Customer First: Hans Timola on Marketing in the Age of AI

The Customer Can Get Lost in the AI Rush

AI pilots compete for attention across marketing organisations. Hans Timola’s starting point is the customer: what they need, where they look for information and which moments influence their decisions. At Professio’s MarTech Nordic 2026 in Helsinki, he asked whether the pursuit of new tools was leaving enough room for those questions.

“Are you too busy thinking about AI pilots instead of what your customers are looking for?”

Timola argued that marketing is too often treated as a succession of campaigns and isolated activities. A more effective approach connects processes, data, technology and creativity around a shared business purpose.

Reflecting on his first years at KONE, he described a marketing function that had been isolated and strongly driven by products. Building the structures that connect marketing to the business has required sustained work over several years.

His principle of commercial simplicity means removing complexity from customer and employee experiences so that decisions and business interactions become easier. For a CMO, it provides a way to assess new initiatives: each one needs a clear role in the wider system and a connection to the outcome the business wants to achieve.

From Campaign Activity to Customer Impact

Timola described KONE’s introduction of a customer journey engagement loop to identify the moments where the company can create customer and business value. The model maps 16 key moments and helps the team decide where its work can have the greatest impact.

This also changes decisions about content. Timola urged marketers to make conscious choices about what they produce, based on the information a customer needs at a particular stage. Content volume alone offers little guidance on whether those needs are being met.

The same perspective helps clarify marketing’s relationship with sales and operations. Timola described familiar discussions about who owns the customer or lead management. Understanding each function’s contribution to the customer journey gives those discussions a more useful starting point.

When AI Helps the Customer Choose

KONE’s public website renewal brought another question into focus: would the company be discoverable when AI helps a customer choose? Timola described organising the site’s information around customer needs, with levels covering positioning, the offering, solutions and services, and the innovations behind them.

The structure is intended to make information accessible to both people and machines. It also raises a broader question about the website’s purpose as customers use other tools to research suppliers.

“What if customers no longer come to the website?”

Timola explained that KONE is also exploring how the website can serve as a sales enablement tool. For marketing leaders, his example connects discoverability with information architecture and the practical use of content across the customer journey.

Creativity Still Creates a Difference

As technology becomes more widely available, Timola sees greater importance in the things it cannot readily replicate. He emphasised creativity’s role in building an emotional connection, illustrated by KONE’s global One concept and its adaptation across markets.

His recommendation is to define where AI adds value while keeping the company’s needs and the customer’s experience in view.

“AI should be seen as a servant, not the master.”

For CMOs, the implication is a more selective approach to investment and execution. A connected system, clear customer priorities and distinctive creative work give the team a basis for deciding which AI applications deserve its time.

His closing principle brought the discussion back to its starting point: “Put the customer at the center, everything else follows.”

Based on Hans Timola’s keynote at Professio’s MarTech Nordic 2026, Helsinki, 21 October 2026.