Marketing & AI: SB Group Insights 2019-2025

Introduction

SB GROUP 2019 – March 2025 Briefing Document: Marketing and AI

Date: March 11, 2025

Chair: Ed Robinson

This briefing document summarizes the key themes, ideas, and facts presented in the provided sources, focusing on the intersection of marketing and Artificial Intelligence, emerging digital marketing trends, and the importance of measuring marketing ROI. It also includes information regarding the Vistage Group’s operational guidelines and future meeting schedule.

I. The Transformative Impact of AI on Marketing

Artificial Intelligence is poised to fundamentally reshape the marketing landscape, bringing both opportunities and challenges.

• Significant Automation and Role Changes: “AI will handle 95% of what marketers use agencies, strategists, marketing, and creative professionals for today.” This quote from Sam Altman highlights the potential for massive automation. While jobs will be different and potentially uncomfortable for many, AI is ultimately viewed as a “job enabler, and a job creator.”
• Enhanced Digital Strategies: AI can “supercharge your digital marketing to growth your organization” by offering practical strategies for:
• Generating high-quality website content.
• Conducting in-depth SEO research.
• Optimizing Pay Per Click (PPC) campaigns.
• Analyzing competitor websites.
• Crafting compelling landing pages.
• Improving website performance with AI-powered HTML recommendations.
• Hyper-personalized ads that adjust in real-time.
• Optimizing email campaigns based on user behavior (timing, content, frequency).
• Rapidly advancing e-commerce interfaces.
• AI Agents for Campaign Management: The concept of “NoGood’s “AI agents” will autonomously manage cross-channel campaigns,” leveraging machine learning for optimization. This suggests a future where AI handles complex, multi-platform ad operations.
• AI’s Limitations and Human Imperatives:Current AI models “can’t think like we do” and operate well on small amounts of information. Marketers should focus on “elements that are more creative and strategic” while AI handles more routine tasks.
• AI poses a “threatens introverts” as large language models excel at tasks traditionally associated with introverted professions (reading, writing, programming). Marketers are advised to be empathetic and suggest cultivating “classically extroverted activities like inspiring people, playing team sports and closing big deals.”
• The “human touch” remains crucial, especially in sectors like healthcare and finance where empathy is critical. Misuse or over-reliance on AI can backfire, with one Spotify campaign seeing a 15% drop in engagement when users learned playlist descriptions were machine-written.
• Bias and discrimination are significant concerns, as AI models trained on historical data can perpetuate societal biases (e.g., mortgage lenders excluding minority neighborhoods, resume-screening tools downgrading applicants from non-Western universities).
• Best Practices for AI Implementation:Strategic Alignment: Define clear objectives (e.g., boosting engagement, reducing ad spend) and audit existing strategies to identify high-impact AI applications.
• Data Governance: Centralize and integrate data from various systems (CRM, social media, transactional) to train AI models, ensuring privacy compliance and data accuracy.
• Pilot Testing: Launch small-scale pilots to evaluate AI tools before full deployment.
• Ethical AI: Embed ethical safeguards, such as bias detection algorithms and audit trails, to comply with regulations.

II. Key Digital Marketing Trends for 2025

The digital marketing landscape is constantly evolving, requiring marketers to stay adaptable and curious.

• The Battle Between Real-Time Platforms:X (formerly Twitter) is experiencing a decline in popularity due to “poor content, low engagement, and moderation issues.”
• BlueSky, created by Jack Dorsey, is attracting users valuing “ad-free spaces, content control, and niche communities,” targeting journalists, publishers, and creators. While gaining attention, it currently has a relatively small global membership of 24 million.
• Meta’s Threads is positioning itself to empower content creators and has a significantly larger user base of 275 million. It offers simplicity and opportunities for organic content, with future monetization plans once it reaches one billion users.
• The Demise of the Third-Party Browser Cookie: Despite Google’s delayed phase-out, “Advertisers have already moved on.” The majority of digital ad spend is now on mobile apps and streaming TV, which don’t use cookies. The proposed opt-in for web tracking could reduce cookie-driven web ads to below 10%. Marketers need “more first-party data, gathered with consent, to win.”
• Consumers are More Narcissistic: Marketers should embrace this “ordinary self-centeredness” as an opportunity, as marketing itself is “somewhat narcissistic.” This trend influenced successful campaigns like Old Spice’s “Swagger.”
• Every Business is Now in Show Business: Businesses, even B2B software companies, must compete for attention with entertainment. Salesforce’s Dreamforce event, featuring celebrities and “shows,” exemplifies this shift, emphasizing the need for immersive brand experiences and compelling content.
• Shift in Search Behavior:Consumers are increasingly turning to social platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube for search queries, especially Gen Z. “Social search has become a big thing.”
• The rise of generative AI conversational searches allows natural language queries, providing “AI Overviews” with key information and links.
• Voice search continues to grow, with 51% of voice shoppers researching products and 22% buying directly using voice. Brands need to find ways to “slip into voice search” through local SEO, keywords, and conversational content.
• Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is emerging, focusing on optimizing content for visibility in AI-driven search results from platforms like Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Copilot, and Gemini.
• Focus on the Customer Journey and Personalization: Marketers need to weave themselves into consumers’ “splintered lives on our own terms,” including social and streaming feeds via influencers and data-driven ad targeting. This means “removing friction everywhere we can, through shoppable ads, QR codes on TV screens or simply a one-tap checkout or a more thumb-friendly app.”
• The Arrival of Gen Alpha: Born between 2010 and 2025, Gen Alpha are “upagers” who are socially aware and become consumers quickly. Their priorities include helping people, equality, diversity, and sustainability. Marketers need to consider new ways to engage them, potentially through gamification and community engagement that align with social values.

III. Small Business Marketing Insights and Strategies

Small businesses face unique challenges and opportunities in their marketing efforts.

