Marketing Without Walls: Ana Mourão on AI, First-Party Data, and Why MarTech & Advertising Are Finally Converging
- Aug 11
- 48 min read
Marketing has spent decades building walls.
Brand versus performance. Advertising versus MarTech. Agencies versus in-house teams. IT versus marketing. Customer experience versus media.
What if those walls are finally coming down?
In this episode of Signal & Noise, Brett House and Rio Longacre sit down with Ana Mourão, a globally recognized marketing technology leader, author, and thought leader, to explore why the future of marketing belongs to leaders who can bridge strategy, technology, data, and AI.
Drawing on years of experience leading marketing transformations inside some of the world’s largest global brands, Ana explains why marketing is evolving from campaign execution into system design. Instead of simply launching promotions, tomorrow’s marketers will architect interconnected systems that continuously learn, adapt, and improve through experimentation, AI, and customer data.
The conversation dives deep into one of the biggest shifts happening across the industry: the convergence of MarTech and AdTech. Historically, these functions have operated independently, often using different data, different technologies, and different success metrics. But as 1PD becomes more valuable and AI begins driving decisions, those boundaries are disappearing.
Ana shares why marketers—not IT—must become the architects of modern marketing systems, while also learning to collaborate effectively with finance, legal, privacy, engineering, and tech teams. She argues tomorrow’s marketing leaders won’t simply create campaigns—they’ll translate across disciplines and become the connective tissue that enables organizations to move faster and make better decisions.
The discussion also explores:
Why first-party and zero-party data have become strategic business assets
How customer data can dramatically improve paid media performance and budget efficiency
Why experimentation—not perfection—is becoming marketing’s competitive advantage
Why marketers need stronger financial and technical literacy to earn influence in the C-suite
How AI is changing the skills marketers need to remain indispensable
Why today’s MarTech stacks have become overly complex—and what happens next
The evolution of Customer Data Platforms (CDPs), data clouds, and composable architectures
Why context may become the most valuable ingredient in AI-driven marketing decisioning
How governance, privacy, and trust must evolve alongside AI adoption
Ana also introduces the framework from her book, Strategic Marketing Skills That Make You Indispensable in the AI Era, offering practical guidance for marketers who want to thrive in a world where AI handles more execution and humans increasingly create strategy, context, experimentation, and organizational alignment.
This conversation is particularly valuable for marketing leaders, advertising professionals, media executives, consultants, data strategists, and anyone trying to understand where AI is taking modern marketing organizations. Because the future won’t belong to marketers who know the most tools.
It will belong to marketers who know how to connect people, systems, data, and AI into one intelligent operating model.
Ana Mourão is a global marketing technology leader, author, speaker, and creator focused on helping marketers develop the strategic, technical, and organizational skills needed to succeed in the AI era. Her work centers on marketing systems, experimentation, first-party data strategy, AI, and the intersection of technology and business transformation.
Read the full transcript below.
Brett (00:00.991)
Hey everybody, welcome back to Signal and Noise. I'm Brett House, joined by my co-host Rio Longanker. and today's guest is Anna Morau, a global marketing and technology leader of Brazilian descent, lives in the United States. I think you might be from S Yeah, totally. And we've had you on the pod in short form. We had you at the possible event in Miami, for fifteen, twenty minutes.
Rio Longacre (00:07.021)
Everyone.
Ana Mourao (00:14.926)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (00:16.149)
Anna, we're so happy to see you.
Ana Mourao (00:19.15)
Thank you. Thank you.
Rio Longacre (00:22.319)
Yeah, we got her impossible. She stopped by the suite. Yep.
Brett (00:25.963)
and you are are you from Sao Paulo? That's I know that's where your education was, or are you from a different city in Brazil? Just a
Ana Mourao (00:32.618)
I am from the countryside of the San Paulo state, about an hour driving from San Paulo capital.
Brett (00:36.271)
Okay. Got it. Got it. Okay, I
Rio Longacre (00:39.343)
It's big city, right? Massive city.
Ana Mourao (00:41.226)
It is, it is humongous.
Brett (00:42.397)
Yeah, we're talking like twelve, probably twelve plus million, right? Like it's a big twenty million?
Rio Longacre (00:45.423)
That's like twenty million or something. It's it's one of the biggest cities in the world, I think, right?
Ana Mourao (00:46.018)
Yes.
It's yeah exactly. I think it's among top three. Top three or four.
Brett (00:52.125)
Yeah. Wow, it's like Seoul and Tokyo and
in in New York and London. so so back to back to you, Anna. You're you've you've been a global technology leader, marketing technology leader. You spent your career in a bunch of global Fortune 500 companies, I think four in total, you know, helping them really with their data strategy, collecting, organizing, activating customer data across marketing. You become quite the thought leader around a lot of these top topics, whether it's Martech or AI
Or marketing strategy in general.
Rio Longacre (01:24.783)
Yeah, you put out a lot of great content out of where I'm I'm always reading whether you I know you put out a book, you've put out lots of stuff on LinkedIn, you you appear in podcasts a lot, so definitely w we are admirers over here.
Ana Mourao (01:30.584)
Mm-hmm.
Brett (01:31.505)
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah. And the book, for those that don't know, is called Strategic Marketing Skills That Make You Indispensable in the AI Era. That is a title that is gonna win some hearts and minds because people are like, I'm I'm fearing for my life and my job. Yeah, plus you have a a newsletter that I've checked out quite a few times that I've read on LinkedIn called Field Notes, by the experimental marketers, where you're really trying to find out what actually happens when marketing teams try to make their technology work, right? Which we love that sort of
Ana Mourao (01:35.437)
Thank you.
Rio Longacre (01:46.927)
People are freaking out, yeah.
Brett (02:04.339)
basics of of like things break, right? It's a lot harder than it looks. And the sort of positioning veneer that we see around a lot of these solutions is oftentimes it it sort of hides what's really going on behind the scenes within organizations, right? And and and technology doesn't really solve everything, I think is one of your core theses, right? You pr you you it it's really around process, right? That's more important than sort of coding. Transformation comes yeah.
Rio Longacre (02:29.859)
And experimenting, right? And like marketing's about testing and experimentation. People forget that a lot.
Ana Mourao (02:32.717)
Mm-hmm.
Brett (02:34.247)
Yeah, and transformation comes from systems rather you know, systems thinking, which I thought you know, I pulled that from one of your your posts or or
promotions versus tool stacking. And so we talk a lot about systems thinking and how and how that's critical, especially in the AI age where you have so many different capabilities that you can immediately access, even through just basic LLMs, and it takes some systems thinking in order to get it right. So I think that's a a really important point. and then what I thought was super interesting about your background is that you are a founding Maverick creator.
right, and this was on her LinkedIn, which I thought was interesting, and I want you to talk about it as part of the marketing is dead exclamation point movement, which is a peer-driven ecosystem focused on building authority and authenticity for marketing leaders, which couldn't be more of an important topic and s in credibility, authenticity, and authority, oftentimes when marketers are not trusted by the CFO and C suite in some cases, and and you know, CMO's job.
Ana Mourao (03:10.237)
Yeah.
Brett (03:36.451)
lengths have have decreased. Everybody's heard those numbers, you know two years or even sub two years.
Rio Longacre (03:40.609)
Yeah, CMOs don't have e even have a seat at the table anymore with a lot of the C suite. And many c many organizations have removed the CMO title altogether. So it's been a a challenging few years.
Brett (03:48.062)
Yeah. So so I think you're the perfect person for the show. I mean you do a ton of thought leadership. You go out there outside of your day job and write books and do and do newsletters and extensively talk about a lot of these topics that are affecting all of our lives, especially as it applies to marketing. So welcome to the show, Anna. We're thrilled to have you. And and and what did I miss in your background? What do you want to tell the audience that that sort of adds full, you know, HD clarity to to who Anna is?
