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# What will the best CMOs do differently in 2027?
- URL: https://www.cmoalliance.com/what-will-the-best-cmos-do-differently-in-2027/
- Published: 2026-10-06T12:28:21.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-06T12:28:21.000Z
- Description: What will top CMOs do differently in 2027? Top CMOs share why campaign-centric marketing is dying and how to adapt to AI, answer engines, and new growth metrics.
- Author: Bonnie Habyan
- Tags: Leadership, Careers, Articles

What does it take to lead a marketing org in 2027? And what will the most successful CMOs do differently to get there? 

Most in the industry will probably agree that running marketing one channel at a time is as good as dead, AI is radically changing execution, and [search behavior](https://www.cmoalliance.com/understanding-human-search-behavior-patterns/) is changing everything we once knew about SEO. 

But what should a CMO actually do about it? 

To find out, we sent the same set of questions to [Donald (Don) Polite](https://www.linkedin.com/in/donaldpolite/), CMO at SKYGEN, and [Bonnie Habyan](https://www.linkedin.com/in/bonnie-habyan/), CMO at X-Caliber, ahead of their panel at the [CMO Summit Chicago](https://events.cmoalliance.com/location/chicago/) (November 17th).

They gave us an honest look at what’s working, what’s quietly dying, and what won't survive into next year. Their insights match what dozens of other marketing leaders told us in our [***CMO Insights Report 2026***](https://www.cmoalliance.com/cmo-insights-report-2026/)*,* confirming that the pressure to adapt is happening across the entire industry.

So, here’s what the best CMOs are doing differently in 2027.

## **How the role of CMO has changed** 

The first question we asked was simple: **what's actually changed about being a CMO over the last five years?**

Bonnie starts five years back, at the pandemic: 

> *"Five years ago, CMOs were emerging from the pandemic and navigating an extraordinary digital acceleration."* 

> *"Digital was no longer simply a channel. It was changing how companies built relationships, generated demand, communicated internally and externally, hosted events, supported sales and managed their brands."* **\- Bonnie Habyan, CMO at X-Caliber**

Now that marketing teams have spent years building up those digital capabilities, the test is what they actually do with them. 

> *"Today, the challenge is to integrate, refine and extract greater business value from those capabilities."* 

> *"It is no longer enough to adopt more platforms, produce more content or collect more data. We must connect those capabilities into a coherent operating model that improves decision-making, strengthens the customer experience, and contributes measurably to growth."* **\- Bonnie Habyan, CMO at X-Caliber**

Don answers the same question from a different angle, framing it around what the job is actually there to do. 

![Don quote about the biggest CMO challenge](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ff/09/ff09ec2c-5937-45c2-bd7e-bcc809b43924/content/images/2026/10/Don-quote-1.png)

In his view, that shift has pulled the CMO well past brand and demand generation: 

> *"CMOs are no longer responsible for just brand awareness and demand generation. They are increasingly expected to influence customer experience, revenue growth, digital transformation, data strategy, and AI adoption."* \- **Donald (Don) Polite, CMO at SKYGEN**

The last five years have really redefined the scope of the CMO role. There was a time when marketing leaders were judged by the volume of output or the amount of noise their campaigns could create, but that’s changed. Now, it’s more important to connect marketing efforts to [drive measurable business growth](https://www.cmoalliance.com/what-is-growth-marketing/).

## **What the CMO role looks like in 2027**

To understand where leaders need to focus their energy today, we asked both CMOs to look ahead and share what they think the CMO role will look like in 2027.

They predict something similar, even though they frame it differently. Bonnie expects the CMO to become "*even more of an enterprise operator*," needing "*a deeper understanding of revenue, margins, customer economics, technology, process design and capacity, alongside the traditional strengths of brand strategy, communications and creativity.*" 

Don reaches the same conclusion from the technologist's side, saying he expects the role to become "*a hybrid of marketer, technologist, and business strategist,*" with AI absorbing tactical execution and leaving the CMO more responsible for guiding "*strategy, governance, and customer-centric innovation*." 

Companies are already hiring for this hybrid skill set, not just predicting a need for it down the line. The [*CMO Insights Report 2026*](https://www.cmoalliance.com/cmo-insights-report-2026/) found that tech and AI savviness is now the single most valued skill CMOs look for in new hires, named by **72%** of respondents this year, up from just **8%** the year before. 