• Common Challenges: Obtaining new leads and customers, and making budgets stretch.
• Marketing Budget Allocations:Businesses with 10 or fewer employees are 31% more likely to have a marketing budget under $500 a month and often lack full-time marketing staff.
• Most local businesses spend 5-10% of revenue on marketing; growing businesses may spend 14%+.
• SEO: $1,000-$5,000/month for small/local businesses; $5,000-$10,000/month for medium; $10,000-$20,000/month for larger brands.
• Social Media: Approximately 15% of the marketing budget.
• 49% of small businesses plan to increase marketing budgets in 2025, with 71% aiming for more leads and sales.
• Over half (51%) plan to invest more in social media ads and content marketing; 47% in search advertising and video marketing.
• Advertising Insights:65% of people click on search ads when looking to purchase, yet only 40% of small businesses use them – a missed opportunity.
• Average Google Ads cost per click for small businesses is $4.66.
• 22% of businesses use display ads.
• Social Media Dominance:76% of small businesses use Facebook, followed by Instagram (63%) and LinkedIn (43%).
• 93% of internet users are on social media.
• 91% of consumers access social media on mobile devices, emphasizing mobile-first strategies.
• Nearly half of social media users rely on brand recommendations from influencers.
• Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Importance:Only 25% of people go past the first page of Google search results, highlighting the critical need for top rankings.
• 46% of all Google searches are for a local product or service.
• Email Marketing as a High ROI Channel:Email marketing returns $36-$40 for every $1 spent, making it the highest ROI marketing channel for small businesses.
• 47% of recipients open emails based on the subject line alone (average 53 characters; 82% under 60 characters).
• 87% of small businesses use email for content distribution.
• 78% consider email important to overall company success.
• Personalized emails increase open rates by 26%; adding a first name to the subject line boosts open rates by 9.1%.
• Over half of businesses send emails 2-4 times per month, with 50% of people buying from a marketing email at least once a month.
• 88% of users check email multiple times daily.
• Website Presence is Crucial:53% of all small business website traffic comes from organic searches.
• Businesses that blog get 55% more website traffic.
• Visitors form an opinion about a website in about half a second.
• Websites with superior user experience generate a 400% higher conversion rate.
• Nearly 60% of people wouldn’t recommend a business with a poorly designed mobile website.
• 70% of small business websites are missing a call to action on their homepage.
• Marketing Automation: Over 75% of businesses use marketing automation, highlighting its growing importance for efficiency.
• Strategic Marketing Checklist (Small Businesses):High-Impact (Tier 1): Strategic positioning, advanced SEO (featured snippets, AI tools for content, backlinks, voice search), better marketing measurement (CLTV, CAC, profit margins), smarter content (original research, reusable formats), customer experience (unified database, personalization, CRM), sales alignment (lead scoring, full journey tracking), and AI-enhanced marketing (predicting leads, testing creative, personalization, competitive intelligence).
• Medium-Impact (Tier 2): Competitor review analysis, market research, bold content, advanced SEO (JavaScript, site speed, content structure), churn analysis, customer grouping, clear AI vs. human content strategy, customer feedback programs.
• Lower-Impact (Tier 3): Content repurposing, content calendars, gradual customer data collection, coordinated communications, limited ad frequency, retargeting, standardized data, cross-device customer recognition, live shopping features, Web3 engagement, AI sentiment analysis, automated social media posting.

IV. Measuring Marketing Return on Investment (ROI)

Understanding and accurately calculating marketing ROI is essential for justifying spend and optimizing campaigns.

• Definition: ROI measures the difference between marketing spend and the revenue generated, expressed as a percentage.
• Basic formula: ROI = (Marketing revenue – marketing spend) / marketing spend x 100
• Importance of ROI:Proves Profitability: Establishes whether marketing campaigns are generating sufficient revenue to justify costs.
• Calculates Growth Potential: Identifies profitable strategies worth increasing investment. For example, if PPC has a higher ROI than SEO, it suggests allocating more budget to PPC.
• Protects Marketing Budget: Helps pinpoint underperforming or negative ROI strategies, allowing for optimization or pausing to save funds.
• Attributes Success & Failure: Provides an accountable measure for testing new strategies, demonstrating successes, identifying failures, and learning lessons.
• Pros of ROI:Simplicity and Clarity: Easy to understand as a revenue-to-spend ratio.
• Fast Comparisons: Quickly compare the effectiveness of different strategies or campaigns.
• Universal Applicability: Can be applied across all levels of marketing activity.
• Cons and Limitations of ROI:Difficult to Calculate Accurately: The biggest challenge is attribution – proving the value of every individual touchpoint (e.g., blog posts, ad views, email campaigns) to final sales. Tracking codes are not infallible, and intangible interactions (brand awareness from ad impressions) are hard to measure.
• Unreliable Prediction Model: ROI measures past performance, not future predictions. Doubling investment does not necessarily double return due to the law of diminishing returns. Many external variables can skew results.
• Can Lead to Poor Decisions: Over-reliance on ROI can lead marketers to pause crucial campaigns that don’t directly generate sales but build brand awareness or support other channels, ultimately reducing overall sales.
• Not the Only Metric: ROI is useful for efficiency but should not be the sole KPI. Marketers often prioritize operational efficiencies (e.g., faster content production) over actual business outcomes (lead quality, sales).
• Other Important Metrics and KPIs (Beyond ROI):Profit (gross, operating, net) and Profit Margin.
• Operating Expenses.
• Market Share.
• Growth Rate.
• Cost per Acquisition.
• Customer Lifetime Value (CLTV).
• Customer Retention.
• Churn Rate.
• These metrics provide a more “rounded picture of marketing profitability” and lead to more accurate predictions and informed decisions.

V. Vistage Group Operations and Schedule

The Vistage Group operates under a defined code of conduct and organizational structure to maximize member experience and performance.