Ana Mourao (03:48.097)
Yeah, clean.
Ana Mourao (04:16.525)
Well, thank you so much for this amazing introduction. I couldn't have asked for a better one. Very thorough. so yes, so I am Brazilian. I live here in South Florida for a while. I started my career actually in digital marketing. I am an economist by trade, so that's where the system thinking right came from. but then I really fell in love with marketing and then digital marketing because of the
Brett (04:36.499)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (04:45.301)
More experimental, like it's quicker to get results, right? So that really did it for me. And then I always like to be like a generic digital marketing manager because I understood even back then that the different activities were connected in the back end, right? So I like to have that more holistic view. So that ended up taking me to analytics.
Brett (04:52.873)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (05:11.531)
Because I wanted to measure my experiments, and then I realized that like the data used to be like a mess. So I decided to organize so that I could like scratch my own itch, that type of stuff. And then from there I had the opportunity to work with my tech. And then with my tech, I understood that then I could have more of the systemic view, right? That through the technology, you could really see marketing as a system. And not only that.
Brett (05:21.19)
Yeah.
Brett (05:31.22)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (05:37.954)
That technology also allows you to go to other teams, to other departments, exchange with them, collaborate with them, right? So I think it also gives the marketer an interesting seat at the table because nowadays all of marketing is really empowered by technology. You have technology in everything, right? So when you are close to the technology, you are also close to a lot of how marketing happens, how it interacts with other teams.
Brett (05:44.861)
Yeah.
Brett (05:58.995)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (06:08.171)
right with other parts of the company. And for me that was what really did it for Martech, right? I was like, Yay, finally I can have this view.
Brett (06:16.358)
Yeah, yeah. It's it's and it's so you felt that that it did it help you speak the speak of other departments and other people because you sort of took a more holistic view of of how does this apply to the business as a whole? You know, which is systems thinking to a certain degree, not just systems from a technology, but systems thinking. I mean, did you find that that was kind of what you're driving, you know, it's like sort sort of how do I remove myself from the the myopia
Ana Mourao (06:24.247)
Totally.
Ana Mourao (06:30.155)
Absolutely.
Brett (06:42.062)
of being in a function like marketing. You know, like every function has its own myopic thinking. But did you find that as part of like the driving to say, I want to be able to to really truly communicate in a language that everybody understands? Right? Or other departments understands.
Ana Mourao (06:54.283)
Yes, because yes, exactly, because when you think about it, right? Yes, you are in your lane, let's say. But everything is so interconnected, right? So you need the other teams. So if you want to really like move the needle, so to speak, and deliver the against the business objectives, you won't do it alone.
Brett (07:15.858)
Yep. Yeah, that's true.
Ana Mourao (07:17.163)
Right, even like the best marketer won't be able to do it alone. And when you also have the customer data, the zero and first party data, then you also have even a a better way of talking to people and really being on those conversations because this will feed into other departments, into other processes as well. Right. So for me it was more like a realization that if I didn't go that extra step.
I would be very limited on what I could influence really. And since everything is so interconnected in the back end, you end up like not influencing much, right? Because you're gonna be in your lane and then it's gonna restrict you there, then it won't make that much of a change, right? Towards what you wanna do.
Brett (07:56.698)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (07:58.254)
Yeah.
Brett (08:04.05)
You created a hyp sh Rio, she Anna created like a hyphenated job before hyphenated jobs were like a thing, right? Like in the sense of you know, we Yeah, we talk about how that like specialization has has definite limitations, which you've just described in sort of real life, right? And that, you know, when you say marketing dash or you know, hyphen or m-dash engineering dash analytics dash operations
Ana Mourao (08:09.1)
Totally.
Rio Longacre (08:11.564)
now they are all the rage, yeah, aren't they?
Ana Mourao (08:13.845)
Ha ha.
Brett (08:30.074)
suddenly you you aren't just one thing, right? You're you're you've got a much more holistic view on the company and how how the data and the systems work. Right, which is which is important. That's awesome.
Ana Mourao (08:38.355)
Exactly.
Rio Longacre (08:38.974)
Yeah. Well, certainly the influence of marketers or the lack of influence and the ability maybe of AI to impact that and change that. It's been a discussion we've had a lot in the show. And and Anna, as Brett mentioned, we're thrilled to have you on here. We had that really nice discussion down in Miami at Possible. Thanks again for stopping by. Part of the reason we wanted to have you back on is that there was a lot of interest based on that discussion and additionally we felt there was a lot of unfinished business, things that we wanted to continue digging into.
To have you back. So we're thrilled to have you on here. Always a pleasure to talk to you. And then I think for our audience, this is going to be very interesting because our audience tends to skew probably a little more to ad tech than Martech. We have a lot of Martech people listening. I know that for sure. And many of our sponsors are more firmly in the Martech space, but I'd say the majority of our listeners probably come from the advertising ad tech space. So terms like CDPs, first party data, customer data, marketing automation, identity, these are terms people use, but they might use them very differently.
And have maybe less of an understanding, or at least a different understanding of them than people from the more Martech CRM world might have. And what I loved about our conversation is I thought it was a nice bridge between those two of them. And when looking at marketing right now, roles are evolving, as as you just mentioned, hyphenator roles are appearing, roles marketing engineer coming really out of nowhere that we may have defined differently or didn't even exist a few years ago. And people are really combining technical fluency, marketing expertise.
the outputs you're getting from AI tools and large language models into really a new, a new type of marketing. And I I thought it would be good to talk about this and what you really mean by ex experimental marketing and how it's really changing the profession and changing how marketers do their jobs. So maybe we start out by like as a marketer, like working working who's worked in big brands for a long time, like when someone asks what do you do every day, how do you describe it to them? What do you tell them?
Ana Mourao (10:34.092)
Well, that's a very good question, right? So I like to think of myself as being in the intersection between marketing and technology, right? And kind of being the translator from one to the other. So I really I'm I say that I help make the marketing activities happen in the best way for the customer, right? Making sure that we honor the customer, that we honor the data we collected, that we activate properly.
Brett (10:36.518)
Mm-hmm.
Ana Mourao (11:03.998)
etc. So in a nutshell, right? That would be that would be it. And what happened is that I had to really kind of learn on the go, right? A lot of what I what I learned with Martech as I was implementing, as I was helping other teams, etc. And then I realized that actually when it comes to marketing technology, marketers should be leading those conversations.
And a lot of times they're not. Exactly. It's in the name. Exactly. But a lot of times I think that marketers are overfocusing on the promotion, right? On the campaign, et cetera, which I understand there are metrics against it. All the good reasons why this happened. But actually, ideally, they would also be leaning into these conversations that help create the system.
Brett (11:34.044)
Yeah. It's in the name. It's in the name. Yeah.
Brett (11:47.912)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (11:57.162)
Right. So instead of like I'm doing c I'm running campaigns, no, I'm running a marketing system. And when you have the marketing system in place, it gets faster to test, right? To go to market, test.
Brett (11:57.256)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (11:57.612)
Yeah.
Brett (12:06.535)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (12:06.91)
And it's interesting you say that though about about about campaigns. I mean, I actually there's an article I'll be publishing next probably later this week, actually. It'll be it'll be out by the time this episode is is dropped about decisioning, the decisioning engine, the whole that whole concept of next best action. In theory, that could peel the concept of the campaign. I don't I don't know if how long it'll take to do that, but that is one potential outcome. I think that's very interesting. But looking at Martech, I love the point you just made about.
Ana Mourao (12:29.352)
Exactly.
