The Big Imaginarium Summit Recap — Part 2

This second installment continues our reflections from the 2025 Imaginarium Summit, where the brightest minds in B2B marketing didn't just share ideas, but challenged assumptions and offered real strategies for what comes next.

In this chapter, the conversations deepen: the changing role of creativity, the demands of digital-native buyers, and how internal alignment may still be the most overlooked growth strategy of all.

From Brand to Demand in the Age of Outcomes

Speakers: Patrick Reynolds, BlueConic. Rachel Newton, Mastercard. Lynn Tornabene, Anteriad.

Summary

Amazing talk about B2B’s existential crisis—either align brand and demand around business outcomes or face extinction. While traditional CMOs are still celebrating creative awards, this panel recognized that marketing has entered a post-bullshit era where CEOs have developed an immunity to marketing speak. Big emphasis on how internal alignment creates the preconditions for external impact. The lesson? Marketing either drives pipeline or ends up being sidelined.

What I Loved

The winners-and-losers framework was refreshingly clear: CMOs who speak the language of EBITDA stay, those who lean too much into brand get replaced. This isn't a stylistic choice—it's economic Darwinism. The panel's collective wisdom around reputation as capital—harder to recover than money—represents the economic truth typically obscured by agencies selling creative services. In 2025, your marketing isn't working if it isn't measurably moving business metrics. Full stop.

Takeaways

• The average CMO tenure is shorter than a TikTok trend—speak pipeline and bookings language or update your LinkedIn profile

• Companies waste millions maintaining separate brand identities post-acquisition when consolidation would drive greater efficiency and market impact

• Attribution debates are marketing's version of deck chairs on the Titanic—focus on whether the business ship is actually staying afloat

• Internal marketing represents the highest ROI activity—when employees become believers, customers follow (MasterCard nailed this)

• The gap between brand and demand teams creates inefficiency that market competitors exploit—integration isn't optional, it's survival

Unbundling the superpowers of account-based marketing.

Unbundled ABM: Maximizing The Impact of B2B’s Favorite Misconception

Speakers: Brittney Frank, EY. Putney Cloos, Bombora. Patrick Reynolds, BlueConic.

Summary

This ABM panel featured a cast of marketing heavyweights who collectively performed an autopsy on Account-Based Marketing's purported demise. The diagnosis? “News of my death has been much exaggerated.” Rather, it's suffering from organizational schizophrenia. While marketers obsess over platforms and tactics, the real value of ABM lies in its strategic approach to account prioritization and targeting. In a world of unlimited digital possibilities, the winners are those with the discipline to focus on fewer accounts with greater precision. The losers? Companies treating ABM as a bolt-on tactic, overly reliant on an expensive platform, while their competitors build integrated account strategies.

What I Loved

The panel ruthlessly exposed the dirty secret of the ABM industrial complex: platforms enable ABM but don't create it. While tech vendors sell ABM as a software problem, successful practitioners understand it's an organizational philosophy. The panel brilliantly articulated that ABM's future isn't about more technology but greater granularity—persona-level insights, digital audience scale, and measurement capabilities. This represents the maturation we've seen across digital: first-generation tools create awareness, second-generation creates sophistication. In 2025, if your ABM strategy is still separate from your overall marketing approach, you're already losing market share.

Takeaways

• ABM functions as philosophy, not a platform—companies obsessing over tech without strategy are throwing good money after bad

• Large matrix organizations create ABM friction—different teams targeting the same accounts without coordination create customer confusion, not conversion

• Intent data's value increases exponentially with granularity—Bombora's shift toward persona-level insights represents the next evolutionary step

• Account-based CTV and other emerging technologies promise precision at scale—but only for organizations with integrated go-to-market approaches

• The ABM-or-brand debate creates a false dichotomy—ABM is the foundation of a strong B2B strategy, and brand is simply one of the many outputs of that strategy

Sade and Kerry explore the impact and opportunity in a category-creating transformation.

Managing Through Transformation

Speakers: Kerry English, Visa. Sadé Muhammad, Time.

Summary

Kerry and Sade delivered a masterclass in organizational transformation. They highlighted the real-world example of evolving from a massive consumer-focused business to a $145 billion B2B opportunity, with tens of billions in revenue viewed as immediately actionable. This isn’t incremental growth, it's category creation. It took a seismic shift from product-centric to audience-led strategies targeting new audiences. The transformation required not just new campaigns but a complete rewiring of marketing's operational DNA—from measurement frameworks to talent deployment.

