The State Of Marketing 2030 Report Deep Dive
Today we released The State of Marketing Report 2030. It was a report my Marketing Unfiltered co-creator, our friends over at The CMO Circle, and Customer.io collaborated on.
We surveyed 130 senior Marketing leaders on with a series of questions. Some of the questions were free field and others were scored 1-6.
I ran the analysis on the project, and I wanted to share my top takeaways:
1. AI's Transformative Potential in Marketing
Biggest Value of AI: The primary values marketers expect from AI are efficiency/efficiencies in answer (23 mentions), Speed in answer (25 mentions), and Automation in answer (10 mentions). This indicates a strong focus on operational improvements and streamlining tasks.
AI's Impact on Tactical Decisions: A significant portion of respondents (66%) believe that by 2030, AI will be making most tactical decisions.
AI's Role in Creative Design: While there is a strong belief in AI's tactical impact, only 38% believe AI will be making most creative design and visual decisions by 2030, suggesting a nuanced view on AI's creative capabilities.
Expect these areas to change over the next 12-18 months while companies adopt AI more successfully. We are currently in stage 2 of the AI adoption curve:
1/ Hype Fear
2/ AI Experimentation
3/ AI Enablement
4/ AI Adoption
This is a slide from my upcoming AI Marketing conference talk
2. Evolving Marketing Landscape
Emerging AI-Specific Roles: There's a clear expectation for new roles related to AI, with "AI specific answers" being mentioned by 79 respondents. This includes roles like "AI Marketing," "AI Prompt Engineers," and "AI SEO specialists."
Channels Expected to Increase: Marketers anticipate an increase in channels like "AIEO/GEO in answer" (31 mentions) and "IRL Meetups, anything with humans." This suggests a dual focus on AI-driven insights and human-centric interactions.
Channels Expected to Shrink: "SEO in Answer" (46 mentions) and "Paid in answer" (10 mentions) are perceived as channels that will shrink. This aligns with the idea that AI will automate or optimize tasks currently handled by these channels.
Roles Expected to Disappear: Roles expected to disappear include "Any boring roles that have to just cover tech/platforms" and "Traditional roles," indicating a shift away from repetitive, manual tasks.
3. Positive Marketer Sentiment Despite Concerns
Career Recommendation: A high percentage of respondents (78%) would recommend a marketing career, with 46% strongly agreeing. This indicates a generally positive outlook on the profession.
Job Enjoyment: 76% of marketers enjoy their job more now than at the start of their career, with 43% strongly agreeing. This suggests increasing job satisfaction over time.
Longevity Concerns: Despite the positive sentiment, 57% of marketers worry about the longevity of their future, with 20% strongly agreeing. This could be attributed to the rapid changes brought about by AI and evolving industry demands.
4. Marketing Influence and Budget
Influence in the C-Suite: 68% of marketers believe marketing has more influence in the C-suite, with 31% strongly agreeing. This suggests a growing recognition of marketing's strategic importance.
Budget Expectations: A majority of marketers (74%) expect their marketing budget to increase, with 31% strongly agreeing. This aligns with the perceived growth and importance of marketing.
These trends highlight a dynamic marketing landscape where AI is a significant driver of change, leading to both opportunities for new roles and channels, and concerns about the future of existing ones.
Despite these shifts, the Marketing leaders generally maintained a positive outlook on their careers and the increasing influence of their discipline.
Interesting Insights From 20+ Years of Service In Marketing
Here is the breakdown of the experience levels from the respondents - from 10 years to 35 years of experience.
There was a wide spread of experience levels in the report from a decade of experience to over 30 years experience.
AI = Speed, Not Strategy: Long-tenured leaders repeatedly single out AI’s power to slash manual work—“do better marketing faster,” “save thousands of hours,” “speed of project delivery.” Yet many caution that strategic thinking, brand storytelling and human creativity remain irreplaceable.
Junior Roles on the Chopping Block: Those with two decades or more of experience are the most vocal about junior, execution-heavy jobs (copywriters, designers, SEO/PPC specialists) disappearing or merging, while senior hybrid “AI strategist” or “creative agent director” roles emerge.
Brand Resurgence Over Pure Performance: Seasoned CMOs argue that over-reliance on performance channels has hit a wall; they predict a swing back to brand, community and IRL experiences as key growth levers—even as traditional search and display budgets shrink.