Brett (12:33.125)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (12:35.938)
Marketers should own it. This has been a fierce debate, right? There were many years where I think marketers were going out like the beginning of SAS. we we can now just get a credit card, we can go get an email platform, we can get a CRM, we can get a dam, we can get a CML, whatever, what have you. They would do that and that created this IT sprawl. Then we noticed a counter reaction, like a reaction to that. Let's say a like a counter-revolution almost where IT is a no, no, no. If it involves customer data, CIO is involved.
Ana Mourao (12:57.823)
Mm-hmm.
Rio Longacre (13:04.438)
If it involves infrastructure, CTOs involved. I saw kind of a a counteract a a counterbalance to that where IT reasserted themselves and started driving those. Now I'm seeing maybe it's we're reaching equilibrium, we're somewhere in the middle. L love your thoughts on that and how that's evolved.
Ana Mourao (13:05.599)
Mm-hmm.
Ana Mourao (13:22.389)
Sure. So the the framework, right? So the experimental marketer framework, I created so that marketers also understand that they need to interface with those teams, right? So it's not only like, I got my platform and I'm here in my marketing position having fun. No, because that platform also involves other aspects like personal data, right? Things that are also resp the responsibility of others inside, especially like large companies.
So the marketer should go and the marketer should knock on the door and say, you know what, I found this platform that is amazing and we would like to test it. And I think this is the use case, and this is the smallest possible proof of concept that we can have that can show us if that works. How could we do about it? What, how could we start? Right? So maybe you have a test that doesn't involve PII first. Right? Maybe that's possible. Or you already have that conversation with
Rio Longacre (14:16.353)
Mm-hmm.
Ana Mourao (14:20.277)
Privacy before even involving IT because if privacy says no
Rio Longacre (14:24.492)
So you're informing them before you actually start this process. You're you're bringing them up to speed very early, right? Is I guess that's an important point, right?
Ana Mourao (14:28.723)
Yes. Yes. Yeah, exactly. Ideally, yes, because if you are the architect of the system, right, or at least one of the architects of the system, then you should go and collaborate with the other ones, the other stakeholders as soon as possible, right? Not say, okay, I bought the two and it's like it's unconnected to anything and I don't know if I'm being respecting our privacy policy.
Brett (14:32.529)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (14:55.433)
Right, no, don't do it. It's actually the other way around.
Rio Longacre (14:57.016)
And I bet this is as much polit I bet this is is as much political as it is functional, right? You actually want to just make them feel included, make them say, Listen, I'm making a decision. I'm asking I'm asking for this. I need you I need you to be involved. You're important. 'Cause I think nothing's worse for someone I mean, leak people in legal like to just put a barrier a lot, is my my experience. So I think if you Spring is if you surprise them, they will block it, has been my experience.
Brett (14:57.64)
Mm-mm.
Ana Mourao (15:05.675)
Of course. Of course.
Brett (15:11.048)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (15:18.763)
Totally.
Brett (15:20.178)
Yeah. Well, but part of it I think is is also I mean I think this ties to kind of the t the topic you know, the the subject of your book, you know, market s strategic marketing skills that make you indispensable, right? And I think if you th if you think of that, oftentimes marketers
Ana Mourao (15:21.44)
Yes.
Brett (15:36.445)
don't have, at least perception, and I've been one, so I've been there and and done that, right? It you know, is that they don't have the subject matter expertise from a product and tech expertise that the product team has. They don't have the commercial expertise or sort of understanding of the customer outside of basic sort of voice of customer work that the commercial teams have. So they're in this sort of what I call the I think I've said this on the pod before the mushy middle, right? And and you know, Greg Stewart, the head of the MMA Global, who we had on the
Ana Mourao (15:41.107)
Me too, me too.
Brett (16:06.588)
pod a little bit ago, talked about how there's not it's not really a it's one of the few functions that you really can't go to school for. There's no real clear definition of what marketing outside of sort of brand marketing, and so people get kind of stuck in this in this approach to marketing that doesn't take in
everything that's involved from tech to data to analytics because there is no sort of academic discipline around what is marketing, how do you train to be a marketer? Whereas you could go to fine you could go study finance and prepare yourself to be a chief financial officer.
Ana Mourao (16:28.469)
Mm-hmm.
Ana Mourao (16:37.917)
Exactly.
Brett (16:44.666)
It's very hard to go and study marketing, which I did in the past and prepare yourself to be a marketer. So, so to the top topic of your book, strategic marketing skills that make you indispensable, what is the key thesis of that and and what are the skills that you've identified that are critical? And you're kind of talking to them and how you're communicating to other teams.
Ana Mourao (17:05.905)
Exactly. So I realized right through my experience that okay, I I was able to be the in this intersection, okay, and make some things work. So I wanted to help other marketers get there too. Right. So the idea is a framework that will help you be in that intersection and actually feel comfortable in that intersection. And not only that, but create like that identity.
Brett (17:27.089)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (17:30.537)
Those skills that can really position you as someone who is that system architect for marketing, regardless of the technology, right? So it doesn't require certifications, it doesn't require like coding. Of course, you can leverage AI whenever feasible, possible, available, allowed. But actually, the idea is that you have eight E's, so eight words that start with the letter E, starting with explore.
Brett (17:37.192)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (17:58.995)
Right. And each one of them will help you get there. So the explore is all about understanding what you already have. Where is your customer data? Are you already collecting zero first part data? Are it's if then where is it going? Is it getting where it should be for activation? Right? And then there is the engage. Engage is all about like negotiating with the other teams. Right. So how is it that you go and you talk in the language they understand? How is it that you are
Brett (18:22.163)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (18:27.888)
Aware of their concerns and you put yourself in their shoes, right? When you are talking about it, and you you guys get to like an understanding. and then there is exchange. Exchange is all about really creating the system, right? So I talk about like system thinking, I talk about also a little bit of the black swan and red swan theories.
Right, about how to create a more anti fragile system as well. Yes, it's economics background, exactly. So how is it that you make it more anti fra fragile? And then the fourth one is
Rio Longacre (19:01.101)
Your economics background, right?
Brett (19:03.516)
Yeah. Yeah.
Brett (19:10.45)
Fra fragile meaning meaning like w w Yeah, so it stands up to interrogation from other people, like your CFO or your CEO or
Ana Mourao (19:13.342)
Anti fragile. So not frag
It actually no, in this case, is all about making sure that big disruptions don't stop your code, right? So you can go. Exactly, exactly. The system, exactly, the system holds and not only holds, but it also learns with the disruption and gets better, gets stronger. So it's it's agile and robust at the same time, right? It it lives in that paradox.
Brett (19:25.974)
Yeah, so your your infrastructure that this this infrastructure doesn't break like a house of cards. Yeah.
Ana Mourao (19:46.323)
And then the next E is everything. So about measurement, right? So how is it that we shouldn't just rely on platforms, attribution? There's a reason for that. Right? How is it that we are confusing correlation with causation? Which is not good. So I go through those as well. And then we have the embrace, right? So embrace again, it's also it's all about making the process more robust.
Brett (19:55.644)
Yeah. Yeah.
Brett (20:01.65)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (20:15.504)
so I go a little deeper there. And then we have the everything. So everything is how do you communicate, right? The wins as well. So it's not only about negotiating, but it's also about going back, communicating the wins, communicating the tests, making sure that there is a loop, a feedback loop in place. Right? and then finally we get to the last A E.
Brett (20:34.343)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (20:40.754)
Which is evolve. So it's the idea of using the framework for your own marketing career. So let's underfragile your own marketing career, right? Let's explore your career. So it's like turning everything inside your career. And then I bring also some ideas from other practitioners, other people that I admire from also other disciplines, right? To bring some other ideas to there as well.
Brett (20:46.77)
Yeah.
