Why Atlanta Needs AIMS: A Marketing Event Built for Connection

Atlanta is a hub for major global brands, fast-growing companies, creative agencies, media organizations, technology leaders, nonprofits, and one of the most active professional communities in the country.

There is no shortage of marketers looking for connection and growth, but those relationships often happen within individual organizations, disciplines, and professional communities.

What Atlanta needs more of is a place where those groups actually come together.

That is the purpose of the Atlanta Integrated Marketing Summit (AIMS).

On October 8 at SCADshow, AIMS will bring together brand leaders, agency partners, marketing organizations, sponsors, and rising talent for a focused afternoon centered on two things marketers need more of right now: useful ideas and meaningful relationships.

Atlanta Deserves Access to the Marketers Doing the Work

One of the biggest priorities for AIMS is bringing in speakers who are actively leading through the challenges marketers are facing now.

The sessions focus on questions that rarely have a one-discipline answer: how brands navigate change, respond to evolving customer expectations, modernize established businesses, and connect strategy, technology, creative, media, and customer experience.

This year’s lineup includes senior leaders responsible for some of the most recognizable brands in the country.

Laura Knebusch, SVP of Marketing & Consumer Experience at Georgia-Pacific, will explore How Heritage Brands Win With Modern Marketing. Knebusch leads an 80+ person organization across media, creative, e-commerce, digital marketing, martech, shopper marketing, and innovation. Her work spans iconic brands including Angel Soft, Quilted Northern, Brawny, Sparkle, Vanity Fair, and Dixie, giving attendees an inside look at what modernization means across a large portfolio of established brands.

Brian Canning, Chief Marketing Officer at Hertz, will speak about Marketing Through Transformation: Reinvigorating an Iconic Brand. He is helping shape the next chapter of a brand that has been part of American travel for generations, drawing on experience across marketing, loyalty, and customer experience at Hertz and during his previous 15 years at Delta Air Lines.

Khalilah Cooper, VP of Brand Strategy, Advertising & Media at Chick-fil-A, will share her perspective on Building Brand Meaning Through Experience & Storytelling. Her work sits at the intersection of strategy, advertising, growth, brand love, and customer experience, including years spent leading innovation across mobile ordering, drive-thru, dine-in, hospitality, and restaurant design.

And the lineup is still growing. Wendy Martin, Chief Marketing Officer at Cricket Wireless, will also join AIMS, with additional session details to come.

These sessions give attendees direct access to leaders making consequential decisions about transformation, customer experience, brand relevance, technology, storytelling, and growth inside complex organizations.

We Saw the Power of Connection Last Year

AIMS 2025 showed what can happen when Atlanta’s marketing community comes together intentionally.

The first AIMS brought marketers across disciplines into one room alongside leaders from Kellanova, UPS, Papa Johns, and Edible Brands. Speakers shared practical perspectives on full-funnel marketing, audience segmentation, authenticity, AI, brand health, integrated marketing, innovation, and building trust in challenging environments.

We also launched the first-ever Marketing Match Lounge, inspired by Setup’s #MarketersBreakfast speed-dating format and designed specifically to help attendees meet people around relevant marketing topics.

Attendees left with more than notes from the sessions. Feedback showed that people made connections with new collaborators, potential employers, agency partners, mentors, and peers. One attendee called AIMS “a true integrated experience,” while another described Setup’s goal of bringing Atlanta’s marketing community together as “a smashing success.”

That reinforced what we want AIMS to become: not simply an event people attend, but a place where marketers encounter people and ideas they may never cross paths with in their everyday work.

For AIMS 2026, we’re building on that foundation with another strong group of marketing leaders, an even broader community of partner organizations, and the return of intentional experiences like the Marketing Match Lounge.

Networking Should Be More Than Standing Around With a Drink

One of the biggest frustrations with professional events is that “networking” often means walking into a crowded room and hoping you happen to meet the right person.

AIMS is designed differently.

Connection is built throughout the afternoon, from check-in and session breaks through the closing Happy Hour. The Marketing Match Lounge and other sponsor activations are designed to make meeting someone new easier and more intentional.

You may be looking to meet another brand marketer, find someone with experience in an area you are exploring, expand your agency network, connect with a potential collaborator, or simply get to know more people in Atlanta’s marketing community.

Whatever brings you into the room, our goal is for you to leave with new perspectives and new relationships.

Why AIMS Matters for Atlanta

Atlanta already has the talent, the brands, the agencies, and the creative energy.

There are countless people, communities, and organizations already building each other up. AIMS exists to help bring more of them under the same roof.

In one focused afternoon, attendees can hear from senior leaders confronting real marketing challenges, exchange ideas with people outside their usual circles, and build relationships that continue long after the event ends.

That is why AIMS isn’t meant to be just another conference. It is a conference built for Atlanta’s marketing community.

And building a stronger community cannot happen through one company or organization alone.

AIMS is being developed alongside organizations already investing in Atlanta’s marketers, including AMA Atlanta, AAF Atlanta, AIGA Atlanta, Marketing AI Pulse, She Runs It, and Fuse.

Each represents a different part of Atlanta’s marketing ecosystem, from creatives and designers to marketing leaders, AI practitioners, and professionals across disciplines. Bringing those communities together creates more opportunities to exchange ideas, meet people outside our usual circles, and strengthen marketing across the city.

Join the community for connections that count, relationships that last, and insights that spark growth.

AIMS 2026 takes place October 8 at SCADshow. Doors open at 1:30 PM, with programming from 2:30–6:30 PM.

Join us in the room and leave with more ideas, more perspective, and more people in your corner.