The Holy Grail.
Greg P. Licciardi is VP of Sponsorships and Partner Programs at the ANA, the world’s largest marketing association. A marketing strategist, educator, and author, he spent decades at the Weather Company, IBM, and across media and technology brands before dedicating his work to defining what modern marketing excellence actually looks like.
“This is the Holy Grail of marketing. The right context is as important as the right audience.”
Greg P. Licciardi is a marketing strategist, educator, and author whose career has spanned television, print, digital, and technology platforms across some of the world’s most recognised brands. As VP of Sponsorships and Partner Programs at the ANA, he works with marketers and brands at the intersection of innovation, sponsorship strategy, and the future of consumer connection.
Licciardi spent years at the Weather Company, where he helped CMOs and marketers understand how contextual relevance and real-time data could transform advertising effectiveness. He worked closely with brand leaders including Microsoft, IBM, and major consumer brands, helping them move from interruption-based advertising towards experience-based connection.
His book is a celebration of marketing innovation, drawing on case studies from challenger brands and platform disruptors. He uses the Harry’s versus Gillette story and the e.l.f. beauty growth story as core examples of how brands with constrained budgets can out-manoeuvre incumbents by focusing on the right audience, the right message, and the right moment.
“On Fridays at 11am, the Wendy’s ad arrived in his feed at exactly the moment he was deciding where to eat.”
The right environment is as important as the right audience.
Licciardi’s Wendy’s moment came when a Friday lunch-hour ad landed in his social feed at exactly the moment he was deciding where to eat. That was not an accident. It was a signal that contextual relevance, not just demographic targeting, is the standard brands should be held to.
Harry’s was forced to survive and to really do innovation.
Going up against Gillette with 67% market share forced Harry’s to be relentlessly clear about its proposition. A stylish, affordable razor delivered to a young man’s home. No store. No complexity. The constraint of being the challenger produced the clarity the incumbent could never achieve from a position of comfort.
As brands are dazzled by AI, what is being lost is emotional connection.
AI can optimise headlines, automate personalisation, and generate content at scale. What it cannot replace is the genuine human insight that makes a consumer feel understood rather than targeted. The brands most at risk are those treating AI as a creative solution rather than a productivity tool.
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