Mi3 asked marketers as a "consumer or customer" to name their favourite personal brand work, best personal customer experience, which brands they advocate, the loyalty programs they use and are influenced by and a few more – eight questions, answer three. Here's the stellar line up: Canva's Zach Kitschke, Penfold's Kristy Keyte, Telstra's Brent Smart, Domain's Rebecca Darley, Baiada's Yash Gandhi, Total Beauty Network's Amanda Connors, BMW's Alex McLean, Tourism New Zealand's Andrew Waddel, Michael Hill's Jo Feeney, Les Mills International's Luke Waldren, Salesforce's Leandro Perez, Chartered Accountants' Chelsea Wymer, Capgemini's Tracy Gawthorne, Nine's Liana Dubois, Kogan's Karl Winther, plus Nikki Clarkson, Mel Hopkins and Hamilton Island's Michael Branagh.

Former PepsiCo, Kimberly-Clark, Interbrand and Westfield [now Scentre Group] marketer John Batistich transitioned to company board roles ahead of most – he’s now a non-executive director (NED) and advisor to seven boards, including the listed buy now pay later firm Zip Co, Muffin Break Bakeries and Jamaica Blue Cafes’ parent company FoodCo, Melbourne unicorn Moose Toys and Sydney-founded fashion label Ksubi International. Batistich has a helicopter view of what boards want from marketing functions, where the gaps remain – and crucially, what marketing can do to close them. In short, “become the expert on customer” because marketing is still seen as a cost centre; focus on “brilliant basics”, build better partnerships, and start working on capability models, because marketing’s capability gap is widening and Batistich sees major skills deficiencies – especially around personalisation for lifetime value. Here's his take on what's coming down the track for marketing, customer and commerce over what looks to be a highly volatile FY25 – and how to prepare.

Marketers are on average directly managing 10 agency partners – and Mi3's Marketing & Customer Benchmarks: FY25 Outlook suggests it's hogging too much bandwidth as their remits expand further into customer. Offloading roster management to a single lead agency is the single biggest shift in relative terms, per the survey of 105 marketers representing $3bn-plus in spend. Across the piste, the preference for project work is all but eclipsing retainers – especially across big spending brands. Tumbleturn Managing Partner Jen Davidson and Akcelo chief Aden Hepburn unpack the key FY25 trends, shifts – and opportunities.

A deep, senior marketer study and report by Mi3, The Australian Marketing Institute (AMI), Qualtrics and Tumbleturn finds hard evidence across 105 top marketers responsible for $3bn-plus of budgets of an emergent three-speed marketing economy and upended KPIs and priorities. There are big question marks in key sectors such as retail around the effectiveness of personalisation efforts: Just 15 per cent think their CX is performing, though telcos are confident they’re smashing it. There’s also a major swing to performance media as CMOs seek instant results. The good news is that after decades of being perceived as the colouring-in department, 83 per cent of marketers say that has now shifted, with boards and CEOs perceiving marketing as a critical growth driver – though B2B marketers are far less certain. Problem is, marketer remits are exploding and the FY25 Marketing & Customer Benchmarks report, polling top marketers across all B2C and B2B sectors, finds the majority feeling ill-equipped to tackle what’s rapidly coming at them. AMI’s Bronwyn Heys, Tumbleturn’s Jen Davidson, Qualtrics’ Ivana Sekanic and Akcelo’s Aden Hepburn unpack the findings and implications for marketers, agencies and the broader supply chain heading into FY25 and beyond.