The Marketing Priorities Shaping Domino’s Global Brand System
At a Glance Interviewee: Kate Trumbull, Executive Vice President and Global CMO Company: Domino’s Location: Ann Arbor, Michigan Website: dominos.com Industry: Quick-service restaurants, pizza, delivery, carryout, digital ordering Company Notes: Domino’s is a global franchise-led pizza brand with a major digital ordering and delivery business Best-Fit Agencies: Creative, social, loyalty/CRM, product launch, retail media, multicultural, brand experience Source: Ad Age Marketer… Get Unlimited NextBigWin Access Subscribe to become a NextBigWin Pro member and get access to all our exclusive content. Turn access and intelligence into your next big client win. Already a member? Login Subscribe to NextBigWin Pro
Signals Behind Zscaler’s Push for Message Clarity
At a Glance Interviewee: Sunil Frida, Chief Marketing Officer Company: Zscaler Estimated Revenue: $2.7B Location: San Jose, California Website: zscaler.com Industry: Cloud security Company Notes: Zscaler is a scaled enterprise SaaS security company with more than 9,400 customers and a broad Zero Trust platform story Best-Fit Agencies: B2B brand strategy, enterprise demand generation, executive communications, partner marketing, event and experience, paid media Source: CMO Jo… Get Unlimited NextBigWin Access Subscribe to become a NextBigWin Pro member and get access to all our exclusive content. Turn access and intelligence into your next big client win. Already a member? Login Subscribe to NextBigWin Pro
Inside Sunil Frida’s Human Approach to Leading at Scale
Executive: Sunil Frida, Chief Marketing OfficerCompany: ZscalerIndustry: Cloud securityCompany Snapshot: Zscaler helps companies replace legacy network architecture with a cloud-based Zero Trust model.Format: CMO Journeys Interview Why It Matters Sunil Frida’s story is not a straight climb up a neat corporate ladder. It is a story about seeing the world early, learning discipline young, and then discovering that great technology only matters if people can actually understand it. That idea runs through everything he says. It also makes his perspective useful for agencies. Because when Frida talks about marketing, he is not talking about polish for polish’s sake. He is talking about clarity, trust, and the hard work of making something complex feel simple and useful. Their Path, in Short Frida grew up in Singapore in what he describes as a middle-class neighborhood, with a sports journalist father and a schoolteacher mother. His parents did something that clearly stayed with him: they stretched what they had to show their family the world. He still tells the story with a laugh. His father was willing to make five flight stops just to save fifty dollars. The trip took forever. It was worth it. That early life sounds grounded and ordinary in the best way. Close friends. School bus rides. Sports. A family that cared about doing well in school and making the most of what was possible. Frida does not present himself as some childhood prodigy. He says he was not the best student or the worst student. But he worked hard. That theme comes up again and again. Then came military service in Singapore, which he describes as life-changing. It was not just about training. It was where he started to understand leadership as real care. That experience, he says, shaped how he thought about leading others. His next turn came in Australia, where he studied engineering after what sounds like a very human, very unplanned moment. He had missed deadlines. A door happened to be open. A professor happened to be there. A spot happened to open. Frida tells the story almost like a shrug, but it lands as something bigger: sometimes a career starts because one door is open on a Friday afternoon. From there, he moved into the tech world and then product management. But the big shift came later, at AWS, when he realized the job was not only to understand the technology. It was to explain it. He saw senior leaders spend days refining language so a complex idea could be understood in simple English. That changed his view of marketing. The breakthrough was not about “speeds and feeds.” It was about positioning, messaging, and making the value real to another human being. Big Themes From the Conversation One theme that kept surfacing was simplicity. Frida comes from technical environments, but he does not romanticize complexity. He almost argues the opposite. If you cannot explain what you are building in plain language, then the brilliance of the product does not matter very much. That belief feels central to how he leads. Another theme is discipline. You can hear it in the way he describes school, the military, and later his working style. He likes focus. He likes priorities. He likes stripping things down to what matters. Even when he jokes, there is a through-line: energy is limited, time is limited, so use both well. There is also a real warmth in how he talks about people. He was pleasantly surprised