Brett (21:03.323)
Yeah. Yeah and you're adding you're adding some
Yeah, you're adding some structure back to that sort of Greg Stewart theory that there is no real discipline or academic discipline or functional discipline around b he basically says that like marketers just don't know what they're doing. They don't know what their function is. And everybody has a d everybody has a different definition. It sounds like you've like, you know, you came from that like design thinking background, right? And you're like, let's add structure to this, let's add some discipline to this, right? Because marketers have to work towards some of these kind of educational goals to to be strong in what they
Rio Longacre (21:18.797)
Yeah, you said a lot of them don't, yeah.
Ana Mourao (21:22.356)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (21:27.23)
Okay.
Rio Longacre (21:38.264)
Well, I think a lot of that bread is the is the evolution of the of the occupation of the field too. And then I think I mean even Adam look pivoting back to the the comment you made earlier about about marketers being more technical and really leading into a lot of the Martech decisions, I wanted to dig into that a little bit. So I've made this argument too myself about how like marketers should be driving these decisions. They should be including other people. But the one
Ana Mourao (21:39.335)
Exactly.
Rio Longacre (22:02.573)
push the piece of pushback I get a lot when I talk to clients about this is like the lack of technical and maybe even financial literacy what a lot of marketers have in order to actually evaluate these systems and like and and even make recommendations in a way that the CFO, the CEO, and a COO or other people at the C suite can even understand and translate it into their terms. Do you think marketers in their current evolution have earned the right to make those recommendations?
Brett (22:10.365)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (22:31.871)
And if not, what do you think they need to do?
Ana Mourao (22:33.638)
Mm, yes, that's a very good question, right? So some marketers would have earned the that seat at the table, right? And and that's amazing. For those who are not there yet. So I'm and my framework can help, right? So here's the thing. You have to understand how the CFO thinks, right? So for it for them, it's not about like, but I brought all those clicks, right? But about this like engagement metrics. They couldn't care less. What they
Brett (22:41.66)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (23:02.052)
do understand is, you know, if I had put this money in the bank, would I have made more money in this money than giving to you for this campaign? So that's what you are really exactly. Yes. Exactly. It's capital allocation. It's like why shouldn't I invest my money and you know just have interest in the money and why should I give it to you?
Brett (23:07.375)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. CFOs think that way too. They're I've got you've got a big pile of cash, now now double that pile of cash. Do something with it that's effective. Yeah.
Ana Mourao (23:26.876)
Right. So that's what marketers should really be thinking about when they go talk to the CFO. And and we are not trained for that. And depending on your experience, you are just trained to go and talk about like click-through rates and engagement metrics and reach and exposure or or brand exact, which are all very valid. Don't get me wrong, but you need to translate. You need to be the translator and say, Okay, this is how it really affects our the capital that we invested. This is what we can see.
Brett (23:26.908)
Yeah.
Brett (23:33.533)
Yeah.
Brett (23:40.975)
Or brand or brand or campaign logic, yeah.
Ana Mourao (23:55.912)
Right. So if you need to do like incrementality tests, right? Test MA models, right? You may need to go a little deeper. And that's where I say that AI really helps because you can go and educate yourself much faster now. Right? You can have that help to operationalize. Right? Exactly.
Brett (24:11.121)
Yeah. So that's number nine. That's number nine to your book's thesis is educate. Go and educate yourself on on you know and part an an MBA does that to a certain degree. You're taking those finance classes, you're doing calculus for the first time in many years. It was brutal, finance classes. Yeah. You you know enough to be dangerous, right?
Ana Mourao (24:19.485)
There you go.
Ana Mourao (24:24.752)
Mm-hmm. Exactly.
Rio Longacre (24:26.7)
But to your point, you don't have to be an expert in all these things. You have AI that can support you just so you can you can l lean on, right.
Brett (24:33.115)
Yeah, and to be able to speak the language of understand the financial metrics, understand how they how you know, financial projections, right? Not just simply budget management, which is often, you know, it's not really running a PL, you're just running a budget that's been allocated to you, the the the bag of cash that the CFO gave to you, right? You know, but how do you actually get closer to actual balance sheet and P and L management? Because that's gonna get you closer to the business results and how the the CFO and CEO are thinking about the business holistically. And then on the technical side, it's sort of the same thing. How do you get
Ana Mourao (24:47.016)
Exactly.
Brett (25:03.079)
closer to the technical underpinnings and how this stuff actually works. Even if you don't build it, you can still educate yourself around how it works, what it does, opportunities, risks, all that sort of stuff, right? And
Ana Mourao (25:03.365)
Exactly.
Rio Longacre (25:16.64)
Yeah. Well so Anna, knowing that a lot of people who listen to our podcasts have an advertising and ad tech background, right? And Martech may be a little I don't want to say alien, but more foreign to them, right? Like, as you've engaged with advertising professionals, and I know you've worked y you do a lot of work with them, you we talked about this at Possible specifically with both media teams, advertising professionals as well as media agencies. Like what
Ana Mourao (25:17.382)
Absolutely.
Ana Mourao (25:26.544)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (25:40.652)
Tends to surprise advertising professionals when they work with people on the Martech side, number one. And how have you seen that relationship evolve over the past few years?
Ana Mourao (25:51.274)
So throughout my career, right, what I've usually I've I've seen different things, right? So I've seen some marketers that have really like given the the the strategy or or let the strategy in the hands of the agency, right? Which I don't recommend because I think strategy is something that you should own again. But so in those cases, right, a lot of
Brett (26:11.451)
Yep. The
Ana Mourao (26:19.801)
everything was really defined by the agency, right? So then the agency would go and and ask and it would do a little of the exploring sometimes. Like what do you guys have? What is in there? Right?
Brett (26:23.003)
Yeah.
Brett (26:32.497)
That that seems intellectually lazy.
Ana Mourao (26:35.505)
It d for mi.
Rio Longacre (26:35.927)
Well then you're basically being you're basically being a vendor manager then, right? You're I would argue. But keep going, Anna.
Brett (26:38.287)
Yeah. Exactly.
Ana Mourao (26:39.333)
Exactly. Exactly. Which I think it's not ideal, right? It again, ideally there is a system that you help put together that if you take the vendor and plug another one, the system holds, right? It's not
Brett (26:51.665)
Yeah, yeah, the worst thing you want is like the CEO coming to you and asking you a direct question, let's say you're the CMO or some you know, SVP, whatever of marketing, and you can't answer the question. Like you have to pull in an outside vendor who has the expertise, right? Because now that you're in a really bad position if you're in that in that tight spot.
Ana Mourao (27:07.539)
Yes.
Rio Longacre (27:10.061)
Well it's funny, Brett. I have a funny story with I actually know a guy who was an early employee at Amazon and he said that Bezos came to a meeting with the head of email and said, How many emails did we send out last week? And then the guy was like, I'll I'll have to go find out. He said, That's unacceptable. You lead this. You should know. I don't care who sending that they were sending them out to. He didn't know. And he said, You'd never come to a meeting again without having that number at your fingertips. That's your job. And I thought that was so fascinating to think that, but it's actually not
Ana Mourao (27:10.289)
Exactly.
Brett (27:27.079)
You're fired.
Brett (27:31.282)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (27:39.745)
I don't think that's an a a crazy expectation that people should for the things they own have that level of knowledge and be able to summon that level of detail. So so so Adam, sorry we cut you off but keep going.
Ana Mourao (27:43.123)
So
Ana Mourao (27:50.759)
No, no worries. So and in other cases, right, then we have like the the vendor kind of relying on the marketer. So I I think it really it who sets the tone is really the brand. Right? I think that the brand is the one that sets the tone of that relationship. So I've seen it in different ways when this relationship was was set. But what I'll tell other, like the attackers here is the following.
If you are in the position to help a brand, right, make sure that you ask them if they have zero and first party data that they could use with the proper consent after talking to the appropriate people and teams, right? To then help build the segmentations in paid media campaign, for instance, right? Or social boosting, because that helps. And what I have seen throughout my career as well is that that has helped decrease CAC.
