Exploring the MarTech & CX Landscape
New consumer survey data from Five9, “Inflation, Deals, and Divide: What’s Driving 2025 Holiday Shopping,” indicates that nearly 20% of consumers have already commenced holiday shopping, with another 31% planning to start well before Black Friday.
While consumers generally prefer tailored experiences, they also express significant concerns regarding invasiveness. The MX8 Labs report, “Getting Personal: What Consumers Really Think About Ad Relevance and Targeting”, provides critical insights into navigating this delicate balance, highlighting a clear imperative for data-driven, ethical, and contextually aware advertising strategies.
CXP turns every customer interaction into governed, intelligent action by unifying interactions, systems, and data across voice and digital channels.
What puts an ad on the top of the “nice list” this Christmas season? New analysis from Zappi, the leading consumer insights platform, shows that the most successful campaigns aren’t the flashiest — they’re the ones that made people feel.
The “Signals From The Stage” report from the 2025 ANA Masters of Marketing Conference provides a critical roadmap for senior marketing and CX leaders. As 2026 approaches, the path to sustained brand growth requires a balanced approach: prioritizing authentic, real-world engagement, responsibly integrating AI into discovery and purchase, and strategically investing in the stability and development of marketing talent.
As marketing leaders, we live and die by digital metrics and measurements. We obsess over click-through rates, scroll-depth, and algorithmic favor. We’ve become masters of a world measured in pixels and milliseconds, constantly striving to capture a sliver of attention in a deafeningly loud and crowded space.
Today, we’re going to talk about one of the most persistent and costly problems in B2B: the handoff from marketing to sales. We’ll explore why the traditional MQL model often fails, creating friction and wasting budget, and how a more intelligent, data-driven approach to lead qualification can not only fix the sales pipeline but also prove marketing’s direct contribution to the bottom line.
To help me discuss this topic, I’d like to welcome, Gabe Lullo, CEO at Alleyoop and host of the “Do Hard Things” podcast.
Today, we’re going to talk about something that many retailers see as a pure cost center: customer returns. Instead, we’ll explore how a smart, data-driven post-purchase strategy can actually become a powerful engine for customer retention and lifetime value. We’ll look at the data trends shaping retail, how to navigate the complex pressures on merchants today, and why this often-overlooked part of the business might be the key to unlocking future growth. Joining me to discuss this is Laura Huddle, CRO at Seel.
Eleos Life announced the launch of its innovative AI voice agent, designed to provide instant, around-the-clock assistance to customers without the frustration of wait times. The AI voice agent offers always-on support, drawing answers directly from real Eleos policy documents to address a wide range of customer questions.
The 2025 Mystery Shopping Report by Stord reveals a consistent imbalance across U.S. e-commerce brands: while investments in digital storefronts and customer acquisition are substantial, operational foundations in fulfillment and post-purchase experiences have not kept pace with these rising consumer expectations.
