If there was any concern about the spread of artificial intelligence (AI) in the marketing ecosystem, the 390 delegates at this year’s PHD BrainScape conference no longer feel it.
Banyan Tree’s Bluewaters Forum conference, which brought together marketers, agency professionals and media owners, gave them a broad perspective on the opportunities and benefits for the marketing community, businesses and the creative economy.
The event brought together Mark Holden, PHD’s Global Strategy Director, Alex Connock, Senior Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford, author and entrepreneur, and social scientist, researcher, author and entrepreneur, Léa Steinacker.
They shared their individual perspectives on what the future holds for marketing and media professionals in the world of AI and how to grow and thrive in it.
AI: A Tool Controlled by Humans
The first key takeaway is that AI, as a tool and colleague, which relies on training data and prompts to execute commands, will continue to require human intervention.
This allows us to maintain control. Another point is that creative work and innovation require motivation and emotion. However, current AI models of creativity focus mainly on cognitive dimensions and lack cultural context and personality factors.
“Our gut is often called our second brain and plays a major role in our ability to sense and analyze,” Steinacker says. “AI models can’t replicate that, nor the irreverence and unpredictability of human genius. It allows us to look and move forward rather than constantly looking back.”
At the event, Steinacker explained that the future belongs to those who can develop these “centaur skills,” combining human creativity with the computing power of AI.
Connock explained that AI would lead to a creative explosion. “It will happen with AI (and) not in spite of it. It doesn’t mean we lose our creative power to technology, because we are still the ultimate creators,” he said.
Connock also highlighted the possibility for media outlets to license their data to train AI models, providing a solution to the thorny copyright issue. He also addressed the crucial issue of using AI for reinforcement learning and recommendation engines to surface content, brands and products, while consumers are modelled and primed for optimisation.
“What’s really exciting is the developments in emotional intelligence models, generative search and AI optimization,” he said. “Marketers who can master these areas will have a larger market share in the future. And that starts now, not five years from now.”
However, human marketers need better training on AI
At the event, Holden shared the results of a survey of 700 global marketers conducted by PHD and WARC, which highlighted the urgency of removing barriers to AI.
The results revealed that 86% of marketers, from both internal brand teams and agencies, do not have sufficient knowledge levels to lead their respective organizations/clients in AI.
This highlights the importance of acquiring, developing and applying knowledge for marketers in the region.
Technical apprehension is another major barrier. Holden revealed that the lack of technical expertise in generative AI is particularly felt among client-side marketers.
“Current-generation AI is a major Cambrian explosion that will change the world,” Holden said. “We all need to prepare for it now.”
Holden also predicted that marketers need to prepare for the next era of AI. “After an initial period of experimentation, companies need to prepare for the coming acceleration era (2026-2028), where AI integration will increase rapidly,” he said.
Holden explained that investing in AI-focused training and development is critical to scaling AI solutions across an organization and building marketer skills.
“The real magic happens when we use Gen-AI and machine learning to build enterprise AI, leveraging Frontier models to move from assistants to agents,” Holden said, and further explained that CMOs can expect to become owner-operators of their organization’s large language models, acting as orchestrators of these interoperable capabilities.
“By then, AI agents may well be considered staff, but making executive decisions on top of AI will require human empathy and intuition,” Holden said.
The world of AI is here
Dan Shepherd, Co-Managing Director of PHD MENA, closed the event by emphasizing that AI is “here and it’s here to stay.”
According to him, the industry is heading towards a “synthetic future,” with more than 13,000 AI tools already available.
“Our message to our colleagues and partners is simple: go out, test, try and learn, now,” he said.
Shepherd testified that the PHD team has been integrating AI into its operations for 10 years.
“We are really seeing the change, the impact and the results. The digital transformation of marketing will accelerate with this momentum and create many opportunities for marketers at all levels,” Shepherd concludes.
