Uncensored CMO

Seth Matlins is the Managing Director of the Forbes Forbes CMO Network, where he oversees the annual Forbes World's Most Influential CMOs List, the Forbes Entrepreneurial CMO 50 List, the Forbes CMO Summit, the Forbes European CMO Summit, and an expanding marketing content portfolio. Seth is an award-winning marketer, who has spent a career in and advising the C-suite of dozens of the 100 most valuable brands globally.

Timestamps

00:00 - Intro
00:45 - Seth’s new podcast
02:58 - Why are there not enough CMOs becoming CEOs
05:28 - Marketing needs much better marketing
07:36 - Seth’s career history
08:00 - Working jobs that have never existed before
11:41 - Scars from being a failed entrepreneur
13:24 - Making unexpected connections between fields
18:23 - Why organisations need to trust their marketers
20:26 - What makes a CMO influential
26:29 - Everyone is a brand manager
28:35 - How CMOs can be more influential
35:13 - The world’s most entrepreneurial CMOs
41:12 - What makes a CMO entrepreneurial
46:22 - Doing a lot with little
47:02 - What is changing for CMOs in 2025

Today Jon talks with Eugenia Zalis, CMO for one of the most iconic sweet brands in the world, Oreo. We talk about their "stay playful" positioning, incredible brand collaborations (with the likes of Coca-Cola and Post Malone) and some of the interesting innovations the brand has worked on.

Timestamps
00:00 - Intro
00:46 - Eugenia’s marketing journey
01:33 - What can we learn from the Unilever approach to marketing?
02:27 - How Dove turned into the brand it is today
05:42 - How Eugenia started with Oreo
06:33 - The “stay playful” positioning
09:49 - The best way to eat an Oreo cookie
11:08 - Managing a 110 year old brand
12:14 - The Oreo playbook for marketing in different regions
15:18 - Oreo’s collab with Coca-Cola
18:49 - Oreo’s approach to innovation
21:14 - System1 testing on Oreo innovations
23:40 - Innovations from around the world
25:23 - The surprising Coca-Cola collaboration
25:52 - Oreo’s SuperBowl ad in 2024
28:34 - Winning a Cannes Lion for a tweet
30:34 - Why is humour not used more
35:37 - Oreo x Post Malone collab
38:07 - Creative process for collabs
39:02 - How to lead a $4.5b organisation
43:57 - Advice to aspiring CMOs

Cadillac is an iconic American brand who are navigating the shift to electrification in the automotive industry and have partnered up with 72andSunny to launch their brand new campaign “Let’s Take the Cadillac. So today, Melissa Grady Dias, CMO of Cadillac, and Marianne Malina, President of 72andSunny join Jon to talk about working with a new agency and launching their first campaign together.

Timestamps

00:00 - Intro
03:53 - Marianne’s background
06:49 - How to manage a brand like Cadillac
08:34 - How EV’s are changing the industry
13:53 - How do you change your marketing for EVs
15:08 - Insights and inception of “Let’s Take the Cadillac”
17:56 - Developing the “Let’s Take the Cadillac” campaign
21:41 - How to launch a new car
23:39 - Building the campaign for different formats
25:42 - 72andSunny and Cadillac’s first campaign together
28:11 - Challenging the conformity in car advertising
30:48 - Why brand is so important for car purchasing
32:31 - Leading the marketing agenda inside a big org like General Motors
34:24 - In car Cadillac Car-aoke
35:22 - Melissa’s song
36:13 - Coolest feature about Escalade IQ
38:37 - Creating a luxury experience
39:27 - Choosing your car as CMO of Cadillac
40:57 - Creating a premium vehicle
42:53 - Thoughts on the Escalade IQ

Rob Mayhew joins Jon for bonus episode, talking about his big move to New York City, becoming a full-time content creator and how brands can work with creators like him effectively.

Timestamps

00:00 - Intro
01:39 - Why Rob moved to NYC
04:20 - Rob’s new YouTube show
05:47 - London vs New York for marketers
08:00 - Rob’s approach to content in 2025
11:00 - Rob’s view on the future of the social platforms
14:17 - How System1’s ad testing works
17:27 - Rob’s funniest posts on LinkedIn
18:46 - Rob’s process for making content
20:16 - Any trends that are different in the US than UK
21:43 - Thoughts on the creator economy
23:09 - The Poppi vending machine backlash
24:22 - How does Rob plan his content?
25:18 - Different audiences for TikTok and LinkedIn
25:38 - Rory Sutherland’s TikTok
26:48 - Power of B2B content creation

Rare Beauty is a brand built on the inclusive approach to beauty set by their celebrity founder, Selena Gomez. They've taken the US market by storm and so I'm speaking to their CMO, Katie Welch, about how they've done it. From strong positioning and making a difference in mental health across their customer base to growing a strong presence on social media (with a little help from their founder with over 400m Instagram followers), Rare Beauty is a wonderful success story of a challenger brand.