• Code of Conduct:Start and end meetings on time.
• Members process at least 2 issues per year, using prepared forms.
• 75% annual meeting attendance is required; three absences trigger group discussion.
• Financial dashboards must be submitted 48 hours before meetings, even if absent.
• Absent members review check-ins and audio recordings, sending a follow-up email.
• One group retreat per year is required.
• Members must be PRESENT and fully participate, avoiding distractions.
• Operate with highest respect, strict confidentiality, and commitment to truth and acting in others’ best interest.
• “Don’t shoot the messenger” mentality; avoid taking things personally.
• If not benefiting, talk to the group before leaving.
• Group Committees: Designed to work with the Chair to maximize the Vistage Group experience and achieve high-performance objectives. Terms are annual, not exceeding two consecutive years.
• Accountability Committee: Ensures members and Chair adhere to group expectations (ground rules, attendance, check-ins, financial dashboards, issue processing follow-up, speaker prep, evaluations, annual goals).
• Quality Committee: Maintains the high quality of the Vistage experience (Executive Sessions, Best Practice Discussions, Speakers, Issue Processing, Host Presentations, Tiger Teams, leveraging Vistage Resources, Group Retreat).
• Recruiting Committee: Ensures group slots are full (16 members) and vets quality members (membership composition needs, welcoming guests, screening new members, group recruiting activities, onboarding new members).
• 2025 Meeting Schedule Highlights:March 11, 2025: All Day Executive Session hosted by Brian Blood.
• Speaker Meetings: Include Dr. Kent Wessinger (Leading Younger Workforce, Feb-25), K. Scott Crawford (Financial Headlights, Jun-25), and Adam Nemer (Workplace Mental Health, Dec-25, Joint Group).
• Executive Sessions: Numerous throughout the year (March, April, May, July, August, October, November).
• Goal Planning Presentation: January 14, 2025.
• Chair: Ed Robinson is noted as the Chair for the March 11, 2025 meeting and host of the December 2025 Joint Group Speaker Meeting.

SB Group 2019 – March 2025: Marketing and AI Study Guide

I. Key Concepts and Themes

This study guide covers topics related to digital marketing trends, the impact of AI on marketing, small business marketing strategies, and the importance of measuring marketing ROI.

A. The Evolving Landscape of Marketing

• AI’s Transformative Role: AI is predicted to handle a significant percentage of marketing tasks and fundamentally change inbound marketing, job roles, and problem-solving approaches. It’s viewed as both a job enabler and creator.
• Mega-Trends for 2025:Consumer Narcissism: Marketers should embrace consumers’ self-centeredness as an opportunity for more personalized and attention-grabbing campaigns.
• Demise of Third-Party Cookies: Advertisers are shifting to channels like mobile apps and streaming TV that don’t rely on cookies, requiring new strategies for data collection (e.g., first-party data with consent).
• AI and Introverts: AI excels at tasks traditionally associated with introverted activities (reading, writing, programming), potentially impacting marketing team dynamics.
• Every Business as Show Business: Companies, even B2B software, need to compete for attention with entertainment, requiring more engaging and immersive marketing experiences.
• Digital Marketing Trends for 2025:Real-time Platform Battle: The decline of X and the rise of BlueSky and Threads as alternative social platforms.
• AI Integration: AI’s increasing role in content creation, SEO, PPC, competitor analysis, landing page optimization, email marketing, hyper-personalized ads, and e-commerce interfaces.
• Human Skills in Demand: Despite AI, “human” skills like collaborative problem-solving and soft skills remain crucial.
• Evolving Search Behavior: Shift from traditional search engines to social platforms (TikTok, Instagram, YouTube) for search, and the rise of generative AI conversational searches.
• Voice Search Growth: Increasing use of voice assistants for product research, purchases, and complex queries, emphasizing the need for conversational content and local SEO.
• Generative Engine Optimization (GEO): Optimizing content for AI-driven search results (Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, etc.).
• Gen Alpha: Understanding the priorities (helping people, equality, diversity, sustainability) and preferences (gamification) of this emerging consumer cohort.

B. Marketing Strategy and Implementation

• Vistage Group Committees:Accountability Committee: Ensures adherence to group rules, attendance, check-ins, financial dashboards, issue processing, and evaluation completion.
• Quality Committee: Focuses on maintaining high-quality Vistage experience through executive sessions, best practice discussions, speakers, and group retreats.
• Recruiting Committee: Aims to maintain full group membership by vetting quality members, welcoming guests, screening new members, and onboarding.
• Small Business Marketing Strategies:Budget Allocation: Most local businesses spend 5-10% of revenue on marketing, growing businesses up to 14%+. Significant planned increases in marketing budgets for 2025, especially in social media ads and content marketing.
• Advertising: High click-through rates for search ads, but underutilized by small businesses.
• Social Media: Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn are dominant platforms. Mobile device access to social media is high. Influencer recommendations are impactful.
• SEO: Importance of ranking high on search results (75% of users don’t go past page one). Voice search results are concise. Local SEO is crucial.
• Email Marketing: High ROI ($36-40 for every $1 spent), often seen as the highest ROI channel by small businesses. Subject lines are critical, personalization boosts open rates.
• Website: First impressions matter (0.5 seconds to form an opinion). Good user experience leads to higher conversion rates. Mobile optimization is essential. Call-to-action on homepages is often missing.
• Small Business Marketing Strategy Checklist:Tier 1 (High-Impact): Strategic positioning, advanced SEO (featured snippets, AI tools, backlinks, voice search), better marketing measurement (CLTV, CAC, profit margins), smarter content strategy (original research, content mapping, repurposing), customer experience improvement (unified database, personalization, CRM), AI-enhanced marketing (predict high-converting leads, automate personalization, competitive intelligence).
• Tier 2 (Medium-Impact): Competitor review analysis, market research, bold content, JavaScript SEO, site speed optimization, customer churn analysis, content experiments, structured feedback programs, evaluating new tools, alternative social platforms, spatial computing, AI budget allocation.
• Tier 3 (Lower-Impact/Efficiency): Content repurposing, content calendar, gradual data collection, coordinated communications, limited ad frequency, retargeting, standardized data, cross-device customer recognition, live shopping, Web3 engagement, automatic sentiment analysis, automated social posting.