by how driven and mission-oriented the culture at Zscaler felt from the inside. He talks about joy at work without sounding forced or performative. For him, joy is not extra. It is part of what makes good work possible. And then there is curiosity. Frida sounds like a person who wants to understand how things work all the way down. Not just the headline. Not just the pitch. The actual mechanics. That curiosity shows up in his questions, in his stories, and in the way he describes building teams and solving problems. Watch Or Listen CMO Journey Interview How They Choose the Right Agency Partners When I asked how he thinks about agency partners, Frida did not give a vague speech about collaboration. He got specific fast. First, he starts with scope. What is the work? What are the big buckets that need to get done? What can the internal team do well on its own, and where does outside support actually make sense? That sounds obvious, but he treats it like a discipline, not a slogan. He also draws a pretty clear line around certain work. Product marketing, in his view, belongs close to the product and the market. He describes it as part art, part science, and he does not sound eager to hand that over. Other areas, like media, advertising support, social, and reach extension, are different. Those are places where outside partners can help the company scale. But here is where it gets interesting: Frida is not looking for agencies to impress him with volume. He is looking for them to make sense. He says a lot of outreach lands on his LinkedIn and in his inbox. The agencies that stand out are the ones that can explain, in simple English, how they would help his product and story scale. Not a flood of data. Not a giant pile of industry talk. Clarity. He also wants depth. Frida says he asks a lot of questions and likes to get into the weeds. He comes from product and product marketing. So when someone pitches him, he wants to know the why behind it. Why would this work? Why this approach? Why this message? He is not looking to be read the news. He is looking for someone who understands the product, the customer, and the connection between the two. That creates a useful lesson for agencies. Frida seems to respond less to flash and more to translation. Can you take something technical and make it intelligible? Can you show that
M&A Signals – Deals Announced Through April 29, 2026
Highlights Eli Lilly acquired Ajax Therapeutics — Deal value: up to $2.3B Eli Lilly is a U.S. drugmaker expanding its oncology pipeline. Ajax Therapeutics is a privately held cancer drug developer with an early-stage oral treatment for myelofibrosis. The deal supports Lilly’s search for next-generation cancer treatments. It also builds on Lilly’s blood cancer capabilities and could expand future commercial products beyond obesity. Agency lens: This is a pipeline-exp… Get Unlimited NextBigWin Access Subscribe to become a NextBigWin Pro member and get access to all our exclusive content. Turn access and intelligence into your next big client win. Already a member? Login Subscribe to NextBigWin Pro
Why AI Is Creating a Massive Opportunity for Agencies
I recently sat down with Scott Brinker, a leading voice in marketing technology, to discuss how AI is changing opportunities for agencies. Brinker has spent over two decades in marketing technology, leading strategy at HubSpot, founding a SaaS company, advising startups, and publishing chiefmartec for 80,000+ industry leaders. He’s best known for creating the Marketing Technology Landscape annual report. He’s seen every major wave of change in how marketing gets done. That’s what made his perspective on AI stand out. While much of the conversation has focused on disruption and replacement, Brinker sees something else emerging — something that could drive significant demand for agencies. AI Isn’t Just Disrupting. It’s Overwhelming. One of the first things Brinker pointed to is the speed of change. Unlike past technology shifts that took years, AI is compressing transformation into months or even less. That compression is putting pressure on organizations. Companies are being forced to rethink their technology, customer engagement models, and how work gets done internally. Most aren’t set up to manage that level of change. As Brinker put it, “overwhelming is an understatement.” This shift in behavior is critical: instead of trying to figure everything out internally, many companies are now looking outward for guidance. For agencies, that shifts the role. It’s less about executing predefined work and more about helping clients determine what they should be doing in the first place. The Structural Advantage Agencies Have In Brinker’s view, agencies are uniquely positioned in this environment because of how they accumulate experience. A brand may face a transformation once. An agency does it repeatedly across clients. Each engagement provides lessons that can be reused. He describes this as a form of arbitrage. Companies get