in consumer behavior in the last 10 years, and how has it impacted the way you think about marketing and communications?
The last 10 years– 2016 to 2025? Hmm, that covered some major shifts in contemporary history: from Brexit to the surprising outcome of the US election in 2016, to the global pandemic that changed how humans interact with others. In the midst of all the life-changing events, we continue consuming: content, material, food, environments. If the timeframe can be shortened from 10 years to 2-3 years, the answer undoubtedly would be the rapid breakthrough of A.I. From driverless cars to the proliferation of generative A.I. and agentic A.I., A.I. basically reshaped how we think, move, act, and communicate.
However, if we look across the 10-year horizon, the commoditization of smartphones fundamentally changed how we conduct our lives and has had a greater and broader impact up to this moment. As smart phones shift from luxury to commodity, the once “complimentary screen” becomes the primary screen – it’s the source of information, work-related tasks and communications, social belongingness, and of course, shopping. A friend of mine told me that her children are now making travel decisions solely based on online reviews instead of other forms of research, and I am sure they are not alone.
Marshall McLuhan claimed that media are the extensions of man– guess I’d rephrase it to “human” for obvious reasons– and with smartphones, the world is literally on our fingertips. As consumers become less patient and more vocal about their expectations and experiences, we have to meet them whenever and wherever they are.
The traditional definitions of “channel”, “storefront”, or “purchase funnel” are no longer adequate – instead of a linear path, today’s consumer journey is jumping from one point to another like a pinball machine. We have to be flexible and adaptive, and in the meantime not lose sight of brand development, relationship-building, and real business growth. That’s not an easy task.
Introducing the MAPS Reputation Index
Reputation rankings are everywhere. But in most cases, the ranking is the point. With the MAPS Reputation Index, it’s just the start. We’re interested in why certain companies have a strong reputation – and sharing these lessons with our clients.
Stay tuned – we’ll share the details next week. If you’d like a preview of your company’s profile, feel free to reach out.
How do you see privacy impacting the way that marketers work – both today and in the future?
Working in the data industry we know how much we can learn about a person based on their browsing patterns, purchasing records, or their whereabouts, and what companies can do with that data with or without ill intent. Keep in mind that even harmless-sounding data points such as purchase behaviors or visitation patterns can be valuable to some parties beyond trying to sell you a coffee or a burger.
Since the 2016 Cambridge Analytica scandal, there has been increasing awareness and action taken by various parties to protect consumer privacy such as GDPR, CCPA, CPRA (I live in California and am grateful for the protection), and another 19 or so state-level legislations. In most cases, sensitive data such as race and ethnicity, healthcare, religion, sexual orientation, or related to minors, are protected. For example, in the states where data related to race and ethnicity are protected, digitally targeting ethnic minorities could be challenging, as is measuring the reach of the target audience, or the ad’s effectiveness.
Legislation aside, big tech companies such as Apple, Google, Microsoft and beyond, all aim to limit the collection and unauthorized use of personal data, which resulted in the ongoing loss of identifiers and disconnected signals– these impact the whole martech ecosystem.
For marketers, we need to practice above and beyond the minimal requirement. While privacy legislation and the leading tech companies’ policies may make collecting and connecting consumer data more difficult, in the core of the 1st party data, it’s the trust between consumers and the business that holds the key. Simply put, “what we can” doesn’t mean “what we should”. While some consumers still give away their data freely in exchange for convenience, there are others who are more cautious about sharing their data and in what capacity.
Here’s an example: After listening to my comment about privacy on the Identity Architects podcast, a friend of mine called because she was upset that retail media like Amazon can collect her data and sell them without her consent. I told her there are actions that people can take to protect their own data and we went through her account settings together. Then she asked me, how do we know if those settings changes were followed through? Who is there to reinforce the privacy laws? She pointed out that most consumers won’t even know how this industry monetizes their data, let alone take extra precautions to protect their own. Besides, privacy laws are only the baseline.
For marketers, the true value exchange should be based on building long-term trusted relationships instead of short-term transaction- or convenience-based deals. For example, I am far more likely to share my data with Apple than I ever will with Meta. That’s the brand equity from Apple’s long-term business practices. It would be blankly ignorant for marketers to seize the short term exchange at the cost of long-term trust and relationship. An honest conversation about why and what data is collected, as well as how it will be used, is essential. Call me naïve – FYI, no one ever does – but I do believe that “honesty is the best policy” as simple as that might sound.
