Dive Brief:

• Among surveyed CMOs, 27% report no or limited adoption of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in their teams, according to new research from Gartner. 
• For those who have embraced the technology, 47% are seeing a large benefit for tasks such as campaign evaluation and reporting. Generative AI is more prevalent among what Gartner classifies as high performers, businesses that overachieve in relation to annual profit growth and marketing objectives. 
• Eighty-four percent of high performers are leveraging generative AI for creative development while over half (52%) are putting it toward strategy development. In Gartner’s assessment, marketers that are ignoring the technology are in a position of greater risk.

Dive Insight:

Several years into the generative AI hype wave, a decent chunk of marketers still appear reluctant to dip their toes in the water. Gartner revealed that 21% of surveyed marketing organizations are only tapping into the tech in a very limited capacity while 6% are making no use of generative AI at all. On the flip side, some marketing chiefs, around 15%, are seeing “extremely broad use” among their staff.

Uneven adoption speaks to ongoing caution surrounding generative AI as many legal and ethical questions linger and as the cost of some leading enterprise products remains steep. The fast emergence of disruptors like China’s DeepSeek has changed the conversation around pricing and spurred renewed interest in open-source models while stoking fresh debate in the areas of data security and privacy. 

The report also found that, while generative AI can deliver substantial boosts to certain practices, the upside is less apparent elsewhere. More than a quarter of CMOs see little to no benefit from generative AI when it comes to cost reduction, customer service and scalability. Making dollars stretch further has been a significant pressure on CMOs. 

“Many believe GenAI will transform marketing, but despite the hype, many CMOs feel that their GenAI investments have yet to pay off,” said Suzanne Schwartz, senior director analyst at the Gartner Marketing Practice, in a statement.

Gartner surveyed 418 marketing decision-makers between July and September 2024, months before DeepSeek was a major factor. 

Gartner’s findings emphasize that tech laggards risk falling further behind while high-performing marketing organizations are leading the way in regard to generative AI. High performers are most commonly using these tools for content creation, planning and strategy development, with the aim of better optimizing campaigns. A narrow majority of marketers are experimenting with generative AI in a moderate capacity while just 4% of respondents said that their entire team is using the software category.

Gartner’s takeaways echo other surveys that have uncovered a mismatch between media excitement around generative AI and concrete enterprise implementation. Polling attendees of its CIO Network Summit earlier this month, The Wall Street Journal found that 21% of information technology leaders were not using AI agents, with reliability a chief concern.