Right. increase click through rate. So it is a powerful tool and it's something that the brand owns. Right? They can then leverage that with the proper consent, but if they own it.
Brett (28:58.193)
Yeah. So so get get comforta Yeah. Yeah, and so get comfortable with the data that you own, zero first party data, whatever it might be. and and get get comfortable with the numbers, get comfortable with with the segmentation strategies because that as a consumer brand, that is the fundamental that's like the the fountainhead for company growth, right? Like without audience and without knowing who your audience is, how do you sell product and and keep them as customers?
Ana Mourao (29:07.911)
Yes.
Ana Mourao (29:13.255)
Yes.
Rio Longacre (29:22.568)
W w well well but Brett but I mean that's there's been a lot of talk in industry, right, Brett, in the last few years about using first party data, especially on the media side, right, in order for whether it's actually creating taking audiences from CRM and bringing them there in order to activate them immediately pay media channel or using them as seeds to create look alike. So there's been a lot of talk about that. But then we had member Rob McLaughlin from audiences was saying whether what's the number through? I think it's three percent or five percent. It's some very low percent of media is actually informed at all by first party data.
Ana Mourao (29:24.154)
Exactly.
Brett (29:51.58)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (29:51.935)
So so knowing that in theory it works great, like Anna, what have you seen? How much of first party data is being used to drive paid media? And it you mentioned a couple of use cases, like where have you seen it have the most impact?
Ana Mourao (30:05.978)
Hmm, so I have seen having the most impact in budget optimization. You can make the most out of your budget, right? You can stretch a little, a little further because we're starting at a more solid segmentation foundation. Right? Because you can say, okay, I want to find other people like this. Whatever segment.
Brett (30:14.301)
Yeah.
Brett (30:28.402)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (30:29.311)
As your customers, right. I mean, do you sh like in theory you have a lot of information on them, you know, what the lifetime value is, you know, you have all the psychographic and de demographic information theory on them. You could be using that, right? So you've seen it for for budget so so budget optimization you mean by rec marketing to the right type of people? Is that is that what you mean?
Ana Mourao (30:37.019)
Exactly.
Ana Mourao (30:42.952)
Exactly.
Ana Mourao (30:48.292)
Exactly. Like instead of s starting with a very generic targeting, you can start already with a more specific targeting. Right? So that can h make the budget go further because you are making the most out of it.
Brett (30:55.845)
Yeah, and and yeah.
Brett (31:03.343)
Yeah. Well, i but ar you know, arguably, but if you get into micro targeting, right, your your CPMs are gonna go up, your cost of of working media is gonna go up because you're trying to reach hyper specific audiences. so yeah, so so but budget optimization, just knowing that you're not it's it's the wanamaker rule, Rhea.
Ana Mourao (31:11.437)
Yes, of course, to a point.
Brett (31:22.117)
I mean it's it's the you know you're you're you're better than fifty percent, better than a flip of a coin and understanding who you're reaching and what's actually having an effect because you've just got a better clarity on the on the audiences that you're speaking to. And it's ba and even if the the first party data is a seed, like a seed audience that you're modeling out, right, you know that it's based on a lot of like high fidelity information about, like you said, Rio, right, about that person or that household, right? And so you're modeling on a good seed.
Ana Mourao (31:48.381)
Mm-hmm.
Brett (31:52.104)
Which which probably increases the likelihood that you're gonna have success when you reach audiences outside because it th you kind of run into a wall of like, I need incremental new audiences, how do I reach them as effectively as possible without to your point, Anna, just doing kind of broad reach plays, right? 25 to 34 female, you know, dot dot dot. you can get much more specific, which is gonna hopefully, you know, increase your hit rates, your engagement rates, all that sort of stuff.
Ana Mourao (32:12.056)
Exactly.
Ana Mourao (32:19.364)
Exact. And even if you just use as an exclusion as well. Sorry, Rio. Even if you use like an exclusion and suppression, I think some people may not even be using the lowest of the hanging fruits, right? So sorry, Rio.
Rio Longacre (32:19.84)
Wait, so Anna, looking at first party data act j yeah, just for suppression. Yeah, yeah, no, yeah. Yeah.
Brett (32:27.302)
Yeah.
Brett (32:32.699)
The Yeah. The most ba yeah, the most basic s yeah it's stuff to just eliminate audiences.
Rio Longacre (32:35.606)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, right. For from many it depends on type of business. And some some let's say some like retailer CPG firms might not care about suppression very much because they want people to buy more frequently. But you're right. Especially like I I've worked with a a cable company that were selling cell phones and you know, th there's no point in targeting someone again for a cell phone if they just bought one within six months. I mean it's absolutely useless. It's a total waste of media dollars. So but looking at the reasons why first party data may not be
Ana Mourao (32:57.287)
Right?
Rio Longacre (33:05.59)
Let's say leveraged or activated. When I've run into it in the past, I've seen really two buckets of of let's say sources of pro of reasons why it may not work. Is one is I think for many CPGs, they just don't have, they have never invested in the data, they don't have it. But then even the ones that do, I found typically, whether it's privacy concerns, especially for European companies, GDPR, regulatory, legal teams, process.
Ana Mourao (33:19.954)
Mm-hmm.
Rio Longacre (33:31.402)
I find those things make it very difficult. And I've seen a lot of brands just throw up their hands and say it's not the juice the juice doesn't seem to be worth the squeeze. So the thoughts on like like what barriers have run into and how have you overcome those barriers?
Brett (33:38.117)
Is it worth the screen? Yeah, excuse.
Ana Mourao (33:46.076)
So yes, I've seen both, right, throughout my career. And I understand both, right? Because in some cases they didn't have to like collect any data before. So they never really started that process, never put that in place. So now you have to really like get that goal after many, many years, decades, right? Of not doing it because it
It didn't make a difference before. You didn't have that proximity, you didn't have that interest as a brand or you didn't want conflict with the channels, what have you.
Brett (34:19.172)
And we're talking specifically C P G of course, right here, at at this point, right? As the manufacturer, right? That doesn't have the direct relationship with the consumer. Yeah. Yeah.
Ana Mourao (34:26.189)
Exactly, exactly, exactly. And I think that we also, like as marketers, right, we also got into like that that idea of the playbook or the flywheel, right? Where you were renting that data from platforms and it's working. And I think that for a while it worked, but now we are seeing that module being questioned, right? The returnings are like decreasing returns on that model. So now it makes more even more more sense or more urgency of having your own data.
So that's number one. Number two, for those that are very like on the very regulatory side, etc. Is there anything that they could do even directionally? So you don't get any PII, right? But you could do like at the segment, right? And try to activate that segment and see how that goes. Like something that is very, very soft, but could be directional, right? Because we are also, if we think about it, we are also going.
Brett (34:55.601)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (35:25.447)
to a like maybe a zero click marketing era as Amanda Natividad says and others, right? So exactly. So we may be forced to do those things.
Brett (35:31.311)
Yeah. With the grow growth of AEO and GEO and and the changing search behavior, yeah. And and Goog and Google we talked about the yeah, and Google is is sort of willingly embracing the cannibalization of their own s their own search business. Right? They're saying, We don't give a we don't give an F, right? Like we're good we know this is the future and we will cannibalize our own, you know, extremely the most profitable business ever created, I think, is
Ana Mourao (35:52.827)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (35:59.712)
Best business ever created, yeah.
Brett (36:00.772)
Yeah, is is search. And they're actively cannibalizing it because they know that to your point about a zero click future, right? so do you think C P Gs so speaking of CPGs in sp specifically 'cause we're on this topic, they don't control the point of sale unless they go DTC. So there's been a lot of acquisitions around DTC brands, right? You know, that allow them either that or they build it internally that allow them to And a lot of them have struggled. So do do you think they struggled because they were
Ana Mourao (36:18.555)
Mm-hmm.
