Marketing In The Now

In this episode of Marketing in the Now, host David Reske sits down with Eleanor Kubacki, CEO of EFK Group, a socially responsible marketing agency with 30 years of experience serving clients like Nike, the U.S. Navy, and the CDC. Eleanor shares her personal journey from AI skepticism to full-scale reinvention, unpacking why women — especially those 50 and older — are uniquely positioned to lead in the AI era rather than be left behind by it. She breaks down her three-part framework for embracing AI (accepting it as a superpower, using it daily, and committing to reinvention), and gets candid about the fear, ethical questions, and internal culture shifts she had to work through before investing in her own AI software platform. The conversation is a practical, honest look at what it really takes for an established business — and an established leader — to reinvent itself in real time.

In this episode, David Reske sits down with Katie Sadler, owner of SDLR Consulting and go-to-market strategist, to explore what it really means to build an AI-native sales and marketing operation. Katie breaks down the difference between AI endpoint tools and truly AI-native workflows, shares practical examples of where AI is creating the biggest breakthroughs in B2B sales — from intelligent content hubs to AI-powered onboarding — and explains why the future of selling is less about replacing human connection and more about giving buyers a safe, informed space to research and engage. She also introduces her content diagnostic tool, designed to help companies understand how AI models are actually interpreting and representing their brand.

In this returning visit to Marketing In The Now, David Reske sits down again with Mark Goloboy, founder of Market Growth Consulting, to explore how AI is transforming the way B2B companies market, sell, and operate. Mark shares how he rebuilt his own website around a custom GPT — what he calls an "answer engine" — designed to function as a digital twin that responds to prospect questions in his own voice. The conversation digs into the strategy behind training AI on real visitor questions, the intersection of SEO and generative engine optimization (GEO), and why 2026 has shifted from AI experimentation to full production roadmaps. If you're a marketer or business leader trying to figure out where to invest in AI right now, this episode is your playbook.

What separates a brand people use from a brand people love? In this episode of Marketing In The Now, host David Reske sits down with Lee Nadler — CMO of Flip and marketing veteran behind iconic brands like Snapple, DoubleClick, and MINI Cooper — to explore the discipline of building brand movements. Drawing on three decades of experience, Lee unpacks how the most powerful marketing goes beyond messaging to create communities of zealots, from Snapple fans sending love letters to Mini owners driving across the country together. He also reveals how AI — and Flip's voice technology specifically — is transforming customer service from a cost center into a competitive advantage, and how listening at scale can be the first step toward turning any customer into a lifelong fan.

Mike Ensing, CEO and co-founder of Revere, returns to Marketing In The Now to go deeper on what he calls the "AI brand control crisis" — a fundamental shift in how brands are perceived, discussed, and recommended in the age of LLMs. Host David Reske and Mike pick up where they left off a year ago, exploring how dramatically the landscape has changed: from the rise of clickless search and AI-driven buying decisions to the coming wave of autonomous agents that will evaluate and execute B2B purchases on behalf of users. Mike explains why traditional SEO and even GEO strategies are no longer enough, and shares Revere's six pillars of AI brand transformation — technical SEO, GEO, brand management, company reputation, data readiness, and company practice — making the case that the brands winning in 2026 and beyond will be those that treat LLMs as the powerful, opinion-forming influencers they've already become.

In this episode of Marketing In The Now, David Reske sits down with Maria Scheifler, a 15-year go-to-market veteran and Fractional CMO of MKT Velocity, to unpack her sprint-based marketing operating system — a framework built to help growing teams cut through chaos, align with revenue goals, and ship meaningful work consistently. Maria explains why AI alone can't fix a broken team dynamic, and why the real foundation of high-performing marketing is a combination of the right culture (trust, psychological safety, and a growth mindset) and agile practices borrowed from the world of software development. From two-week sprint cycles to transparent stakeholder reviews, this conversation is packed with actionable insight for any marketing leader who's tired of their team staying busy without moving the needle.

In this episode of Marketing In The Now, host David Reske sits down with Pam Boiros — fractional CMO and creator of the Marketing AI Jumpstart — to explore why successful AI adoption is fundamentally a people challenge, not a technology one. Pam shares why AI literacy is the antidote to workplace fear, how to reimagine marketing workflows from the ground up rather than simply layering AI onto existing processes, and what it takes for marketing leaders to build a culture of responsible, high-impact AI use. Whether you're a CMO navigating organizational change or a marketer trying to future-proof your career, this conversation offers a practical and human-centered roadmap for thriving in the AI era.

In this episode of Marketing In The Now, host David Reske sits down with brand consultant, keynote speaker, and author Ernie Harker (Your Brand Sucks: How to Ignite a Brand That Doesn't) to explore how AI is reshaping the world of branding and design. Ernie shares his fascinating journey from storyboard illustrator to AI-powered brand strategist, and why the rise of AI image and content generation — rather than threatening his career — pushed him to become one of its biggest advocates. Together, David and Ernie dig into the difference between using AI generically (and blending in with everyone else) versus training it on your unique brand voice and strategy to produce content that is authentically, unmistakably you. They also tackle the big question: where does human creativity end and AI assistance begin when it comes to building a brand from the soul up?