What I Loved

Kerry and Sade discuss the uncomfortable truth of B2B transformation: the greatest resistance comes from within. While most CMOs waste time debating creative briefs, Visa’s leadership recognized that internal education represents high ROI marketing activity during a time of transformation—they were willing to truly invest in their future. The revelation that B2B marketing must be positioned as a growth driver rather than a support function allowed them to stay on their front foot in building a new category. This represents the defining challenge for enterprise marketing: gaining enough organizational power to connect marketing activities to business outcomes.

Takeaways

• Internal "roadshows" and stakeholder education represent the highest ROI marketing activity during a period of transformation

• The shift from product-focused to solution-focused marketing requires organizational restructuring, not just messaging changes

• Legacy measurement frameworks designed for consumer marketing create fundamental misalignments for B2B (check out Octane11 to see a platform specifically built to address this)

• Marketing leaders must secure a business partner "invested in the marketing function" to gain the organizational authority required for transformation

Alicia and Irina dive deep into the behaviors of a new generation of B2B buying committees. 

The New B2B Buyer: How Gen Z & Millennials Are Reshaping Sales in a Digital-First World

Speakers: Irina Novoselsky, Hootsuite. Alicia Alongi, Zion & Zion.

Summary

Irina and Alicia delivered the marketing equivalent of a cardiac stress test for traditional B2B organizations. Soon, a staggering 75% of B2B decision-makers will be Gen Z and millennials—digital natives who treat cold calls like spam emails and traditional sales tactics like communicable diseases. Hootsuite's bold transition to 100% inbound with a 70% direct message rate isn't just impressive—it's the canary in the coal mine for every legacy sales organization still measuring success by "meetings booked." This isn't about optimizing your funnel, it's about rebuilding your entire go-to-market approach for buyers who've already decided before your sales team has had their morning espresso.

What I Loved

The research involving 500+ Gen Z decision-makers revealed a serious B2B paradox: they demand authenticity while rejecting human contact. This isn't a minor preference shift—it's the next evolutionary leap in B2B sales. While most companies tinker with their LinkedIn strategy, Hootsuite has completely reinvented its revenue engine around digital self-service. The economic implications are seismic: B2B organizations with traditional sales structures will experience margin compression. Companies with bloated outbound teams are going to get squeezed and the leaders who are managing them need to innovate to remain relevant.

Takeaways

• Soon, your B2B buyers will make decisions through AI-powered research, social validation, and self-service—your sales team becomes implementation consultants, not persuaders

• Employee advocacy isn't a nice-to-have marketing program—it's your primary channel for reaching Gen Z decision-makers who trust people, not brands

• CRMs designed for "contact management" are fundamentally misaligned with buyers who refuse to be contacted—rethink your tech stack or become irrelevant

• Traditional B2B pricing complexity and "talk to sales" gatekeeping is the digital equivalent of a "No Trespassing" sign to Gen Z buyers who expect Amazon-like transparency

• The winners of 2025 will minimize human touch in the buying process, but maximize human value in implementation and success

Is Creativity a New Frontier in B2B Marketing

Speakers: Kathy Klingler, Brightcove. Lynn Schlesinger, Forbes. Peter Weingart, Wipro.

Summary

This session demolished the notion that B2B marketing must be boring to be serious. In markets where technological parity approaches 95%, creative differentiation represents the final frontier of competitive advantage. This panel emphasized the performance aspect of high-end creative and the higher conversion rates that breakthrough creative can deliver—but here's the twist: this creativity isn't random artistic expression but carefully engineered storytelling that translates complex value propositions into human understanding for customers.

What I Loved

Here’s the deal: creativity done right is the ultimate arbitrage opportunity—while competitors obsess over marginal improvements in ad targeting, winners are investing in brand storytelling that can be a step-change in growth. This isn't about making B2B marketing "fun"—it's about making it effective.  Kathy, Lynn, and Peter recognized that one of the most challenging things can be bringing your stakeholders along with you—but that’s an act of storytelling in its own right, and it’s far more powerful when the story is backed up by data.

Takeaways

• Data-driven creativity is the new performance marketing—campaigns that blend emotional resonance with measurable outcomes outperform

• The most creative B2B companies deploy narrative architectures as thoughtfully as they deploy technology stacks

• Creative testing frameworks should mirror engineering sprint cycles—rapid iteration, measurement, and optimization

• The future B2B CMO will be able to seamlessly apply creative storytelling to their brand narrative, while translating that work into measurable outcomes that are “board-friendly”