The marketing leadership agenda has never been more complex, or more consequential. CMOs are navigating the rapid integration of AI into every workflow, defending brand-building investment against relentless pressure for short-term performance, and reaching increasingly fragmented audiences in a privacy-first, platform-volatile landscape all while doing more with shrinking budgets and leaner teams.
Reuters Events: Strategic Marketing 2026 brings together 250+ CMOs, VPs, and senior marketing leaders from the world’s most influential brands for a single, high-impact day of curated programming, peer-to-peer networking, and solution-oriented dialogue.
If you are an innovative technology platform, agency, data provider, or solution partner, we create the environment for you to connect with the senior brand-side decision-makers shaping the future of marketing.
A curated audience ensures meaningful connections are made:
• Exclusively C-Suite, VP and Director level attendance
• 70% of attendees are client-side, with vendor & agency places strictly limited
• Interactive formats and contextualised meetings ensure no conversation is wasted
AI has moved from novelty to necessity but impact remains uneven. Examine where AI is genuinely adding value today, where it creates new risk, and how organisations are embedding it responsibly into workflows. Candid discussions on governance, change management, human oversight, and the trade-offs behind real AI decisions.
Marketing leaders are adapting to sustained budget pressure, leaner teams and rising performance expectations. Sessions will focus on real-world prioritisation decisions, operating models that scale with fewer resources, and how marketers are redefining effectiveness when “more with less” is no longer a temporary challenge, but the new normal.
As pressure mounts to move faster, marketers must balance speed with accuracy, compliance and brand trust. How teams are re-engineering insight pipelines combining traditional research, AI-driven intelligence and real-time data to accelerate activation without sacrificing quality, governance or credibility.
Marketing departments are being reshaped by technology, resource constraints and changing expectations from the C-suite. Leaders are redefining roles, future-proofing skills, driving adoption of new ways of working, and leading teams through continuous change while keeping talent motivated and marketing’s value visible across the business.
Strategic Marketing is attended exclusively by senior leaders from the world’s most influential brands. We’ve carefully curated an environment that prioritizes authentic, high-value networking. With strictly limited vendor presence, every conversation is relevant, insightful, and grounded in shared challenges. Expect fresh perspectives, impactful dialogue, and relationships that extend well beyond the event.
Our agenda is built through deep collaboration with our community to ensure every session delivers substance over soundbites. You’ll hear from true subject matter leaders via candid case studies, collaborative roundtables, and varied panel discussions —providing clarity on what’s driving success across the marketing landscape.
Benchmark your strategy against the best in the business. Hear directly from senior marketers at the world’s leading brands and gain practical insights from peers in similar roles. Every session is designed to help you measure performance, validate your approach, and apply proven strategies with confidence.