Rio Longacre (36:22.668)
Yeah, but a lot of them have also struggled the last couple of years, Brad. I mean, there was that initial push, right?
Brett (36:29.482)
their business models and their competencies sort of lied outside of sort of direct retail relationships and all the complexities of that? Or do you think they struggled for other reasons? I mean, wha what what's your theory on that, Rio?
Rio Longacre (36:43.904)
I think I think that many of them took too much money and they didn't spend it wisely, right? A lot of them like like all birds. I mean they had a core customer group of like basically tech nerds in Silicon Valley who bought their product and then then w they in the Colorado Cherry Creek Mall they built an old bird store. No one's ever in there. Like no one like they they they they should never have built brick and mortar. It was a gr it was a gr a great niche online business. I I think all birds are ugly.
Brett (37:04.401)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (37:11.172)
but I did actually have to buy a couple for f what for com like were actually work related where like, everyone's gotta buy blue all birds for this thing. So I think they would have had a great niche online business, but they overexpanded. They ha they blew all their money. So I I think a lot of it was that Britt. These are companies that didn't spend their money wisely. And the D T C business, I mean, some of them did well though. You look like Harry's razors, right? That started as a like a a D T D C and then I I still I still order them. You can buy them now in in like in Nor like Walgreens and in different
Ana Mourao (37:28.047)
Mm.
Brett (37:32.698)
Yep. Yep.
Rio Longacre (37:41.6)
Safeway in different regular retail stores, but I think they they you th you never they never built Harry's brick and mortar f I don't think so, right? So I think it's just knowing you're
Brett (37:49.521)
Yeah. And it doesn't necessarily it doesn't necessarily mean brick and mortar, it just means direct to consumer relationship and capturing that sale, whether it's online, offline or otherwise, right?
Ana Mourao (37:50.726)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (37:59.532)
Well all these companies, you look at even like even some of those direct to c consumer like meal in a box, like blue aprons and stuff, they all there there were these crazes, VCs go crazy, they throw tons of money at it, these companies waste lots of money, and then you know, my understanding is the founders of Blue Apron didn't even get anything. Like they like w the stock crashed so much, they actually made no money on it. So which which is crazy. So but but Anna, looking at one one thing you wrote about recently that I thought was really interesting was you talked about and I saw you posting about how
Brett (38:06.555)
Yeah.
Brett (38:20.442)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (38:29.291)
The Martex stack has become very bloated. And in theory, some of it maybe shouldn't e maybe should go away, maybe shouldn't be here. And I've written about recently the death of the Martech stack. Our PA article actually did really well. So there's been a lot of talk about this. Some of it's AR related, some of it's just, I think, bloat of the stack. Love you to comment on like what percentage of the Martex stack do you think maybe doesn't need to be there and potentially won't even be there in the future. Thoughts on that?
Ana Mourao (38:55.303)
So yeah, so my comments on that actually come from a lot of the research that there is out there, right? Like the gardeners of the world, et cetera, saying that a lot of the the stack is not used, right? And I think that a lot of it is because again, as we were discussing, like one team bought this tool and the other team bought that too. And things are still like being seen by teams or by business divisions and not as a s part as a system, right? And that
Brett (39:23.996)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (39:25.051)
That's where the the boat can live. On the other hand, I also think that there is some level of overlap that is interesting, right? For resilience purposes. Exactly. For for resilience purposes or for data purpose, like to make sure that there is like you know some duplication so that we know if something goes bad here, everything's okay there, right? So I I
Rio Longacre (39:34.123)
There's probably always gonna be some overlap, like w correct, right?
Brett (39:36.368)
Yeah.
Brett (39:50.129)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (39:51.249)
Th there is some of that overlap that I think it's it's okay. But I think that nowadays it's not the overlap, it's more like those separate little silas. Yeah.
Brett (39:59.805)
Point solutions. Yeah, point solutions and functional point solutions. It's the first thing that CFOs, you know, when there's any cuts that are that are you know, even even sometimes just as as as kind of best practice from an audit perspective, a new CFO comes in. The first thing they look at is sort of that stack across departments to say, what are all these tools that we have? There's fifteen thousand five hundred Martech tools now. And I think the average CMO, I've seen various numbers, but has six yeah, something like no, no, no, it has like sixty, sixty
Ana Mourao (40:19.056)
Mm-hmm.
Rio Longacre (40:25.579)
About three years, yeah.
Brett (40:29.838)
independent tools within their own sort of remit, right? And are you actually using and leveraging those?
Ana Mourao (40:31.695)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (40:33.807)
yeah, Brett, I remember I told you about that audit. So I used to do these Martec audits, still do them sometimes, right? We go into the capability framework, it's about a hundred capabilities, and then you you then eventually map them to tools. I remember one, this one beauty brand I worked with, they had it's like ninety-four, something like that, distinct Martech tools. Only four were actually integrated into their core kind of like CRM and data and loyalty programs.
Brett (40:54.684)
It's like apps on your phone.
Rio Longacre (40:57.193)
So they just like random stuff. They had someone had gotten to run a test anna at your point earlier. They uploaded maybe a small seed list and they and then but just sat there and they're paying for it, right? And then I looked at how much money they're paying, what they're actually using. It was it was a huge delta and that was that was a big issue. So but like so looking at Martex stacks, say what percent, Anna, do you think could be gone in a couple of years or maybe should never have been there when you look at most most of these brands? Are they is it a twenty percent, is it forty percent, is it ten percent? Any thought any can you pick a number or no?
Ana Mourao (41:25.382)
Hmm. I I wouldn't know. I I think it really depends on the different companies, right? So some companies may have more of a bloat than others, depending on how they organize and how that bloat came about. Right. So I think it's hard to define a percentage. But what I think it's going to happen is those type of cycles that Brett that those review cycles that Brett just described, I think they're gonna happen more often.
Brett (41:52.028)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (41:54.789)
Right. And I and I think marketers are gonna be get more questions about like, hey, how are you using this tool? Are you sure? Because you know, I saw the other two as well, and it does kind of the same thing. Can we then consolidate? Right. So I think there will be some consolidation that is driven by like finance and by those concerns that will force the other teams to catch up. Right. And ideally it would be the other way around, but
Brett (42:19.707)
Well and I and I
Rio Longacre (42:22.202)
yeah. by the way, and I think that's a really good point you just made. And I think as a marketer, you should be prepared. Just like that email guy should have been prepared for Bezos to ask them how many emails are going out. As a marketer, you should be prepared for the CFO to come to you and say, What is the total cost of ownership of the Martex stack? Right. And you can't be like, I'm not sure, right? I know I know SaaS is a pain in the butt, right? Like you've got
Brett (42:30.684)
To answer w yeah.
Ana Mourao (42:33.658)
Yes, yes.
Brett (42:40.496)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (42:41.539)
Exactly.
Rio Longacre (42:45.974)
Platform fees, seat fees, bandwidth fees, overage fees, train this fees. I it it can be unwieldy, but as a as a marketing leader, you should have a calculator or a spreadsheet or a bunch of spreadsheets or some way that you could or a dashboard where you can say, I pretty much know how much within maybe two to five percent on any given month we're spending to support our Martex stack, and these are the tools they're spending it on. I
Ana Mourao (42:57.028)
Yes.
Ana Mourao (43:10.778)
Mm-hmm.
Rio Longacre (43:12.532)
I've done these assessments where people have no idea and they think, we're spending this X on this thing, but they don't realize they're actually spending three or four of that because overages and different seats that have gotten. So as a marketer, you should you should know that. You should know what your TCO is for the stack. You should have at your fingertips. I that I will stand by that.
