These days, business leaders are encouraged to create and promote their personal brand. And while it’s difficult for anyone in business to develop one as strong and resonant as Elon Musk, Steve Jobs or Warren Buffett, executives can benefit from people within their own company as well as in the wider world on social media to get an idea of what they’re about, what they do in their jobs, and the personal beliefs that helped them get there.

This is likely what drove McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinski to start his Instagram account in 2020, the year after he was named the fast food chain’s leader. The posts on his account often deal with leadership advice, recognizing employees and taste-testing McDonald’s menu items from around the world. Kempczinski, who calls himself “Chris K” in self-narrated videos, presents himself as approachable, supportive and knowledgeable about the McDonald’s brand.

Last month, however, his Instagram feed received the wrong kind of attention. The CEO posted himself taking what’s been pilloried as a half-hearted nibble out of the restaurant’s new Big Arch burger. And while the video has gone viral for all the wrong reasons, it begs the question of whether it’s actually bad publicity for the burger, McDonald’s or Kempczinski himself.

As AI technology is reshaping marketing as a whole, it’s time for those who are in the business to ask whether it’s also sidelining the humans and creative energy that has driven marketing through the ages. I talked to Columbia Business School Professor Rajeev Kohli about how the people in marketing can keep up with AI technology and assert the importance of humans in the field. An excerpt from our conversation is later in this newsletter.

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One of the most important tenets of marketing food products: Make them look delicious. A viral video of McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinski awkwardly eating the chain’s new Big Arch burger missed the mark. The video, posted on Instagram about a month ago, shows Kempczinski talking up the attributes of the “product” (the online peanut gallery has noted countless times that he should call it a “burger”) and ending with taking a “big bite”—which looks like a small nibble—and proclaiming with limited enthusiasm that it is “so good.” Reactions have mocked Kempczinski’s “unnatural” style, and many have said it looks like he hates McDonald’s food.

Rival chain Burger King jumped into the fracas this week, posting a TikTok video of U.S. and Canada President Tom Curtis taking a big bite of the restaurant’s Whopper in a restaurant kitchen.

While Kempczinski is getting a lot of attention for his Big Arch video, it’s not clear how the post has impacted sales of the burger—or the branding of the restaurant in general. Forbes contributor Kate Hardcastle writes this is a prime opportunity for McDonald’s to move the marketing conversation. After all, thanks to the video, the Big Arch is now being talked about more than it would be if it just appeared on the restaurant chain’s menu.

Kempczinski has been CEO of McDonald’s since 2019, and has led several successful business changes to the restaurant, including drive thru speed improvements and innovations with chicken sandwiches. He doesn’t appear to have responded to the criticism on his Instagram account, much of which is dedicated to him giving career advice. In one video, he shares what he would say if he weren’t concerned about hurting feelings, starting with: “Have a thick skin.”

Even though Netflix most likely won’t be buying Warner Bros. Discovery—Paramount Skydance topped the streamer’s bid last week, and Netflix opted to walk away from the deal—the new company created by the deal will be a force in the streaming industry. Combining current subscribers of Paramount+ and HBO Max in the merger would create a subscriber pool of at least 55.3 million U.S. customers.

Globally, the numbers could be much higher. In their last quarterly reports, Warner Bros. Discovery had 131.6 million subscribers around the world, while Paramount+ had 78.9 million. Adding in subscribers from smaller services—BET+ and Discovery+—as well as HBO cable subscribers, Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison says the new company would start out with a subscriber base of 200 million.

That is a lot, but it would still soundly be beat by the leader in streaming: Netflix. The company surpassed 325 million subscribers around the globe at the end of 2025.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

AI chatbots have a reputation for being way too nice. They’re known for being quick to praise users for the quality of their queries, thought processes and ideas—which can have negative consequences. But they’re not always nice about brands, and new research from BrightEdge shows negative sentiment tends to show up as chatbot users are doing brand research.

There’s the issue of what shows up: Top chatbots surface different negative sentiments and at different times. While Google’s AI is 44% more likely to show something negative than ChatGPT, the chatbots likely won’t be showing users the same negative things. The same query to both chatbots will offer different criticisms for different brands 73% of the time, BrightEdge found. Google tends to bring up controversy about a brand or product, while ChatGPT focuses more on product evaluation. With Google, 85% of the negative information shows up at the beginning of the user’s query process. For ChatGPT, close to a fifth of it surfaces near the end—presumably as a user is making final decisions about a brand.

Dealing with negativity in AI search is much different than a bad product review or waiting out a controversy. AI pulls from the internet at large, and isn’t always the best at timeliness. BrightEdge found that Google’s AI Overviews will warn users seeking information about Samsung phones about the 2016 Galaxy Note 7 battery recall, even though that happened about a decade ago. And some queries about Adidas will surface controversial comments made by Kanye West years ago. AI also tends to keep repeating query answers, meaning negative sentiments can be woven into countless responses about a brand.