one version of the transformation. Agencies get many. In a moment where there is no clear playbook, that repetition becomes valuable. It allows agencies to move faster, avoid common pitfalls, and bring a level of pattern recognition that most internal teams don’t yet have. A Delivery Model Under Pressure Yet, as agencies find themselves in this evolving role, the way they deliver work is also beginning to change. Historically, much of an agency’s value came from execution: the production, coordination, and manual work needed for campaigns. Pricing often relied on time and resources. AI is starting to absorb a meaningful portion of that execution layer. As that happens, the traditional time-and-materials model becomes harder to defend. Not because the work itself is less valuable, but because the inputs have changed. “The time and materials basis of this has become irrelevant,” Brinker said. What clients still want is the outcome. Strategy, creativity, and orchestration remain central, but the way those are packaged and priced is shifting toward impact rather than effort. Why This Isn’t a Simple Race to the Bottom One concern that comes up frequently in conversations about AI is commoditization. If the tools are widely accessible, does everything become interchangeable? Brinker’s perspective is more nuanced. While AI may standardize parts of execution, companies aren’t hiring agencies for sameness. They’re hiring them to differentiate. That puts more weight on imagination, judgment, and the ability to translate ideas into something that actually works within a business. Not all strategy is equal. As AI improves, some structured analysis is easy to replicate. The defensible work is original thinking, clear positioning, and tying ideas to real-world needs. A Shift Beneath the Surface: From Applications to Infrastructure Another change Brinker highlighted is happening at the technology level. For years, marketing has been built around packaged applications—tools with fixed capabilities that companies assemble into stacks. That model is evolving as AI makes it easier to build custom workflows, tools, and agents on top of broader platforms. In this environment, technology becomes less about individual applications and more about infrastructure. For agencies, this creates new opportunities. They help design how systems are built, connected, and used, extending work beyond campaigns into internal marketing operations. Multiple Transformations Happening at Once Part of what makes this moment so complex is that it isn’t just one shift. It’s several things happening at once. Brinker pointed to three in particular: the transformation of technology and data infrastructure, the transformation of buyer behavior, and the transformation of how work gets done inside organizations. Each of these would be significant on its own. Together, they create a level of change that most companies struggle to manage internally. That complexity is what’s driving demand—not just for execution, but for guidance. The Gap Between Strategy and Execution Is Shrinking AI is also compressing the distance between strategy and execution. In the past, there was a clear separation between the two. Strategy was developed first, and execution followed over weeks or months. That gap is now shrinking. What once took months can now be built, tested, and iterated in days or even hours. That creates a different operating model, one where thinking and doing are much more closely connected. For agencies, the ability to move fluidly between strategy and execution becomes increasingly important. Why Smaller Agencies May See New Opportunities One of the more interesting implications of this shift is what it means for smaller agencies. Historically, larger agencies benefited from scale: more people, more resources, and broader capabilities. AI begins to level parts of that equation by making advanced capabilities more accessible to smaller teams. That said, the advantage isn’t absolute. While the capability gap may narrow, other factors, such as visibility, reputation, and access to enterprise clients, remain significant. For many smaller agencies, the challenge isn’t whether they can deliver the work, but whether they can consistently get in the room to compete for it. The Real Challenge: Managing Change Despite all of these opportunities, most organizations are still behind. Not because the technology isn’t available, but because adapting to it is difficult. Even companies making decisions in response to AI often haven’t fully figured out how they will operate differently as a result. That points to a broader issue. The challenge isn’t just adopting AI. It’s managing
Funding Signals – Activity Through April 28, 2026