Brett (43:15.215)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (43:15.718)
Exactly.
Ana Mourao (43:26.854)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Brett (43:29.114)
Yeah, and you should you should know the strategic implications of why you keep something and why you get rid of something, right? The yay or the nay, and whether or not something's nice to have or need to have. And and I wanna I wanna sort of pivot a little and I 'cause you've certainly talked a lot about from a thought leadership perspective, Anna, about AI and its implications. You know, the you know, we've got a lot of of SAS, there's we're in a sort of a SAS pocalypse, right? A lot of lot of these services are going or solutions are going. Yeah.
Ana Mourao (43:37.39)
Exactly.
Rio Longacre (43:55.436)
That's debatable, but like it's we're in a sh a time of SAS change. Yeah. Yeah.
Brett (43:57.834)
The the beginnings of they're going headless, they're not they're the the days of sort of gating your data with a with a fancy user interface and charging people per seat, I don't think have of yeah, I think that's going away over time. And so you see more composability, composable solutions that are plugging into exit existing data and cloud and in sort of data collaboration and privacy infrastructures, right? you see you know a lot of headless solutions that are plugging into this, right? even one of our guests that we just
Ana Mourao (43:59.261)
Yeah.
Rio Longacre (44:09.225)
Yeah, just going away, yeah.
Brett (44:27.697)
had and this this is where I'll throw it because I think it it sort of points to where AI could potentially lead us. Kyle Chick and this is a good episode in if you haven't heard it in the and for the audience, Machines of Love and Grace.
Rio Longacre (44:37.963)
It's almost two hours just warning people.
Brett (44:39.579)
Yeah, it's almost two hours, right? So I've only made it through half and I worked out for an hour this morning with this on and I've only made it through half of it. So but but he he had this incredible theory that was probably one of the gold nuggets of like a lot of these podcasts was like we are stuck in a IBM nineteen sixties paradigm and it's influencing everything we do. And he basically says it's the no the no you know, they they invented this notion where you could centralize data into kind of a central computer system.
Rio Longacre (44:47.083)
It's a cool th yeah, I I'm about two thirds done. It's a great discussion.
Brett (45:09.723)
Think warehouses, data lake houses, whatever you want to call them, right? Where you're moving data from A to B, you're bringing it together, you're normalizing it, and then you're you're develop you're you're you know getting insights from it, right? But that process is a human process, it's a it's a tech process that takes days and months, and he's saying that's all going away, right? This idea of of no data movement, that that you can have you know agentic systems that literally plug into your existing must-have.
Ana Mourao (45:27.343)
Mm-hmm.
Ana Mourao (45:31.597)
Mm.
Brett (45:40.35)
Platforms, right? ERP, CRM, whatever it might be, and there's no need for an underlying unified data infrastructure. That was his argument. So he kind of called, he said, you don't really need Snowflake or Databricks. And that was an interesting concept. what do you think about that idea of of sort of a a total headless future where there's gonna be core platforms that do core things like ERP or CRM, and that you just you don't need the unified data ever because
your your your agents can pull the right things from the right places and do the right types of analysis. I mean do you think there's weight in that argument?
Ana Mourao (46:19.413)
And yes, I think there is. I think we're not there yet, right? Because then those agents, we need to really understand how they work, how they pick that that data, right? Everything needs to be traceable. Because if there is a decision, a marketing decision that is based on those agents, on the information they retrieved and the analysis they did, we need to be able to also be accountable for it, right? The human needs to be accountable for it. So we need to understand how that part, I think, would play.
Brett (46:42.993)
Yeah.
Brett (46:49.521)
Yeah. The traceability back to the source of the data and where that came from for both regulatory and governance perspectives. Yeah.
Ana Mourao (46:49.859)
Right? Because I think exactly. Ex if exactly. Exactly. Right. Which I think nowadays the bigger platforms can provide. Right? Because they they log the the actions, the information. So I I think there is wait, but let's see. Let's see how that goes.
Brett (47:12.369)
Yeah, yeah.
Rio Longacre (47:12.991)
So and I'll like so I guess following that up, there's been a lot of discussion recently about how the cloud data warehouse or like the let's say the the you know the the data warehouse itself, right? like let's say Snowflakes or Snowflake or Databricks has been kind of devouring the C D P right. And then I I think this follows the you know, the headless movement we the headless movement as well as the composable movement we've seen over the past few years.
Right. Well, that's definitely reshaped the stack. And I think it's really come up like for at least for in the enterprise space, it's become kind of the best practice for enterprise architecture for customer data. So looking at that, how we had that recent announcement by Databricks for their agentic C D P right? And like thoughts on that. Like where do you see the category going? Does C D P stick around? do you think the Databricks I don't know if you read the announcement yet? It came out a few weeks ago. Do you think that's
Brett (47:55.953)
Yep.
Rio Longacre (48:07.433)
That's compelling and makes sense thoughts on that.
Ana Mourao (48:11.045)
I think it is compelling, it does make sense, right? I think that CDP may mean different things to different companies and different teams, right? So I I think that like close definition of what a CDP is is what is it's it's going away. Not the not the not what it provides.
Brett (48:32.475)
Yeah, it's it's limiting the way we think about it. Yeah. Yeah. And you see and you see and you see companies
Rio Longacre (48:38.441)
And then well, I guess the and then the data cloud, I mean, if that happens, you then have the you have the data cloud, which is really your system becomes your system of record for customer data, and then the CDP, I mean you CDP is used to do ingestion, normalization, identity resolution, segmentation. Used to do all these things. So maybe a CDP does some of that, right? But the system golden where the golden record sits, the system record for customer data ends up being the data cloud, and then and I guess out of that, you then get, but I th I think
Like the emerging trend I see is like where does context sit? Because I you brought it up at the beginning of this conversation. No, we're going full circle here. The big trend I'm seeing in Martech now is how do we work out decisioning? Where does that sit? For that you need context and you need data, right? So I think the battle over where decisioning sits is the next battle in Martech, in my opinion. Thoughts on that?
Ana Mourao (49:12.975)
Mm. Yes.
Ana Mourao (49:20.079)
Mm-hmm.
Exactly.
Ana Mourao (49:30.027)
absolutely. I've heard that from other practitioners as well that I read. So I I could not agree more. I I think it is. And I think that again, right, you may have this capability of unifying records that sits on top of your warehouse, right? And that is your de facto CDP, so to speak, right? along with the the warehouse. So again, the the what we need to get accomplished.
Right, will continue to happen because we'll need to to know to have that record, to have the context on it, etcetera, to have the decision of the next best action, for instance. Right? But the naming, the the acronyms, right, they may change. That's how I'm seeing that now.
Brett (50:19.292)
Yeah, and I I think, you know, that is if warehouses exist in five years.
we'll see we'll see what happens with that theory. And I get it and I I think the the the argument around without all the baggage that the word composable has, but this idea that you can within let's say a Databricks environment or an Azure environment that you can have functionality that's doing the same thing that a point solution did. Whether it's an identity resolution use case, whether it's a customer segmentation or customer activation use case or a measurement use case, why not have that built in an app type of y you know, like I like
Rio Longacre (50:24.446)
Yeah. We'll see, yeah.
Ana Mourao (50:26.208)
Exactly.
Brett (50:53.076)
That's what composability is. We've got it, we've got basically an app that's designed for this one specific set of use cases or simple use case that's basically built within those environments, right? And in all of those environments, the snowflakes and the database allow you to come in and build your own native applications. And so you saw we did this at Newstar. You saw as a kind of a software vendor going and saying we have to build natively within this ecosystem because that's where you know 10 of our top 20 clients are located. Let's say it's Snowflake, right? So you want to be where they are.