C. Measuring Marketing Performance

• Marketing ROI:Definition: Measures revenue generated in exchange for total marketing spend.
• Formula: (Marketing revenue – marketing spend) / marketing spend x 100.
• Importance: Proves profitability, calculates growth potential, protects budgets, attributes success and failure.
• Pros: Quantifiable, simple comparison, universal applicability.
• Cons: Difficult to calculate accurately (attribution issues), unreliable as a prediction model (diminishing returns, external variables), can be misused (pausing crucial supporting campaigns).
• Not Overrated but Misunderstood: ROI is a useful gauge of efficiency but has limitations and should not be the sole KPI.
• Other Important Metrics & KPIs: Profit (gross, operating, net), profit margin, operating expenses, market share, growth rate, cost per acquisition (CPA), customer lifetime value (CLTV), customer retention, churn rate.
• Best Practices for Implementing AI in Marketing:Strategic Alignment and Goal Setting
• Data Governance and Integration
• Pilot Testing and Iteration
• Ethical AI and Regulatory Compliance
• Autonomous AI Marketing Agents

D. Challenges and Considerations with AI in Marketing

• Authenticity and Empathy: AI struggles with genuine human empathy and creativity; disclosed AI use can reduce engagement.
• Bias and Discrimination: AI models trained on historical data can perpetuate societal biases, leading to discriminatory outcomes.
• Misaligned KPIs: AI’s multi-touch influence makes traditional metrics difficult; AI optimization may boost operational efficiency but not directly impact sales if KPIs are misaligned.
• Overemphasis on Vanity Metrics: Focusing on AI’s operational efficiencies (e.g., faster content production) over actual business outcomes (e.g., lead quality).

II. Quiz

Instructions: Answer each question in 2-3 sentences.

1. According to Sam Altman, what significant impact will AI have on the marketing industry?
2. What are two emerging social media platforms mentioned as gaining ground while X declines, and what is a key difference in their user numbers?
3. What is one major marketing trend for 2025 related to consumer behavior, and how should marketers approach it?
4. Briefly explain the primary purpose of the Vistage Accountability Committee.
5. What is the basic formula for calculating Marketing ROI, and why is it considered difficult to calculate accurately?
6. List two “human” skills that remain important for marketers despite the rise of AI.
7. How does the source describe the shift in search behavior for consumers, particularly for Gen Z?
8. What is the average range of marketing budget allocation for local businesses as a percentage of their revenue?
9. Identify two potential downsides or challenges of relying too heavily on AI in marketing, as discussed in the source.
10. What is Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), and why is it becoming important for marketers?

III. Answer Key

1. Sam Altman states that AI will handle 95% of what marketers currently use agencies, strategists, marketing, and creative professionals for. He also believes it will fundamentally transform inbound marketing, change jobs, and serve as both a job enabler and creator.
2. BlueSky and Threads are two emerging social media platforms. Threads has significantly more users (275 million) compared to BlueSky (24 million), making it a much larger competitor to X.
3. One major trend is increased consumer narcissism, not pathological, but ordinary self-centeredness. Marketers should embrace this by creating content that appeals to this self-focus, such as using “swagger” or designing highly personalized experiences.
4. The Vistage Accountability Committee’s primary purpose is to ensure that all Vistage members and the Chair consistently follow through on their commitments and adhere to the group’s established expectations and ground rules. This includes monitoring attendance, financial dashboards, and issue processing.
5. The basic ROI formula is (Marketing revenue – marketing spend) / marketing spend x 100. It’s considered difficult to calculate accurately primarily due to attribution challenges, as it’s hard to precisely track and assign value to every marketing touchpoint that contributes to a final sale.
6. Two human skills that remain important for marketers are ‘collaborative problem-solving,’ which was named the top marketing skill of the year, and other soft skills such as active listening. These are crucial because AI currently struggles with tasks requiring empathy and complex human interaction.
7. Consumers are increasingly turning to social platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube for searches, rather than solely relying on traditional search engines. There’s also a rise in generative AI conversational searches, allowing users to ask complex, spoken queries for direct answers.
8. Most local businesses typically allocate about 5-10% of their revenue towards marketing. However, for growing businesses, this percentage can climb higher, potentially reaching 14% or more.
9. Two potential downsides of relying too heavily on AI in marketing include issues with authenticity and empathy, as AI-generated content can reduce engagement if users perceive it as inauthentic. Another challenge is the perpetuation of bias and discrimination, as AI models trained on historical data can unintentionally exclude minority groups or discriminate in applications like resume screening.
10. Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is the process of optimizing website content to improve its visibility in AI-driven search results from platforms like Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, and Gemini. It’s becoming important because a large percentage of consumers are expected to use AI-enhanced search, making it a critical channel for discoverability.

IV. Essay Format Questions

1. Discuss the dual nature of AI as both a job enabler and creator, as well as a potential threat to certain “introverted” skills within marketing. How should marketing teams adapt their strategies and cultivate skills to navigate this evolving landscape?
2. Analyze the significance of the “demise of the third-party browser cookie” and the rise of new social platforms (BlueSky, Threads) for digital marketing in 2025. What challenges and opportunities do these shifts present for advertisers, and how might they adjust their data collection and platform strategies?
3. Evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of using Marketing ROI as a primary Key Performance Indicator (KPI). What other metrics and considerations should marketers integrate alongside ROI to gain a comprehensive understanding of their campaign performance and profitability?
4. Given the “8 Mega-Trends That Matter For Marketing In 2025,” select two trends and elaborate on their potential impact on small businesses. Provide specific examples from the study guide of how small businesses can leverage or mitigate the effects of these trends.
5. The “Small Business Marketing Strategy Checklist” categorizes strategies into Tier 1 (High-Impact), Tier 2 (Medium-Impact), and Tier 3 (Lower-Impact/Efficiency). Choose one strategy from each tier that you believe is most crucial for a small business focused on sustained growth and customer retention. Justify your choices by explaining why each selected strategy is vital and how they collectively contribute to long-term success.