Timestamps

00:00 - Intro
00:50 - Katie’s career background
07:46 - How Katie joined Rare Beauty
11:09 - The challenges of launching a startup beauty brand
14:19 - The positioning of Rare Beauty
16:21 - New guest host interruption
16:58 - Being true to the brand positioning
19:48 - Being a purpose led brand
22:47 - Addressing the pressures of social media
26:27 - Building the Rare Beauty brand on social media
28:22 - How involved does Selena Gomez get in the Rare Beauty brand
29:57 - The secret to a successful product launch for Rare Beauty
33:00 - Dealing with the growth challenges of a scale up
40:36 - Evolving the Rare Beauty community
42:24 - What’s next for the Rare Beauty brand?
42:47 - Being an entreprenuer in a startup
45:09 - Katie growing her own social accounts

This episode is a QSR masterclass. Ken Muench is the CMO of Yum! brands, who own Taco Bell, KFC and Pizza Hut. I speak to Ken about how he started the agency that got acquired by Yum! (The Collider Lab) and his journey to being the CMO of such a large group of brands. We also talk about how all CMOs within Yum! are encouraged to swing big to make impactful campaigns and drive innovation within their brands. Ken is also the co-author of "R.E.D Marketing: The Three Ingredients of Leading Brands" which breaks down why Relevance, Ease and Distinctiveness are essential for QSR brands.

Timestamps:

• 00:00 - Intro
• 01:07 - Ken’s career background
• 03:44 - In-house vs agency creative
• 06:39 - Taking bigger swings
• 07:46 - The secret to the success of The Collider Lab
• 12:06 - Food is fuel vs experience
• 14:42 - Why Ken wrote the book: R.E.D Marketing
• 17:29 - The R.E.D framework
• 20:51 - How brands grow
• 23:58 - Why “ease” is an untapped opportunity for marketers
• 28:26 - The power of distinctive assets
• 30:31 - Changing the Taco Bell strapline to Live Mas!
• 32:52 - How Yum! brands approach innovation
• 37:14 - How Yum! brands innovation scored
• 41:29 - What happens when innovation goes wrong
• 44:10 - Saucy by KFC
• 47:47 - The innovators dilemma
• 49:44 - Taking chances: KFC FCK campaign
• 51:48 - Ken’s favourite moments as Yum! CMO
• 53:01 - How to be a successful CMO at such a large brand
• 55:44 - What makes a great CMO

Marcel Marcondes is the CMO of AB InBev, who run the largest portfolio of beer brands in the world. Stella Artois, Corona, Michelob Ultra and Budweiser are all under the marketing leadership of Marcel. Through creativity and consistency, AB InBev have produced some of the most effective campaigns of the past few years, often topping out the System1 charts. This has led to Marcel and his team to win some incredible awards, including WFA marketer of the year (Marcel) and most effective marketer of the year by the Effies (AB InBev).

Timestamps

00:00 - Intro
00:48 - Marcel’s journey to running the biggest portfolio in the world
03:51 - The global beer brands Marcel oversees
04:27 - How to manage such a large portfolio of brands
07:04 - Being the most effective marketing team for the past 3 years
09:39 - The Olympics partnership
13:08 - How important is creativity to deliver effectiveness
16:35 - How to demonstrate the power of marketing internally
18:10 - Why campaign consistency is so important for AB InBev
21:25 - The most effective ad by AB InBev
22:39 - Having 4 brands with Super Bowl ads
24:53 - Stella Artois 2025 Super Bowl ad with David Beckham
30:20 - Michelob Ultra at Super Bowl
33:29 - Executing a campaign across platforms
36:18 - The relationship with creative agencies
40:07 - Marcel’s advice to CMOs

I think one of the biggest problems facing us today is the amount of distraction in our lives. Social media feeds, unnecessary meetings, huge inboxes full of emails you didn't really need. All these things are grabbing our attention and taking us away from doing what we're supposed to be doing.

In this episode I'm talking to Nir Eyal, who's the author of a brilliant book called Indistractable, which is all about how we can reclaim our attention to focus our energy around the things that really matter. Now, as marketers, we can have a massive impact on our brands and our business, if only we can focus our time and effort on the right things. So Nir is uncovering all the tips and tricks for how to do that and how to make sure you're more productive and less distracted.

Timestamps:

• 00:00 Intro
• 05:12 What is the source of distraction
• 07:06 How to deal with the internal triggers
• 12:50 Turning your values into time 
• 18:14 Multi channel multitasking
• 20:06 Why we need to change meeting culture
• 26:20 Building a culture of indistraction in an organization
• 32:20 Imposter syndrome
• 34:53 Our perception of our quality of sleep
• 38:03 Luck is a belief set
• 42:12 Marketers are bad judges of marketing
• 44:06 Why successful people get more successful

The Super Bowl is the biggest advertising event of the year, with the biggest brands in the world flexing their advertising muscles (and budgets). A new entrant to the Super Bowl in 2024 was Pfizer, and they're back again this year with an ad that has blown the socks off the Pharma category. Their big game ad "Knock Out", scored 4.4 stars in System1 testing, also making it one of the best ads overall. I speak with Pfizer CMO, Susan Rienow about what it takes to create such a successful ad in the most competitive environment.

Timestamps

00:00 - Intro
01:20 - Susan’s successful career so far
03:19 - What Pfizer does and their mission
04:21 - The Covid vaccine rollout
06:29 - The role of insights for making business decisions
07:36 - Dealing with the complexities of different audiences
10:12 - Managing the impact of fair balance in advertising
14:51 - The role of Pfizer’s advertising
17:04 - Why have Pfizer gone all in with a Super Bowl ad
20:12 - The Pfizer Super Bowl ad in 2025
25:20 - What role does testing play for creating an effective ad
33:31 - The role of testing giving confidence to the board
37:39 - How tiny changes can make such a big difference
39:15 - How to evaluate the impact of a Super Bowl ad
41:22 - What makes a great CMO
46:40 - Advice Susan would give to young marketers