AR and be where the data is, why you know and it sort of supports this notion of of of no data movement. But do you think clean rooms, that's another topic, right? Are these these these cloud data warehouses eating up the notion of what do you need a clean room for when all of that stuff can happen within one environment?
Ana Mourao (51:31.726)
Mm-hmm.
Rio Longacre (51:40.114)
Yeah, if if if your if your data cloud's configured for zero copy anyway, yeah.
Brett (51:43.922)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (51:44.869)
So and again, here the idea is the outcome. I totally agree. You may not need to go out of the data warehouse, right? Or you may, depending on what they offer. So if you think about a data crap a data data clean room, you think about scrubbing your data against like of a retainer or of a partner, right? So you need to understand what the data of that partner also is, for instance, right? And it may be in a
Brett (52:10.257)
Yeah. Yep.
Ana Mourao (52:14.478)
clean room somewhere or it may be on on the the the warehouse as well right so you will what it's the most important part here is the idea that with the proper consent with the proper processes in place right you could scrub your data like our zero first part data against a partner against a retailer against a publisher that is important to you and see the overlap and then act on that overlap and test it
Brett (52:14.898)
Different
Brett (52:40.093)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (52:43.234)
Right. So that outcome is the most important thing. If that's going to happen in this environment or that, I think that is secondary at this point, in my opinion.
Brett (52:51.569)
Yep. Yep. And then overlap analysis seems like the most simple use case, but oftentimes that's that's what people are using clean rooms for to come up with some sort of either incremental new audience. Yeah, we've got we've found a second party audience that we both share, you know, airline and hotel, right? You know, we know people are going to this destination from, you know, the airline and we're a hotel that has hotels at that destination. And even those second party data use cases where there's overlap and you're finding an incremental audience that you can reach and
Rio Longacre (52:52.564)
Yeah. Good point.
Ana Mourao (52:59.872)
Yes, like the first the first step.
Ana Mourao (53:08.087)
Exactly.
Brett (53:18.787)
at at at the right time because you know they're going to that destination. I use that as a as an analogy because it makes a lot of sense and it's easy for people to understand. But I find that even that can be challenging, right? And I'm like, how is that hard? Like that seems to me like the easiest, most basic use case, right? And I find that it's, you know, Rio, you even said that sometimes it's really challenging just to do that.
Ana Mourao (53:27.524)
Exactly. Mm-hmm.
Rio Longacre (53:35.37)
Or should be one of the most basic things you can do with the clean room. Yeah, agreed. Yeah. That's what it's for, I'd be
Rio Longacre (53:43.723)
Yeah, I've a lot of cleaning work and it's I mean adoption has been slower. We're doing more now than we ever were, and I think it's finally remerging as a core capability, but definitely not a piece of standalone like markitecture you would you would necessarily get. But Anna, I know that you are a little pressed for time. You do have a a call you've got to jump to in a couple of minutes. So before you leave, let's quickly go into quick hits if you don't mind, and I will start it out. What's the most overrated Martech buzzword today?
Ana Mourao (54:06.19)
Sure.
Ana Mourao (54:11.286)
Agentic.
Brett (54:13.927)
Ha it's that orchestration? yeah orchestration's another one, but agentic, yeah, like it d it doesn't mean everything. Yeah. do CDPs exist in five years?
Rio Longacre (54:14.099)
Yes, okay.
Ana Mourao (54:17.026)
Right. And yeah, gentic. Everything is agentic. Yeah.
Ana Mourao (54:28.484)
I think that the outcomes that C D P provide it will exist in five years. And again, the acronym may change, right? But the outcomes will be there.
Rio Longacre (54:39.432)
What's one one technology every CMO should have on his or her radar today?
Ana Mourao (54:47.268)
Ooh, that's a very good one. I think that I I don't know if that's exactly the technology, right? But going back to context, if we're talking about marketing technology, a lot of the context will be marketing context. So marketers, you guys are already working on context without knowing, without having the title and the name. But so go and and understand what is needed, because I think that's a part where
marketers must be the the creators or co-creators, right? To make sure that in addition to the rags and all the technical stuff that must be in place, that the definitions match what marketers use, what's being used in promotions, in the market, in all the activities.
Brett (55:32.123)
Yeah, so last up, what's what what's a good book, not your own, what's a good book that every marketing leader should read? Speaking of academic foundations.
Ana Mourao (55:41.486)
my goodness, there are so many. there are so many. But let me here, let me recommend reshuffle. I shand repo sangrete. Right? it's a yes, because actually he explains exactly how when we have AI and we rethink the system, the production system, right? That's where you really get the the benefits.
Brett (55:55.068)
I'm writing it down.
Ana Mourao (56:09.771)
Because otherwise you can use AI just like to move the friction throughout the system, but you don't remove it. Right? We're just like because if you don't see as a systematically. And he uses all many examples of other like transformational technology periods throughout history where that happened as well. Right? So it's very well researched and it's a very interesting vision of, you know, if you use
Brett (56:17.361)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (56:37.641)
AI the the opportunity here is to rethink the entire process, the entire system. It's not just to get efficient here in this piece of the process that belongs to you. So I think that's an interesting view.
Brett (56:49.467)
Yeah. That is awesome. I think we could do a whole episode on the the book reshuffle Rhea. That that's that's like right exactly what we'd want to talk about. And we have been asked, I've been asked at at Cannes and a couple places that we should do an episode where we actually talk about like key reads, key books, key things that we're reading. Because people are like, You guys are citing all this stuff, can you share for the audience? So maybe we will do that in a future episode. Yeah.
Rio Longacre (56:53.748)
Yeah, we could. It's fun.
Ana Mourao (57:06.911)
Nice. Totally.
Rio Longacre (57:13.662)
Where do you get this stuff? Yeah, we we get asked about that a lot. Yes, Anna, thanks for that. That was cool. It's been and it's been and this has been fun. It's been great and it's been great to have you on here. I know you gotta you gotta go in a minute, but it's been fun and it's been it's one of these where any of these specific topics that we covered we probably could have dug in and kept going for a while. So it was as predicted, great to have you on and we'd love to have you on again, Anna, and in a future date.
Ana Mourao (57:13.985)
Great idea.
Brett (57:17.669)
Some of it's fiction, some of it's non fiction. Yeah, so Reshuffle sounds like a great book to read.
Ana Mourao (57:18.573)
Sure yeah.
Ana Mourao (57:23.459)
Thank you.
Brett (57:34.77)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (57:35.245)
Totally.
Ana Mourao (57:38.957)
Course.
Brett (57:40.765)
Yep.
maybe at one of the events or maybe another full full episode and we'll go down a different path. but everybody that made it this far, check us out on wdebdeb.signal noise.ai. Check out all the articles that are being published. Dorio is super prolific. We've got a bunch of new writers that are putting stuff out. I'm I'm I'm a little bit lazy on that front, but running two companies isn't easy. And we're also putting out more Instagram, more TikTok for the young ones in the audience, as well as YouTube, Spotify, and Apple.
Ana Mourao (57:44.097)
Yes.
Rio Longacre (58:09.064)
And we're we're and we're doing and two or three of these long form pods per week. We've lots of great content. So YouTube, Spotify, Apple, all of them.
Ana Mourao (58:09.889)
Nice.
Brett (58:15.547)
Yep. And lots of snackables too. Yeah. If you just go to YouTube you'll see there's a ton of forty-five second clips where you can just get sound bites. But if you want the full Joe Rogan, the full two hour episodes, we just published one, we've got plenty of those for for really deep and interesting and riveting conversations. This was one of them. So not two hours, but thank you Anna for joining us and we'll we'll see everybody next time.
Ana Mourao (58:16.631)
Yes.
Ana Mourao (58:27.731)
Yeah.
Ana Mourao (58:38.381)
Thank you for having me. Thank you so much.
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