V. Glossary of Key Terms

• AI (Artificial Intelligence): The simulation of human intelligence processes by machines, especially computer systems. In marketing, it refers to tools and systems that automate and optimize tasks like content creation, data analysis, and ad targeting.
• Attribution: The process of identifying the marketing touchpoints that contribute to a conversion or sale. A challenge in accurately calculating marketing ROI.
• Brand Loyalty: The tendency of consumers to continuously purchase products from a particular brand over others. Hyper-personalized experiences, often enabled by AI, can increase this.
• Browser Cookie (Third-Party): Small pieces of data stored on a user’s computer by a website they visit, often used by third-party advertisers for tracking user behavior across different sites. Its demise necessitates new tracking methods.
• CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost): The cost associated with convincing a consumer to buy a product or service. A key metric for marketing measurement.
• Churn Rate: The percentage of customers who stop doing business with a company over a given period.
• CLTV (Customer Lifetime Value): A prediction of the net profit attributed to the entire future relationship with a customer. A crucial metric for long-term marketing strategy.
• Content Marketing: A strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience.
• CRM (Customer Relationship Management): Software and processes used to manage and analyze customer interactions and data throughout the customer lifecycle, with the goal of improving business relationships.
• Display Ads: Visual advertisements, such as images, videos, or animations, that appear on websites or apps.
• First-Party Data: Data collected directly from a company’s own customers through their interactions with the brand’s website, apps, emails, or CRM. Becoming more important with the decline of third-party cookies.
• Gamification: The application of game-design elements and game principles in non-game contexts, often used in marketing to drive engagement, particularly with younger generations like Gen Alpha.
• Gen Alpha: The demographic cohort following Generation Z, typically born between 2010 and 2025. Characterized as “upagers” who are socially aware and become consumers more quickly.
• Gen Z: The demographic cohort following Millennials, typically born between the mid-1990s and early 2010s. Known for their high engagement with social media and video platforms.
• Generative AI: A type of artificial intelligence that can produce various types of content, including text, images, audio, and synthetic data, often in response to prompts.
• Generative Engine Optimization (GEO): The process of optimizing website content to improve its visibility and ranking in AI-driven search results (e.g., Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT).
• Inbound Marketing: A business methodology that attracts customers by creating valuable content and experiences tailored to them.
• Issue Processing (Vistage): A structured method within Vistage group meetings for members to present and discuss business challenges or opportunities to receive feedback and solutions from the group.
• KPI (Key Performance Indicator): A measurable value that demonstrates how effectively a company is achieving key business objectives.
• Large Language Models (LLMs): Advanced AI models trained on vast amounts of text data, capable of understanding, generating, and processing human language (e.g., OpenAI’s GPT, Claude, Gemini).
• Law of Diminishing Returns: An economic principle stating that in all productive processes, adding more of one factor of production, while holding all others constant, will at some point yield lower per-unit returns. Relevant to marketing spend not always producing linear ROI.
• Lead Scoring: A methodology used to rank prospects against a scale, typically in terms of their perceived value to the organization. Helps prioritize high-value leads for sales teams.
• Local SEO: The practice of optimizing a business’s online presence to rank higher in local search results (e.g., “restaurants near me”). Crucial for businesses with physical locations.
• Marketing ROI (Return on Investment): A metric that measures the profitability or efficiency of a marketing campaign or activity by comparing the revenue generated to the marketing spend.
• PPC (Pay-Per-Click): An internet advertising model in which advertisers pay a fee each time one of their ads is clicked. Primarily associated with search engine advertising.
• Sentiment Analysis: The process of computationally identifying and categorizing opinions expressed in a piece of text, often used to understand customer feedback or social media mentions.
• SEO (Search Engine Optimization): The process of improving the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine’s unpaid results.
• Social Search: The use of social media platforms (e.g., TikTok, Instagram) as a primary source for discovering information, products, or services, complementing or replacing traditional search engines.
• Soft Skills: Personal attributes that enable someone to interact effectively and harmoniously with other people, such as communication, collaboration, and empathy. Increasingly valued in marketing.
• Spatial Computing: A concept that merges physical and digital realities, allowing users to interact with digital content in a three-dimensional physical space. Can create immersive brand experiences.
• USP (Unique Selling Proposition): The unique benefit a company offers to its customers that makes it stand out from its competitors.
• Vistage: A peer advisory group and executive coaching organization where CEOs, business owners, and key executives meet to help each other solve problems and grow their businesses.
• Voice Search: The use of voice commands to perform web searches on devices like smartphones, smart speakers, or virtual assistants.
• Web3: An idea for a new iteration of the World Wide Web based on blockchain technology, decentralization, and token-based economics. Offers new avenues for niche audience engagement.

Timeline of Main Events

2010 – 2025 (Ongoing):

• Birth of Generation Alpha: This generation, born between 2010 and 2025, is identified as “upagers” who are socially aware at a young age and become consumers quickly. Marketers are urged to understand this cohort, their values (helping people, treating everyone the same, diversity, sustainability), and how to engage them, potentially through gamification.

2019:

• Vistage Group 2019 Established: The “SB GROUP 2019” document implies the formation or continued operation of this Vistage group, with established codes of conduct and committee objectives.

September (Specific Year Unspecified, but likely 2023):

• Salesforce’s Dreamforce Event: Held in San Francisco, this event showcased the growing trend of businesses incorporating “show business” elements into their conferences, featuring celebrities and live performances.

November 14, 2024:

• “92 Small Business Marketing Stats You Need to Know” Published: Susie Marino authors an article compiling statistics to help small businesses optimize their marketing decisions, covering budget allocation, advertising, social media, and email marketing.

January 2, 2025:

• “8 Mega-Trends That Matter For Marketing In 2025” Published: Martin Kihn writes for Forbes Communications Council, highlighting key trends like the persistent influence of AI, consumer narcissism, the demise of the third-party browser cookie, and the rise of “show business” in marketing.
• “What are the Digital Marketing Trends for 2025?” Published: The Digital Marketing Institute releases an article detailing major digital marketing trends for the year, including the pervasive impact of AI, the battle between real-time social platforms (BlueSky, Threads vs. X), the importance of soft skills for marketers, social search, voice search, and generative engine optimization (GEO).