This sudden shift matters because it tells us that a permanent change in how marketing organizations deliver value is happening. Up until now, technical skills were treated as specialist capabilities relegated to execution teams or IT partners. 

In 2027, CMOs who don't understand tech, AI, and systems may get left out of strategy conversations, and their numbers will show it.

## **What’s driving the change**

So, why is this shift happening? 

Don lists a wider set of pressures behind it, stating: 

> *"AI, the decline of third-party cookies, heightened privacy expectations, increasing competition, fragmented media consumption, and consumers who expect highly personalized experiences while giving brands less attention than ever before."* \- **Donald (Don) Polite, CMO at SKYGEN**

Each of those pressures is hard to deal with on its own, and most marketing teams are now facing all of them at the same time.

Bonnie focuses on the change from traditional search to AI-generated answers, which she says is "*requiring CMOs to think beyond SEO and embrace answer engine optimization*." 

That's not a future problem, though, as it’s become the reality for many CMOs today. In fact, one CMO featured in our report claimed that **35%** of his company's leads now arrive through [LLM search](https://www.cmoalliance.com/how-llms-are-reshaping-product-discovery/) instead of a traditional search engine.

Search is changing how customers find a brand, but it's not changing who makes the call on strategy. Not one CMO surveyed for the report named strategy or creativity when asked where autonomous AI agents will matter most over the next 18 months. Every answer clustered around reporting, dashboards, and campaign monitoring, which is usually the type of work a junior marketer does, not a CMO. 

Bonnie says it best: 

![Bonnie quote image on how marketing will change in 2027](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ff/09/ff09ec2c-5937-45c2-bd7e-bcc809b43924/content/images/2026/10/Bonnie-quote-1.png)

## **What CMOs will need to be much better at in 2027**

If there’s one clear takeaway from both Bonnie and Don, it’s that the [CMO role](https://www.cmoalliance.com/stopping-the-spread-of-ai-slop/) now demands skills well beyond traditional marketing. The skill set required to lead a [marketing function](https://www.cmoalliance.com/how-i-built-an-ai-first-marketing-function/) is expanding.

On one side, you have Don's emphasis on execution and alignment. He calls out the operational skills CMOs need to build right now, pointing directly to data, AI, and cross-functional leadership:

> "CMOs will need to become significantly more proficient at translating data and AI into business outcomes. That doesn't mean becoming data scientists. It means understanding how to leverage AI responsibly, how to build first-party data strategies, and how to turn customer insights into personalized experiences at scale. Equally important will be change management." - **Don Polite, CMO at SKYGEN**

![Don's quote on successful CMOs in 2027](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ff/09/ff09ec2c-5937-45c2-bd7e-bcc809b43924/content/images/2026/10/Don-quote-2.png)

On the other side, Bonnie looks at the full range of skills the modern [marketing leader](https://www.cmoalliance.com/what-marketing-leaders-need-to-master-for-2026-video/) needs. She describes a mix of analytical rigor and human judgment:

> *"The CMO of 2027 will need a more comprehensive skill set than perhaps any previous generation of marketing leader. CMOs will need strong left-brain capabilities: financial literacy, data analysis, technology fluency, forecasting, resource allocation, process improvement, and performance measurement. They must be able to interpret what the data is really saying, identify friction in the customer journey, and make disciplined decisions about where to invest. At the same time, right-brain capabilities will become even more valuable.* 

> *“CMOs must understand human behavior, recognize a compelling idea, tell an authentic story, and build an emotional connection with an audience. As AI makes content easier to produce, judgment, originality, and empathy will become greater differentiators."* **\- Bonnie Habyan, CMO at X-Caliber**

She adds that even though the role now covers far more disciplines, no single leader is expected to do it all alone:

> *"The role will also require an increasingly broad command of AI, SEO, answer engine optimization, new business development, content scalability, public relations, events, executive visibility, internal and external communications, brand strategy, and sales enablement.* 

> *“No CMO will personally execute every one of these disciplines. The leadership challenge will be knowing enough to establish the strategy, ask the right questions, integrate the functions, and build a team capable of executing at a high level."* **\- Bonnie Habyan, CMO at X-Caliber**

Put both answers together, and the pattern is clear. The CMOs who will do best in 2027 won't stay inside one narrow function. They'll succeed by combining analytical and creative judgment, aligning the rest of the business around one strategy, and turning technology investment into measurable results.