Highlights Reliable Robotics raised $160M (Series D) led by Nimble Partners Reliable Robotics develops autonomous aircraft systems for commercial and defense aviation. The funding will accelerate deployment and scale production of its Reliable Autonomy System. That matters because the company cites more than 200 system commitments, a U.S. Air Force contract, and continued FAA certification progress. Agency lens: Commercial deployment, hiring, and production expansio… Get Unlimited NextBigWin Access Subscribe to become a NextBigWin Pro member and get access to all our exclusive content. Turn access and intelligence into your next big client win. Already a member? Login Subscribe to NextBigWin Pro
Texas Department of Transportation Public Awareness Campaign With Multi-Year Potential
At a Glance Buyer: Texas Department of Transportation Industry: Government/Transportation/Public Safety Location/markets: Statewide Texas Primary scope: Marketing and advertising for the Be Safe. Drive Smart. traffic safety public awareness campaign Key deliverables/channels: Campaign strategy, target audience planning, key messaging, campaign flights, public relations plan, campaign enhancements plan, campaign measurement and message evaluation, project schedule Budget: Not… Get Unlimited NextBigWin Access Subscribe to become a NextBigWin Pro member and get access to all our exclusive content. Turn access and intelligence into your next big client win. Already a member? Login Subscribe to NextBigWin Pro
Washington State University Google Ads Services for Pharmacy Enrollment Campaigns
At a Glance Buyer: Washington State University, College of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences Industry: Higher Education/Healthcare Education Location/markets: Washington State; target markets include Washington, California, Oregon, Hawaii, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, New Mexico, Puerto Rico, Alberta, and British Columbia Primary scope: Digital advertising management and optimization for PharmD and Pharmaceutical and Medical Science… Get Unlimited NextBigWin Access Subscribe to become a NextBigWin Pro member and get access to all our exclusive content. Turn access and intelligence into your next big client win. Already a member? Login Subscribe to NextBigWin Pro
City of Santa Clarita Advertising Campaign Opportunity With $460K Tourism Scope
At a Glance Buyer: City of Santa Clarita Industry: Government/Tourism/Destination Marketing Location/markets: Santa Clarita, California Primary scope: Full-service advertising campaign for Visit Santa Clarita Key deliverables/channels: Strategic planning, media buying, creative development, campaign management, research, reporting, SEO, AIO, PPC, airport advertising coordination, visitor guide development and printing Budget: Not expected to exceed $460,000 Contract type/ter… Get Unlimited NextBigWin Access Subscribe to become a NextBigWin Pro member and get access to all our exclusive content. Turn access and intelligence into your next big client win. Already a member? Login Subscribe to NextBigWin Pro
State of Georgia Marketing Services AOR Across State Parks
At a Glance Buyer: State of Georgia, Department of Natural Resources Industry: Government/Parks, Recreation, Tourism, Historic Sites Location/markets: Georgia and the Southeast Primary scope: Marketing/advertising consultant services for Georgia State Parks Key deliverables/channels: Strategic marketing plan, advertising, public relations, promotions, strategic marketing, interactive marketing communications, reporting Budget: Not specified Contract type/term: One-year initial contract with four one-year renewal options Key dates: Proposal deadline May 15, 2026. Eligibility/must-haves: Team Georgia Marketplace registration; mandatory online bidders/offerors’ conference attendance; required worksheets/forms; required insurance; electronic submission through Team Georgia Marketplace Why This Could Be Interesting The State of Georgia Department of Natural Resources is seeking a marketing and advertising consultant for Georgia State Parks, through its Parks and Historic Sites Division. The work centers on building and executing a strategic marketing plan that supports parks, historic sites, golf courses, two welcome centers, and the SAM Shortline. The selected company will serve as the agent of record for coordinating and integrating marketing efforts across state park properties. This is a broad public-sector tourism and recreation assignment. The stated goals include increasing visitation and revenue, strengthening brand awareness, supporting preservation and conservation, and communicating the value of Georgia’s parks, historic sites, and golf courses. The upside is the term structure. The initial contract runs for one year, but the State has four one-year renewal options. For the right agency, this could become a longer-term relationship with a visible statewide brand and a diverse mix of destination, education, recreation, and stakeholder communications work. Best suited for agencies with public-sector experience, integrated marketing and advertising capabilities, PR support, interactive marketing experience, and strong reporting discipline. Proposal deadline: May 15, 2026 Download the full RFP here.