January 14, 2025:

• SB Group 2019 – January Meeting: A “GOAL PLANNING PRESENTATION MEETING” hosted by Jeff Thorn.

February 11, 2025:

• SB Group 2019 – February Speaker Meeting: Dr. Kent Wessinger presents on “How to Confidently Lead, Motivate and Keep Your Younger Workforce Accountable,” hosted by David McPeak.

March 11, 2025:

• SB Group 2019 – March Meeting: An “ALL DAY EXECUTIVE SESSION” chaired by Ed Robinson and hosted by Brian Blood. This meeting includes a speaker presentation by Mike Rosenfeld on “Boosting Bottom Line: AI Digital Strategies for Executives” and a host presentation by Brian.

Throughout 2025 (Anticipated Trends):

• Continued AI Transformation: AI is expected to handle 95% of marketing tasks currently performed by agencies and professionals (Sam Altman quote). It will fundamentally transform inbound marketing and create/enable new jobs.
• Demise of Third-Party Browser Cookie: Despite Google’s past changes, the expectation is that cookie-driven ads on the web will fall below 10%, with advertisers moving to mobile apps and streaming TV.
• AI Threatens Introverts in Marketing: Large Language Models (LLMs) excel at tasks traditionally done by introverts (reading, writing, programming), potentially impacting roles for introverted marketing professionals.
• Rise of AI Agents: “NoGood’s AI agents” are expected to autonomously manage cross-channel campaigns, optimizing marketing efforts through machine learning.
• Increased Small Business Marketing Budgets: 49% of small businesses plan to increase their marketing budgets in 2025, primarily for more leads and sales. Investment is expected to increase in social media ads, content marketing, search advertising, and video marketing.
• Shifting Social Media Landscape: X (formerly Twitter) continues to decline in popularity, with BlueSky and Meta’s Threads gaining ground. Threads is expected to explore monetization through ads once it reaches one billion users.
• Importance of “Human” Skills: Soft skills, particularly “collaborative problem-solving,” are gaining importance in marketing, highlighting the need for marketers to cultivate these alongside technical skills.
• Evolution of Search: Consumers are increasingly turning to social platforms (TikTok, Instagram, YouTube) for searches, and generative AI conversational searches are becoming more prevalent, offering “AI Overviews.”
• Growth of Voice Search: Voice-assisted devices are being used for product research and purchases, leading to expectations for “zero-click shopping” experiences.
• Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) Emerges: The process of optimizing website content for visibility in AI-driven search results from platforms like Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Copilot, and Gemini. Gartner predicts 79% of consumers will use AI-enhanced search within the year.
• Ethical AI and Regulatory Compliance: As AI adoption grows, consumers demand transparency in data usage (65%), and future tools will incorporate ethical safeguards and comply with regulations like the EU AI Act.
• Challenges in Measuring AI ROI: AI’s multi-touch influence makes traditional ROI metrics difficult to apply, and there’s a risk of overemphasizing “vanity metrics” (e.g., faster content production) over actual business outcomes (e.g., lead quality).

July 19, 2023 (Last Updated):

• “ROI Calculator: How to Calculate Marketing ROI” Article Published: Aaron Brooks authors an article defining marketing ROI, providing a calculator, and discussing the pros and cons of using ROI as a KPI, emphasizing its limitations and the importance of using it alongside other metrics.

Cast of Characters

Individuals Mentioned in Vistage Group Documents:

• Ed Robinson: Chair of the SB Group 2019 meeting on March 11, 2025. He is also listed as the host for the Joint Group Speaker Meeting in December 2025.
• Mike Rosenfeld: Speaker at the March 11, 2025, SB Group 2019 meeting, presenting on “Boosting Bottom Line: AI Digital Strategies for Executives.” Described as a thought leader with energy, passion, creativity, and leadership skills, who loves teaching and mentoring.
• Brian Blood: Host of the ALL DAY EXECUTIVE SESSION for SB Group 2019 on March 11, 2025. Also responsible for “Onboarding New Members” as part of the Recruiting Committee.
• Jeff Thorn: Host of the SB Group 2019 “GOAL PLANNING PRESENTATION MEETING” on January 14, 2025.
• Dr. Kent Wessinger: Speaker at the SB Group 2019 meeting on February 11, 2025, discussing “How to Confidently Lead, Motivate and Keep Your Younger Workforce Accountable.”
• David McPeak: Host of the SB Group 2019 speaker meeting on February 11, 2025.
• Jennifer Kerhin: Host of the SB Group 2019 “ALL DAY EXECUTIVE SESSION” at an event venue on April 1, 2025. Also associated with the “Group Retreat” under the Quality Committee.
• Mike O’Neal: Host of the SB Group 2019 “ALL DAY EXECUTIVE SESSION” on May 13, 2025.
• K. Scott Crawford: Speaker at the SB Group 2019 meeting on June 10, 2025, discussing “Turn on the Financial Headlights: Empowering CEOs with forward-looking tools & strategies to see the road ahead.”
• Jim Dunlop: Host of the SB Group 2019 speaker meeting on June 10, 2025.
• Jackie Bates: Host of the SB Group 2019 “ALL DAY EXECUTIVE SESSION” on July 8, 2025.
• David Huff: Host of the SB Group 2019 “ALL DAY EXECUTIVE SESSION” on August 12, 2025.
• Ashly Miller: Host of the SB Group 2019 speaker meeting on September 9, 2025 (speaker TBD).
• Lindsay Klaff: Host of the SB Group 2019 “ALL DAY EXECUTIVE SESSION” on October 14, 2025.
• Brian Znamirowski: Host of the SB Group 2019 “ALL DAY EXECUTIVE SESSION” on November 11, 2025.
• Adam Nemer: Speaker at the Joint Group Speaker Meeting on December 16, 2025, on “Workplace Mental Health Literacy Workshop.”

