You can’t predict the future. You can build the fitness to respond to it. #MindCandy is the fuel for strategic conversation about what’s next.
A long time ago (2011), I read The Old Rules of Marketing Are Dead. Fifteen years later, the message is the same — only the executioner has changed. AI agents will do the shopping. They will make the value chain and pricing fully transparent. They will end brand loyalty as we know it. Agent experience replaces user experience. Answers replace search.
Purpose, authenticity and originality will be the next Ps of marketing
Marketing spent decades perfecting the art of manipulating human attention. Now the buyer isn’t human. Every dark pattern, every urgency hack, every loyalty programme designed to create switching costs — all of it was built for a brain that gets tired, gets emotional, gets lazy. AI agents don’t. They compare. They verify. They optimise. What survives that filter? Substance. Transparency. A product that is actually better.
The irony is thick. The companies that were already honest, already transparent, already building genuine value — they were playing the long game without knowing it. Everyone else is about to find out what their brand is worth when you strip away the manipulation.
- https://www.rollingstone.com/culture-council/articles/the-end-of-digital-marketing-the-age-of-ai-agents-1235561304/
- https://www.mytotalretail.com/article/how-is-ai-changing-retail-strategy-now/
- https://hbr.org/2026/05/research-traditional-marketing-doesnt-work-on-ai-shopping-agents
Your marketing strategy was built to persuade humans. When the buyer is an AI agent that is immune to persuasion, what is left?
The other prompts:
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https://www.ronimmink.com/books-by-ron-immink/
The Creativity Gap: why bold thinking is now a strategic necessity
Treating innovation as a departmental function is no longer just a limitation — in the age of AI and economic caution, it’s a strategic disadvantage,
Why Avoiding Controversial Conversations is a Short-Sighted Strategy for Modern Business Leaders
Stepping into difficult dialogues allows organizational leaders to transform potential conflict into a powerful catalyst for long-term cultural resilience and growth.
How Fast-Growing Companies Can Make Better Decisions
“Structured empowerment” is a decision-making approach that scale
https://hbr.org/2026/05/how-fast-growing-companies-can-make-better-decisions
This New Memory Technology Could Make Devices Last Months on One Charge
Ferroelectric Memory Offers a Low-Power Alternative. This type of memory uses ferroelectricity, a property where a material’s internal electric polarization can be reversed. Changing that polarization affects how easily current flows, allowing information to be stored.
https://scitechdaily.com/this-new-memory-technology-could-make-devices-last-months-on-one-charge/
This tiny grain-of-rice sensor gives robots a new sense and changes what delicate tools can detect
Researchers have developed a sensor about the size of a grain of rice that can measure forces and twisting motions in all directions using light instead of traditional electronics. The new sensor could help robotic tools and medical devices “feel” what they are touching, especially at very small scales.
https://phys.org/news/2026-05-tiny-grain-rice-sensor-robots.html
Culture is the new balance sheet
The best business models are coming from culture
https://andjelicaaa.substack.com/p/culture-is-the-new-balance-sheet
Research: Traditional Marketing Doesn’t Work on AI Shopping Agents
New research shows that many classic e-commerce persuasion tactics built for human psychology—scarcity, countdown timers, strike-through pricing, vouchers, and bundles—do not reliably influence AI agents and can even reduce selection depending on the model and product category.
https://hbr.org/2026/05/research-traditional-marketing-doesnt-work-on-ai-shopping-agents
‘Touch dreaming’ helps humanoid robots handle five tricky tasks with 90.9% higher success
Embodied AI. Wait for it.
https://techxplore.com/news/2026-05-humanoid-robots-tricky-tasks-higher.html
New Algae Robots Swarm Like Locusts at the Flick of a Switch
Self-assembling swarms of microrobots could someday deliver drugs and pull toxins from water.
https://singularityhub.com/2026/05/15/new-algae-robots-swarm-like-locusts-at-the-flick-of-a-switch/