## **What CMOs need to *stop* doing**

If you look at how most [marketing teams](https://www.cmoalliance.com/leading-resilient-teams-amid-industry-changes-and-nurturing-trust-before-change-arises/) still spend their time, a lot of it comes down to managing separate channels and launching one-off campaigns. Both Don and Bonnie agree that this way of working will soon be a thing of the past. 

Don's pretty blunt about how buyer expectations have changed. He points out that *"many CMOs are still overly dependent on campaign-centric marketing and channel-specific optimization"*.

By 2027, buyers won't care which team owned a post or which channel a message lived on. *"They will only care about seamless experiences."* Organizations that keep measuring success by campaign performance alone are more likely to struggle.

Instead of chasing short-term campaign spikes, Don argues CMOs need to move toward managing the relationship, not the campaign:

- Shift focus from isolated campaigns to total customer journey orchestration.
- Use first-party data and AI insights to support customers across their entire lifecycle.
- Build lasting, [personalized relationships](https://www.cmoalliance.com/personalization-in-marketing-automation/) rather than one-off touchpoints.

Bonnie's fix starts with how marketing treats its own expertise. A single conversation with a subject matter expert, in her view, shouldn't produce just one piece of content: 

> *"A single subject-matter-expert conversation, for example, can produce a long-form video, short-form clips, an article, sales collateral, email content, social posts, media pitches, FAQs and material optimized for both traditional and AI-driven search. That is not simply content repurposing. It is a disciplined approach to capturing institutional knowledge and turning it into a scalable business asset."* **\- Bonnie Habyan, CMO at X-Caliber**

![Bonnie's quote on future of marketing](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ff/09/ff09ec2c-5937-45c2-bd7e-bcc809b43924/content/images/2026/10/Bonnie-quote-2.png)

## **What CMOs should *start* doing before it’s too late** 

While many marketing teams are hunting for the next ‘big thing’, Bonnie points to something that a lot of companies overlook. She argues that the real secret to scaling impact lies in operational discipline and adapting to how buyers actually discover information today.

A brilliant campaign concept is useless if your internal machine stalls on execution:

> *"Creative ideas matter, but creativity without a repeatable operating process is difficult to scale. Marketing leaders need to examine how work enters the department, how priorities are established, who owns each decision, where approvals create delays, and how one initiative can produce value across multiple channels."* **\- Bonnie Habyan, CMO at X-Caliber**

Second, she highlights a massive shift in online behavior that is already reshaping the digital landscape. The days of simply optimizing for Google's page one search results are behind us:

> *"Search is no longer limited to someone entering a keyword and reviewing a page of links. People are increasingly asking AI platforms direct questions and expecting clear, synthesized answers. That means organizations must invest in both search engine optimization and answer engine optimization. They need clear, credible, and well-structured content that answers the questions their customers are actually asking.* 

> *“The goal is no longer simply to rank. It is to become a trusted source that both people and technology recognize as authoritative."* 

> *"Pulling this off requires breaking down internal walls. Marketing can’t sit in an isolated bubble trying to figure out Answer Engine Optimization on its own. It demands ongoing, tight alignment with technology, sales, compliance, and in-house experts." *\-* *Bonnie Habyan, CMO at X-Caliber**

### 

CMOs in 2027 will be judged on more than [brand campaigns](https://www.cmoalliance.com/marketing-campaign-planning-template-framework/). The job now means working across functions, overseeing AI adoption, and managing the customer experience end-to-end. 

The best CMOs build systems that connect every campaign to a measurable outcome.

## **Don't miss the real conversation in Chicago**

Don Polite and Bonnie Habyan are two of the speakers at CMO Summit Chicago this November, where marketing leaders will compare notes on what's actually changing for 2027.

If you're figuring out AI adoption, answer engine optimization, and cross-team work on your own, the CMO Summit is where other CMOs are working through the same problems.

[**Get your pass for CMO Summit Chicago**](https://events.cmoalliance.com/location/chicago/) to hear from Don, Bonnie, and other CMOs speaking on November 17th.