To combat this, BrightEdge CEO Jim Yu suggests that brands need to be a lot more proactive in sentiment monitoring across the internet, curating content that can be helpful to AI users.

How Marketers Can Keep Up With AI

AI is taking over marketing, whether it’s by way of generative systems that test hundreds of ad variations, or automated targeting systems that determine the best placement. In a recent op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, Rajeev Kohli, the Ira Leon Rennert Professor of Business at Columbia Business School, wrote about how these seemingly positive developments are sidelining human marketers and creators.

I talked with him about what this means to today’s marketers, and how they can keep up with a world being consumed by AI. This conversation has been edited for length, clarity and continuity.

With AI more or less now closing in on the traditional advertising business, what is lost with having fewer humans in the mix—other than jobs?

Kohli: Motivation of people to create things. If you can do the same thing [with AI], it will have an impact on what these ad agencies can do. In some ways, it undermines our own confidence in what we can do as human beings.

I’ve spoken to some people in the advertising industry who are panicking, who are truly scared of the extent to which this is taking over. Yes, it could also mean a further consolidation of the industry because you’ll have fewer players left. And if these large companies like Google and Meta and Amazon can consolidate the ad creation part into their businesses, then what you’re looking at is hugely integrated companies that are doing everything from creating the advertising, to testing it, to providing the platforms on which they can be shown.

All of these companies have two functions. They provide platforms where they can show the advertising, but they also create the markets where advertising is bought and sold. And now if they bring in the creation part in-house, then everything is centralized, everything is controlled within an organization.

At the same time, advertisers are probably going to be happy because it is less expensive for them. It is faster. They need to have fewer people working on things. They don’t have to spend as much on the various processes, including the creative.

For two of the parties—large companies like Google and Amazon and Meta, and the companies spending money on advertising—they see eye-to-eye, which basically means that there’s much more power concentrated in a few hands.

From your viewpoint, do you see this as a positive evolution for marketing and advertising?

It’s very hard to be prescriptive here. The reason I hesitate is nobody’s sitting there trying to say, ‘Let’s take away business from these people.’

How successful something is will ultimately depend upon how much benefit it creates. And unfortunately, the benefit is the least for the consumer directly in this case. It is primarily for the advertisers and the companies that provide them services. It is not possible to tell Google not to do something if it in fact helps their advertisers, because that’s what their business is. That’s why clients come to them. And it’s very hard to tell clients not to use these technologies because they’re the ones who are spending the money and want to use it in the most efficient way possible.

It’s a systems problem. Where technology comes in, it displaces, it creates new things. This is back to [Joseph] Schumpeter and his notion of creative destruction: The idea that the creation of something new always sweeps away the old; things fall along the way.

I hate to not give you a clear answer, but I can’t. There is none.

What kind of advice would you give marketers on how to navigate this, how to keep their heads above water and keep going?

If it’s an ad agency, I would say it’s probably a good idea for you to not hide—because the first tendency is to withdraw and say, ‘We won’t play this game.’ Remember this is a very early stage. This is only going to get more sophisticated and go in directions that we can’t anticipate yet.

The first thing that I suggest is to start using and getting experience with the technology. Not just the technology that is mainstream today, but what is potentially coming down the road. If you can’t see what’s coming, you’re not going to be able to deal with it. And if you have the wherewithal, the resources and the skills to use it better than others, that’s probably the best way for you to survive and change.

These sorts of changes can be wrenching, but there are also opportunities. You may not be looking forward to them, but they can create unanticipated openings and opportunities where you don’t see, but your skills and capabilities may in fact be very useful, but you have to combine them with what is coming next.

Financial services provider USAA appointed Chris Curtin as its new chief marketing officer, effective March 2. Curtin most recently worked as chief marketing officer at Sam’s Club, and he also worked in leadership for Bank of America.

Home goods retailer Williams-Sonoma promoted Abby Teisch to the role of chief marketing officer. Teisch previously worked as the company’s executive vice president of marketing and has been with the company for 20 years.

Restaurant firm Brinker International promoted George Felix to executive vice president and chief marketing officer. Felix most recently worked as the company’s senior vice president and chief marketing officer for Chili’s Bar & Grill, and his expanded role will include Maggiano’s Little Italy.

Once upon a time, collaboration was planned in an office conference room, with detailed plans drawn out on whiteboards, or legions of colorful sticky notes all over the wall. Times, work patterns and technology have changed, but you can still get the same collaborative planning done—without the marker fumes—using digital visual planning tools.

For today’s leaders, IQ and EQ are important to have—but there are more Qs that will help you lead more fairly and compassionately. Here’s a look at why you should also consider the DQ—decency quotient—and LQ—love quotient.

Which legendary advertising mascot “retired” last month?

B. Pillsbury Doughboy

See if you got it right here.

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