Maybe it’s the researcher in me that believes that education is the key to enhancing transparency and protecting privacy. As marketers, investing in educating consumers about the value of their data and respecting those boundaries goes a long way.
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Looking into the future, which fast-moving issues and consumer dynamics will marketing and communications leaders need to be aware of?
Looking into the future, of course we cannot ignore the almighty powerful A.I. used in marketing and communications: how various A.I. tools can easily gather information and produce content– including video and audio, without humans involved. It’s important to remember that A.I. is a force multiplier, trained on real data– including many we did not even provide consent for companies to use.
I also want to call out the use of synthetic data. I know the term has a negative connotation but it does not stop people from using it. I have seen companies proposing using A.I. to boost survey responses. There are concerns related to overlooking outliers which was the reason we needed the sufficient sample size to begin with, normalize critical responses, and amplify stereotypes through data and societal biases. In the meantime, a leader in the application of synthetic data once reminded us that generative A.I., including the popular ChatGPT and Copilot, are the most common uses of synthetic data. For example, if you create a specific A.I. prompt, do we still need this interview or can ChatGPT respond to all these questions representing my perspective even without my consent? Where do we draw the line on authenticity and truth? And how can we ensure our rights are protected?
As for marketers, the rapid development of A.I. makes content creation timely, scalable, and much more affordable. For example, NotebookLM can quickly render a webinar of any topic in minutes, with a lively conversation with emotions and jokes– that was amazing! However, this power comes with caution and frankly, a cost– we no longer know what we can and cannot believe. We used to say “seeing is believing.” That’s no longer true. We all saw videos that look like real people– the ones we know and the ones we don’t, and the voices we are familiar with. Now we don’t know what we can believe– Did he really do that? Did she actually say it? What’s the truth? Technology robs us of our trust. In fact, my husband and I are now paranoid about saying “yes” on any unknown calls because we are worried some hackers would take our voices and fake consent for scheming– and we only see the tip of the iceberg.
With all these incredibly powerful technologies at our fingertips and the legislation falling far behind, I truly believe that marketers should focus on truth and trust. We need to be mindful of the tools we use, and be transparent and truthful with our messages.
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If you could wave a magic wand to fix one problem in marketing and communications, what would you do?
Haha! You don’t want to ask me this question. My answer will piss too many people off.
What one piece of advice would you share to those starting their career in this sector?
I am not sure which sector we are referring to since the landscape continues to evolve. However, if we are thinking of adtech/ martech, I’d tell them that it’s ok to make mistakes as long as you learn from it so you don’t make the same mistake twice. I will remind them that innovation and improvement come from trying different things and many of those trials will fail– we call it learning. And if they are in an environment that does not allow them to try, look for somewhere else.
What’s one piece of measurement-related advice you would give to any CMO?
The basics: measuring what matters.
I was serving a piece of steak– B.I.F.E, at my last presentation as recommendations related to measurement: That stands for:
- Balance short-term / long-term impacts
- Invest in independent / unbiased measurement
- Focus on true business outcomes, and
- Ensure organizational alignment
Most people know where I stand on short-term, siloed, performance-based measurement– those inflated numbers often come with a cost of jeopardizing long-term growth. When it comes to measuring marketing efforts it’s important not to take your eyes off the ball for brand health and brand growth.
Measurement needs to be more holistic, not just a set of numbers and charts to tell you what has happened and put away.
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What has been the defining moment of your career, and why?
“The defining moment”? I don’t think I can isolate a singular moment. As you know, my career is not a streamlined path; it zig-zagged from full service advertising agencies to adtech / martech across the Pacific Ocean and both coasts of the U.S.. Besides, I am not done yet.
But to your question– there were a few pivotal moments in my career path, and this was one of them:
When I first shifted from full-service agencies to an adtech startup, I felt like a total outsider. One day I got a request for a simple “added value” measurement offering as part of an RFP for a leading QSR chain. Instead of just approving a line item, I crafted a proposal and we won our first $1.7 million deal! I believe the reason we won was because the offer was not focused on selling impressions but on what the client needed. Suddenly research, basically measurement, became an important element of all our proposals. Consequently, I got to dive into various data and methodologies and test all kinds of measurement tools, sometimes side-by-side so we could deliver better results and prove the efficacy of pre-roll videos. I’d think it probably influenced my career trajectory in some way 😉
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