The Peerbound Podcast

Evan Jacobs on Keeping Customer Marketing Human

Episode Summary

In this episode of the Peerbound Podcast, Sunny sits down with Evan Jacobs, a longtime customer marketing leader at top B2B software companies, to talk about where the function goes as AI takes over the busywork. Evan explains why release forms, scheduling, and gifting belong with agents, and why relationships with key customers matter more as everything else turns into self-service. They also cover the expanding scope of customer marketing, the hidden cost of building AI tools nobody can maintain, and why real proof is the answer to AI slop.

Episode Notes

How is AI changing customer marketing and customer advocacy? In this episode of the Peerbound Podcast, Evan Jacobs joins Sunny to discuss which tasks AI could take off customer marketers’ plates and why human relationships remain central to the role.

Evan shares lessons from his customer marketing career, including his work at Rapid7, and explains how the function is expanding beyond customer relationships to include content production, distribution, and performance measurement.

In this conversation:

• How AI could reduce administrative work, scheduling, and approval processes
• Why customer advocacy should create value for customers rather than rely on favors
• How customer marketers’ responsibilities are expanding across video testimonials, customer stories, and campaign performance
• Where customer advocacy should sit within an organization: marketing, revenue, or customer success
• Why authentic customer proof matters in a market full of AI-generated content

Chapters
00:00 Meet Evan Jacobs
01:41 Getting started in customer marketing at Rapid7
03:56 Building customer advocacy through mutual value
05:43 The future of customer marketing and AI
11:42 AI use cases with staying power
14:20 AI-generated content and authenticity
17:34 The expanding customer marketing role
22:12 Building AI tools: maintenance and scalability
25:17 Where customer advocacy belongs in an organization
29:30 Rapid-fire questions

Sunny Manivannan: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sunnymanivannan/

Evan Jacobs: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ejacobscustomeradvocacy/