Digital Marketing Experts & Authors:

• Sam Altman: Quoted stating that “AI will handle 95% of what marketers use agencies, strategists, marketing, and creative professionals for today.”
• Martin Kihn: Author of “8 Mega-Trends That Matter For Marketing In 2025” for Forbes Communications Council, and SVP Strategy, Salesforce Marketing Cloud.
• Susie Marino: Author of “92 Small Business Marketing Stats You Need to Know,” and a senior content marketing specialist at LocaliQ.
• Aaron Brooks: Author of “ROI Calculator: How to Calculate Marketing ROI,” and a copywriter & digital strategist specializing in helping agencies & software companies.
• Marcus Taylor: Founder & CEO, Venture Harbour, who reviewed Aaron Brooks’ “ROI Calculator” article.
• Alison Battisby: Founder of Avocado Social and DMI Lecturer, consulted for the Digital Marketing Institute’s trends piece.
• Mischa McInerney: CMO of the Digital Marketing Institute, consulted for the DMI trends piece, and emphasized the importance of soft skills and convenience in voice search.
• Brian Corish: Founder of AI-focused consultancy, Elemental Intelligence & Digital Marketing Institute Global Champion, consulted for the DMI trends piece.
• Jim Lecinski: Clinical Professor of Marketing at Kellogg School of Management, consulted for the DMI trends piece, providing insights on AI’s limitations and its impact on e-commerce interfaces and Gen Alpha engagement.
• Luke O’Leary: Digital marketing expert consulted for the DMI trends piece, discussing the rise of social search.
• Nikki Lindgren: Digital marketing expert consulted for the DMI trends piece.
• Peter Murphy Lewis: Digital marketing expert consulted for the DMI trends piece.
• Clark Boyd: Digital marketing expert consulted for the DMI trends piece.
• Will Francis: DMI Lecturer and host of the DMI Podcast, consulted for the DMI trends piece.
• Jack Dorsey: Previous founder of X (formerly Twitter) and creator of BlueSky.
• Mark Rober: Founder of Crunch Labs, which designs build boxes to encourage kids to “Think Like an Engineer” using gamification, mentioned as an example for engaging Gen Alpha.

FAQs

1. How is AI expected to transform the marketing landscape in 2025?

AI is projected to profoundly change digital marketing by 2025. Experts like Sam Altman suggest AI could handle 95% of tasks currently performed by agencies, strategists, and creative professionals. It will fundamentally transform inbound marketing and all related activities, forcing marketers to rethink established problems. While it may create discomfort for some, it’s ultimately seen as a job enabler and creator. Mike Rosenfeld’s program, “Boosting Bottom Line: AI Digital Strategies for Executives,” highlights AI’s potential to supercharge digital marketing for organizational growth. This includes using AI for generating high-quality website content, conducting in-depth SEO research, optimizing Pay Per Click (PPC) campaigns, analyzing competitor websites, crafting compelling landing pages, and improving website performance with AI-powered HTML recommendations.

2. What are the key emerging digital marketing trends for 2025, beyond AI?

Beyond AI, several significant digital marketing trends are anticipated for 2025. These include:

• Real-time Platform Battle: A decline in X’s popularity with BlueSky and Threads gaining traction as alternatives, offering ad-free spaces, content control, and community focus.
• Hyper-Personalization and Community Engagement: Brands are focusing on building stronger connections with their closest community members through exclusive experiences and private communications, leveraging AI for hyper-personalized ads, email optimization, and e-commerce interfaces.
• The Demise of Third-Party Cookies: While the “death” of third-party cookies has been prolonged, advertisers have largely moved to channels like mobile apps and streaming TV, which do not rely on them. The future likely involves more consent-based first-party data.
• Rise of Social Search and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO): Consumers, especially Gen Z, are increasingly using social platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube for searches, not just traditional search engines. This also includes the growth of generative AI conversational searches, leading to the importance of optimizing content for AI-driven search results (GEO).
• Growth of Voice Search: With the widespread adoption of voice-assisted devices, voice search is evolving beyond simple commands to complex queries for products, services, and even transactional interactions, requiring brands to integrate into conversational search flows.
• Every Business is Show Business: Marketing is becoming more theatrical and experiential, exemplified by large-scale business events that blur the lines between conferences and entertainment, requiring businesses to compete for attention with engaging, user-generated content.
• Increased Consumer Narcissism: Marketers should embrace the trend of ordinary self-centeredness, leveraging it as an opportunity for more attention-grabbing and self-referential marketing.
• Focus on Soft Skills: Despite the rise of AI, “human” skills like collaborative problem-solving are gaining importance for marketers, emphasizing the need for soft skill development.
• Gen Alpha’s Influence: The emerging Gen Alpha (born 2010-2025) are “upagers” who are socially aware and become consumers quickly, prioritizing helping people, equality, diversity, and sustainability. Marketing to this cohort will require different engagement strategies, potentially involving gamification and community-focused digital interactions.

3. How do small businesses typically approach their marketing budgets and strategies for 2025?

Small businesses face challenges like lead generation, customer acquisition, and budget constraints. In terms of budgeting:

• Businesses with 10 or fewer employees are more likely to have a marketing budget under $500 a month and often lack full-time marketing employees.
• Most local businesses allocate 5-10% of their revenue to marketing, though growing businesses might spend 14% or more.
• Monthly SEO spending for small and local businesses typically ranges from $1,000 to $5,000.
• About 15% of the marketing budget is generally allocated to social media.

For 2025, nearly half (49%) of small businesses plan to increase their marketing budgets, primarily to generate more leads and sales (71%). Over half (51%) intend to invest more in social media ads and content marketing, while 47% plan to increase spending on search advertising and video marketing.

