What CMO's Want - Building the Right Agency Ecosystem

This week on The Edge Of Influence, host Iman Issa - Co-Founder and Managing Partner of North Seventy Five, is joined by Alasdair Hall Jones - GCC Director, The Marketing Society and Firas Wahbeh - Chief Brand and Strategy Officer, BEEAH Group, to unpack how the CMO role has shifted from managing marketing output to helping shape business strategy. They dig into why the rise of specialist agencies (retail media, influencer, AI) is fragmenting the marketing ecosystem even as holding companies consolidate, and make the case for treating agencies as an extension of the internal team rather than a vendor relationship. The conversation also covers a candid discussion about AI and the idea that rather than replacing creative talent, instead it should free up agencies to do work that wasn't possible before. Production Credits: Presented by: Iman Issa Editor: Ian Carless Executive Producers: Iman Issa & Ian Carless Produced by: North Seventy Five & Poddworx Dubai