Alex Hockens is the VP of Global Digital Product Marketing and Experience Activation at Estée Lauder, where she focuses on driving D2C operational excellence by transforming enterprise and emerging marketing tech into real go-to-market impact. Hockens’ team builds meaningful, high-touch consumer experiences by deeply understanding how people discover brands today through evolving channels such as ChatGPT and TikTok, redefining what it means to meet consumers where they are.
Named to our Marketers to Watch list in partnership with The Wall Street Journal, Hockens shared insights on the human side of marketing, AI integration, and the future of brand discovery through authenticity and peer validation.
What book or podcast do you recommend to marketing leaders?
One of the most memorable marketing books I’ve read is Rubies in the Orchard by Lynda Resnick. Lynda is the mastermind behind FIJI Water and POM Wonderful. I found her take on storytelling, intuition, and consumer psychology super-inspiring. The book is exemplary in its explanation that marketing is deeply human. I think marketing will continue to be more and more human-rooted; especially with the advent of AI which is doing a fantastic job of amplifying real consumer sentiment and serving it up as a means for brand discovery.
As for podcasts, I love WSJ Tech News Briefing. It’s quick and keeps me plugged into how tech is shaping consumer behavior.
How are you and your team currently using AI?
We’re hard-wiring AI across our processes to accelerate go-to-market execution and enhance the consumer experience. My team uses AI to analyze insights and improve how our content shows up in search, which is making it easier for consumers to find what’s relevant to them. It’s helping us move faster, stay more responsive, and amplify content that’s genuinely useful and discoverable.
What’s a prediction you have for marketing over the next few years?
I think consumers rely on each other now more than ever; through reviews, communities, and emerging platforms like LLM-powered search, to decide what to trust. As ranking algorithms evolve beyond traditional SEO, authenticity and peer validation will drive brand discovery.
Like I said, even with the advent of AI, the concept of marketing will continue to be deeply human-rooted. The most successful brands will learn to collaborate with consumers rather than market to them.
What’s the most innovative or exciting project you’ve worked on recently?
We’ve been reimagining how to meet consumers where they naturally explore and learn, including across new discovery channels like ChatGPT and Perplexity. It’s been exciting to test how these platforms reshape the consumer journey and what “search” really means when it’s conversational. The work is fast, experimental, and full of learning.
What’s the most pressing business challenge you’ve faced in the last year and what have you done to solve it?
Innovation agility and speed-to-market have been front and center. With consumer behavior changing so quickly, we needed to move faster without losing precision. We’ve revamped how teams work by simplifying processes, adopting new tools, and breaking silos. It’s a mindset shift toward “test, learn, act.”
What leadership muscle is most important for marketers to exercise?
For me, it’s about staying scrappy and obsessed with action. Marketing and tech are evolving at lightning speed, and leaders must create space for teams to move fast, experiment, and make data-driven decisions.
What’s the most game-changing piece of career advice you’ve ever received?
“You can do it.” Sometimes that’s all you need to hear to take the right leap.
What gives you energy and inspiration outside of work?
Music! Especially jazz. I live in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn, which has an incredible jazz history that dates back to the 1800s. Live jazz just resets my energy – I love it.
Marketers to Watch is a recognition series to spotlight highly innovative and forward-thinking marketing leaders in the community. If you have someone you’d like to nominate for the series, apply here.