Humans Still Crave Human: Despite their tech optimism, veterans consistently pick events, meet-ups and partnerships as growth channels, suggesting digital saturation is reviving appetite for face-to-face brand moments.
Data Clean-Up Worries: Several 20-year-plus respondents complain that attribution is “less and less 1:1 trackable” and call for in-house RevOps or AI-driven measurement to prove marketing value—hinting at a data-trust crisis even among experts.
Interesting Insights From Those Under 20 Years of Service: What Stands Out (AI Assisted)
AI as a Personalisation Engine: “Mid-career leaders” (11-18 yrs) rave about “hyper-personalisation,” “audience-of-one” messaging and conversational search. Others in the same cohort caution that ultra-targeting can feel creepy and erode trust.
Dark-Social & Community First: Channels such as Discord, Reddit, WhatsApp threads and private forums top their “growth” lists, seen as antidotes to ad fatigue. Sceptics argue these spaces are tough to measure and can’t yet replace reach from classic paid media.
SEO’s Coming Identity Crisis: A striking number predict traditional SEO will “shrink” or “evolve to GEO/AI search,” while a vocal minority insists organic search fundamentals “stay the same—only the interface changes.”
Rise of the Hybrid Tech-Marketer: New titles floated:
“Marketing engineer,”
“GTM architect,”
“AI search-optimisation lead”, blend coding, data and brand craft.
Dissenters say roles won’t actually change, only the skill mix inside existing job families.
Events Make a Comeback?: Despite digital zeal, many under-19-year pros prioritise IRL events for human connection.
The Counterpoint: Some report budgets shifting away from costly physical gatherings toward high-ROI virtual experiences.Brand Still Beats Pure Performance: This cohort, raised during performance-marketing’s boom, now warns that “performance without brand focus” stalls long-term growth—even as a few staunch performance advocates bet on AI to keep CPA low.
Junior Roles in the Firing Line: Consistent theme that entry-level designers, copywriters and data analysts will be “replaced by agents.”
Yet several respondents counter that good juniors become tomorrow’s strategists—and eliminating them erodes the talent pipeline.Speed vs. Quality Anxiety: Automation promises “thousands of hours saved,” but some fear that mass AI content will lower quality unless brands invest in distinctive creative oversight.
Strategic Alignment Obsession: Many emphasise tighter linkage to P&L, RevOps and executive decision-making, moving marketing from “tactical option list” to growth engine. A minority still view marketing primarily as comms, not commercial strategy.
Sentiment Broken Down
Here's a summary of CMOs' sentiment about the future and their views on the importance of various marketing channels:
Overall Sentiment About the Future:
Positive Outlook on Budget Growth: A majority of CMOs (56.69%) anticipate an increase in their marketing budget, indicating a positive outlook on future resource allocation.
Mixed Feelings on Job Longevity: Sentiment regarding job longevity is mixed, with 45.67% of CMOs expressing a negative sentiment about remaining in the same job in two years, while 33.86% hold a positive view.
Less Worry About Future Longevity: Most CMOs (62.20%) express a positive sentiment regarding the longevity of their future, suggesting a general lack of significant worry.
The overall sentiment regarding new roles in the marketing field, as expressed in the column '1 low - 6 high/what new roles do you think will be created', is largely positive and forward-looking.
The responses indicate a strong belief that AI will be a primary driver of new job creation and transformation within the industry.
Here are the key takeaways summarised:
AI-Driven Role Creation:
Many respondents anticipate the emergence of new roles directly related to Artificial Intelligence, such as "AI managers," "AI prompt engineers," "AI strategists," and "AI content specialists."
This suggests a proactive approach to adapting to technological advancements, with a focus on leveraging AI for increased efficiency and innovation.
Shift Towards Strategic and Analytical Functions:
There's a clear expectation for more strategic and analytical roles, including "More strategy-focused roles," "More data analysis and insights," "Creative strategist," "Data architect," and "GTM engineer."
This suggests a potential shift where AI handles more tactical execution, enabling human marketers to concentrate on higher-level planning and analysis.
Focus on Customer Experience and Integration:
New roles like "Chief Experience Officer," "Head of Customer Journey," and "Community marketing manager" highlight an increased emphasis on holistic customer experience and direct engagement.
Some responses also suggest a consolidation of roles, with professionals leading AI tools across multiple disciplines, leading to more integrated and comprehensive positions.