4. What are the essential “high-impact, must-implement” marketing strategies for small businesses?

For small businesses aiming for significant growth and customer engagement, the following strategies are considered high-impact and must-implement:

• Strategic Positioning & Market Analysis: Clearly defining a unique selling proposition (USP), brand story, and value proposition, along with in-depth target audience analysis.
• Advanced Search Engine Optimization (SEO): Optimizing content for featured snippets, using AI for natural language patterns, building high-quality backlinks, and optimizing for conversational voice search.
• Better Marketing Measurement: Tracking customer lifetime value (CLTV) and customer acquisition cost (CAC), determining the point of diminishing returns for marketing spend, predicting future purchases, and analyzing profit margins by customer group.
• Smarter Content Strategy: Developing original research, mapping content connections, breaking down large content into reusable formats, and generating unique, brand-exclusive data.
• Customer Experience Improvement: Building unified customer databases, identifying key customer journey moments, implementing automated personalization, and using CRM software.
• Aligning Marketing with Sales: Implementing lead scoring, tracking the full customer journey, defining clear agreements between marketing and sales on lead handling, and measuring marketing’s impact on sales cycle length and deal size.
• AI-Enhanced Marketing: Utilizing AI to predict high-converting leads, create AI-assisted systems for testing marketing creative, automate content personalization, and gather competitive intelligence.

5. How important is social media for small businesses, and which platforms are most popular?

Social media is extremely important for small businesses, as 93% of internet users are on social media. This indicates that a business’s target market is highly likely to be present on these platforms.

• Facebook is the most widely used platform for small business social media marketing, with over three-quarters (76%) of businesses using it.
• Instagram follows at 63%.
• LinkedIn is used by 43% of small businesses.

Additionally, 91% of consumers access social media from mobile devices, emphasizing the need for a mobile-friendly social media strategy. Influencer marketing also plays a significant role, with nearly half of social media users relying on brand recommendations from influencers.

6. What is the significance of email marketing for small businesses?

Email marketing is a crucial and highly effective channel for small businesses, often providing the highest return on investment.

• High ROI: Email marketing generally returns $36 to $40 for every $1 spent. Small businesses specifically identify it as the marketing channel with the highest ROI.
• Content Distribution: 87% of small businesses use email marketing to distribute their content, highlighting its synergy with content marketing.
• Impact on Success: 78% of small businesses consider email important to overall company success, with 64% using it to reach their ideal customers, demonstrating its direct impact on the bottom line.
• Personalization Benefits: Personalized emails increase open rates by 26%, and including the recipient’s first name in the subject line can boost open rates by 9.1%. A high percentage (83%) of customers are willing to share data for personalized experiences.
• Frequency and Engagement: Over half of businesses send emails two to four times per month, and 50% of people make a purchase from a marketing email at least once a month. Users check their email multiple times a day (88%), with 39% checking 3-5 times daily, indicating high engagement potential.

7. What are the challenges and limitations associated with calculating Marketing ROI accurately?

While Marketing ROI is a crucial KPI, it faces several challenges and limitations that make accurate calculation difficult:

• Attribution Difficulty: The biggest challenge is accurately attributing revenue to every individual marketing touchpoint (e.g., blog posts, ad views, email campaigns, lead generation strategies). It’s impossible to achieve 100% accuracy, as tracking codes aren’t infallible, and some interactions (like ad impressions building brand awareness without an immediate click) hold value that is hard to measure.
• Unreliable Prediction Model: ROI is a measure of past performance, not a reliable prediction model for future returns. Simply doubling investment rarely results in a linear doubling of return due to factors like the law of diminishing returns, where increased investment eventually yields disproportionately smaller increases in revenue.
• External Variables: Numerous external factors beyond marketing control (e.g., weather, economic stability, political events) can influence results, skewing the reliability of ROI as a single metric.
• Misleading Simplicity: The apparent simplicity of the ROI formula can be misleading. Marketers might misuse it, leading to poor decisions, such as pausing campaigns that don’t directly generate revenue but provide crucial value in building brand awareness or supporting other sales channels.
• Lack of Tools/Data: Marketers may not always have the necessary tools or processes to collect granular data required for a truly accurate ROI calculation, especially for campaigns that don’t lead to direct revenue.
• Not the Only Metric: ROI alone cannot provide a complete picture of marketing or business performance. Over-prioritizing ROI can lead to “tunnel vision,” diverting attention from other critical KPIs like profit, profit margin, operating expenses, market share, growth rate, cost per acquisition, customer lifetime value, and customer retention. It’s an efficiency gauge but not the ultimate goal; profit is.

8. What are the core principles of the Vistage Code of Conduct and Committee objectives?

The Vistage Code of Conduct emphasizes professionalism, participation, integrity, and mutual respect within the group:

• Timeliness: Starting and ending meetings on time to respect everyone’s valuable time.
• Active Participation: Each member is expected to process at least two issues per year using a prepared form, attend at least 75% of meetings (with absences becoming a group discussion issue after the third), and be fully present without distractions.
• Information Sharing: Members must check-in and submit financial dashboards, ideally 48 hours before meetings, even if absent. Absent members are also expected to review check-ins and audio recordings to maintain continuity and provide feedback.
• Confidentiality and Honesty: All discussions are held in the strictest confidence, and members commit to always telling the truth, even when uncomfortable, and acting in the best interest of others.
• Constructive Feedback: Operating with a “don’t shoot the messenger” mentality and avoiding taking things personally.
• Engagement and Value: Members are required to participate in one group retreat per year, and if a member feels they aren’t benefiting, they should discuss it with the group before leaving.

Vistage Group Committees are designed to maximize the group experience and achieve high-performance objectives, serving as a sounding board and partner to the Chair. Their term is annual, not exceeding two consecutive years. They conduct annual gap analyses, provide quarterly updates, hold ad hoc discussions, and facilitate outside group activities related to their topic area.

• Accountability Committee: Ensures members and the Chair adhere to group expectations, focusing on ground rules, attendance, check-ins, financial dashboards, issue processing follow-up, speaker prep, evaluations, and annual goals.
• Quality Committee: Maintains the high overall quality of the Vistage experience, focusing on executive sessions, best practice discussions, speakers, issue processing, host presentations, Tiger Teams, leveraging other Vistage resources, and group retreats.
• Recruiting Committee: Aims to keep membership slots full (16 members) with quality individuals, focusing on membership composition needs/gaps, welcoming guests, screening new members, group recruiting activities, and onboarding new members.