New skills, new mindset: Leading marketing in an AI future
MARKET VIEW
Sponsored by:
Produced by:
Amir Jirbandey
Head of International Marketing at Personio
about
Amir Jirbandey
Amir Jirbandey leads international marketing for Personio, directing the company's expansion across Europe, excluding the DACH region. With five years of experience commercialising AI solutions for media organisations before joining Personio, he brings substantial expertise in technology-driven marketing and practical AI implementation. Amir has been a part of Personio's GTM AI council helping put in motion the company's approach to embedding AI meaningfully into marketing workflows. His emphasis on realistic expectations and measurable outcomes continues to inform Personio's strategy for balancing automation with high-value human engagement.
How is your organisation approaching AI adoption, and what leadership principles are guiding the strategy?
We dedicated much of last year to structured experimentation—auditing existing tools, evaluating new solutions, and examining our processes to identify where AI could deliver genuine value. This year, we have transitioned into optimisation mode, implementing various tools, processes, and governance frameworks whilst testing our hypotheses to determine what delivers meaningful results.
Our progress stems largely from executive commitment. Our Executive team established AI adoption as a strategic priority with clear expectations for meaningful integration into daily operations. That leadership approach is delivering results. We have established a dedicated GTM AI council, with our CRO at the helm, that examines our end-to-end lifecycle to identify opportunities for improvement through automation, content creation, and intent data analysis.
One of our most impactful investments has been establishing appropriate parameters for effective AI usage. We implemented robust data governance policies with our AI provider, Langdock, enabling us to confidently upload company information in a structured manner. This makes our AI tools significantly more context-aware, elevating outputs beyond generic responses to genuinely useful content that reflects our positioning and messaging.
Where are you achieving the most significant operational gains from AI in your marketing workflows?
The most prevalent applications involve content development—email sequences, campaign copy, and landing page drafts. However, our most substantial gains come from accelerated collaboration enabled by context-aware AI.
Consider developing an account-based marketing campaign targeting competitive displacement. Previously, this required coordination across multiple teams—product marketing, content, project management—with sequential sign-offs at each stage. Now, a considerable portion of that process can be streamlined because our AI tools are pre-loaded with approved messaging frameworks and positioning documents. We execute significantly faster whilst maintaining quality standards.
Our underlying philosophy is straightforward: if AI can handle the twenty to thirty percent of work that is repetitive and procedural, we can dedicate greater attention to activities where human judgement and creativity are essential. This approach has actually enabled us to increase investment in relationship-driven initiatives and personalised engagement as a direct result of operational efficiencies elsewhere.
How are you leveraging AI and machine learning to improve targeting precision and demonstrate marketing's contribution?
At Personio, precision targeting is fundamental to our strategy. Unlike many SaaS categories, HR software is inherently regional—employment legislation dictates specific functionality requirements, which creates complexity when expanding beyond home markets. Additionally, research indicates that only five to seven percent of any market is actively evaluating solutions at any given time.
Our ongoing priority has been consolidating disparate intent signals into a unified view. We are implementing an AI powered revenue data platform to map the customer journey before prospects have formally engaged with us, enabling our commercial teams to act on insights earlier. This supports our integrated GTM structure, where marketing and sales operate as a single organisation rather than separate functions.
Our methodology begins with analysing successful outcomes. Using conversation intelligence tools, we examine completed deals comprehensively—understanding competitive dynamics, identifying the specific challenges we addressed, and documenting the factors that influenced the decision. We then profile those accounts across firmographic and demographic dimensions, identify similar organisations through platforms like 6sense, and systematically test our hypotheses. The objective is developing a propensity model informed by both account characteristics and behavioural signals that correlate with successful outcomes.
We are seeing incremental improvements rather than dramatic shifts in conversion rates, but the trajectory is positive. We continue experimenting across territories with different approaches—automated outreach in some markets, nurture programmes in others, and traditional engagement elsewhere—to determine optimal channel allocation for different prospect profiles.
What guidance would you offer marketing leaders who are beginning to integrate AI into their operations?
Rather than starting with technology, start with process. Document your current workflows comprehensively before considering where AI might contribute. We conducted an exercise at our GTM leadership gathering where teams identified operational challenges, then mapped existing processes in detail—documenting handoffs, data flows, and constraints. Only after completing that analysis did we evaluate which components could benefit from AI enhancement.
One team examined customer advocacy content production—a universal priority. After mapping the complete process, they developed a comprehensive improvement blueprint. No individual element was transformative in isolation, but the cumulative effect of systematic improvements was substantial.
Maintaining realistic expectations is essential. There is rarely a single solution that addresses your primary challenge comprehensively. Progress typically comes through incremental improvements across multiple areas rather than wholesale transformation. Timeline expectations also require adjustment—organisations beyond a certain scale cannot pause operations to rebuild from the ground up. Implementation happens whilst maintaining business continuity, which naturally extends delivery schedules.
I would also counsel against over-investing prematurely. The market offers numerous platforms promising comprehensive solutions, but often you require only specific capabilities rather than entire ecosystems. Established enterprise tools already incorporate substantial AI functionality that provides an excellent foundation with broad applicability. Focus on individual challenges sequentially, prioritise based on potential impact, and allocate resources accordingly to initiatives with the greatest potential return.
about
Personio
Personio is the intelligent HR platform and a leading European software company providing comprehensive human resources solutions designed for medium-sized businesses. The platform streamlines core HR processes including recruiting, onboarding, payroll, and people management across multiple markets. Headquartered in Germany, Personio serves thousands of organisations and continues to expand internationally whilst adapting its offering to meet regional employment requirements.
About 6sense
6sense is on a mission to revolutionise the way B2B organisations create revenue by predicting customers most likely to buy and recommending the best course of action to engage anonymous buying teams. 6sense Revenue AI is the only sales and marketing platform to unlock the ability to create, manage and convert high-quality pipeline to revenue. Customers report 2X increases in average contract value, 4X increases in win rate and 20-40% reduction in time to close deals. Know everything, do anything, with 6sense.