Wednesday - 30 / 9 / 2026
Registration
A Gift for the First 100 Attendees! Receive a complimentary copy of „Building Distinctive Brand Assets“ by the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute.Speciál: Brands Powered by AI
The afternoon special at Brand Management 2026 will explore how artificial intelligence is transforming the way marketers think about customers, content, creativity, and strategy.
Branding in the Age of AI: When Experience Is Created in Real Time
What will it be about?AI is transforming brands far more profoundly than simply helping marketers create copy, images, or campaigns faster. It is changing the very nature of how people interact with brands. Customers no longer engage only with advertisements, websites, sales representatives, or customer support. Increasingly, they are communicating with algorithms, recommendation engines, chatbots, and personalized content generated in real time.
What does this mean for brands? How can they maintain their identity, tone of voice, and trustworthiness in an environment where communication is no longer planned entirely in advance but is continuously shaped by data, context, and customer needs? And where is the line between useful personalization and a brand that fragments into a thousand different versions of itself?
Digital marketer, marketing and AI enthusiast. Founder and Chief Digital Officer of PS:Digital and the largest marketing conference in Slovakia, Marketing RULEZZ.
He began his career as a marketing manager in several non-profit organizations. He later worked for the magazine Stratégie as an editor focused on digital marketing and as a creative director for digital projects. At Zoznam, he was responsible for new business development.
In 2014, he founded the agency PS:Digital, which quickly became one of the leading digital agencies in Slovakia and has been behind numerous successful campaigns recognized for their creativity, effectiveness, and digital PR. He regularly speaks at conferences and lectures at several universities.
Together with Gabo Tóth, he co-creates Buzzworld by Gabo a Peťo, the most-listened-to marketing podcast in Slovakia. Alongside Barbora Okrúhľanská, he is involved in the Digital Parents project and podcast, which has won the Podcast of the Year award in the leisure podcast category for three consecutive years.
In 2025, he received the Marketer of the Year award and currently leads his own educational project, AI Fitko.
Are You Sitting on a Goldmine of Data? How to Get the Most from Research You've Already Paid For
What will it be about?Companies invest significant budgets in research, yet only a fraction of the collected data—often no more than 10%—makes it into presentations, while the rest remains unused on a hard drive. Through a series of case studies, we will demonstrate how advanced AI can unlock this "sleeping capital" by extracting new insights from existing data, generating compelling communication concepts, and providing a deeper understanding of target audience segments—helping businesses accelerate growth.
For eight years, she worked in marketing for Procter & Gamble in the regions of Central Europe, Southeast Asia, Australia and India. She then founded her own research and innovation agency CONFESS, which she has been leading for 20 years. She is an expert in the use of neuroscience in the field of marketing research and communication testing. She has lectured on the topic of subconscious research at international conferences, such as the Insight & Innovation Exchange Amsterdam 2023 or the American Market Research Association QRCA conference, Phoenix 2018.
An AI-Era Veteran: How to Rejuvenate the Czech Republic's Oldest Domain
What will it be about?How do you celebrate 30 years in the digital world while proving you're focused on the future, not just the past? How do you show that the Czech Republic's oldest domain can still feel fresh and relevant, despite being the clear veteran among its peers? And can a fully AI-generated commercial really work for a long-established brand?
Get the answers firsthand as we take you behind the scenes of this unique campaign and reveal how generative AI can genuinely reshape the rules of brand building.
Tomáš leads a team of marketers responsible for 14 brands across the Czech and Slovak markets within Alma Career, including Jobs.cz, Práce za rohem, and Profesia. In his work, he is constantly looking for new, unexplored approaches to marketing, bringing what matters most into every campaign – emotion and humor. His goal is simple: create work that stands out by doing things differently rather than following the crowd.
From the very beginning of the Jobs.cz anniversary campaign, Tomáš had a clear vision: to steer away from cheap "AI slop" and instead explore whether modern technology could be used to create something genuinely meaningful and of exceptional quality.
When Data Tells a Story: AI Bridges Market Research and Real-World Consumer Behavior
What will it be about?What if it were possible to combine a nationally representative survey of the Czech population with behavioral data from millions of online users? NaDa Research and Seznam have brought their data ecosystems together in a unique AI-powered project that integrates responses from more than 20,000 survey participants with Seznam's user data.
The result is Data Kompas — a new market planning and analytics tool that enables organizations to work with extensive datasets and uncover insights that would otherwise remain hidden. Join us to discover how AI is transforming the way data is analyzed and giving businesses a whole new perspective on Czech consumers.
Tomáš has more than 15 years of experience in market and media research. He is the Managing Director of NaDa Research, a company providing insights into consumer behavior, purchasing habits, and Czech consumers' relationships with brands, and serves as CEO of the research agency ResSOLUTION Group. He also holds the position of Vice Chairman of SIMAR, the Czech Association of Market and Public Opinion Research Agencies.
At Seznam.cz, he is responsible for user data, identity, personalization, and data strategy. With more than 20 years of experience in data, research, and marketing analytics, he focuses on developing identity solutions and leveraging data to gain a deeper understanding of users in the digital environment.
What Does Craft Mean in the Age of AI?
What will it be about?AI can now generate a visual in seconds but it still can't decide whether it's any good.
Drawing on 15 years of experience across client service, strategy, and creative, Rado will show where AI genuinely saves time and budget in the creative process and where it is powerless without human judgment. In his view, true craft cannot be generated; it can only be replaced with something inferior.
Rado has experienced every side of the advertising business—from client service and strategy to creative leadership. Over the past 15 years, he has worked on campaigns recognized both in the Czech Republic and internationally.
He has led projects for clients including T-Mobile, the Czech Insurance Association (ČAP), Kofola, Gambrinus, Pilsner Urquell, and IKEA. He also contributed to I Love Důchod for Komerční banka, the campaign that won the Grand Prix at the Impact Awards.
As Chief of Creativity at TRIAD, he helps clients navigate transformation—whether through market expansion, brand repositioning, or strategic change. He believes emotion is the one thing that truly differentiates brands from artificial intelligence, and even in the era of AI-generated content, he insists that no campaign succeeds without a powerful idea and an unexpected perspective.
When AI Can Create Anything, Taste Becomes Everything
What will it be about?In a world flooded with AI-generated content, the real challenge is no longer creating more. It is finding people with the taste to create, curate, and elevate what truly matters, what stands out, and what people will actually remember.
In this session, Pavlína will explore why taste is becoming the defining competitive advantage in the age of AI. She will show how it is reshaping who creates brands, how brands are built, and what marketers can do to stay relevant when technology makes production effortless but differentiation increasingly difficult.
Pavlína Louženská is the founder of TrendBrews, a trend forecasting agency focused on Central and Eastern Europe. More than 14,000 readers subscribe to her newsletter on trends and technology, pavlinaspeaks.substack.com, which was recognized by Substack as one of the Top 50 Rising in Business newsletters globally.
Her future-focused insights and predictions have been featured by Wired, ELLE, and TED. She serves on the advisory boards of several technology companies and non-profit organizations, including the Independent Press Foundation and Nekrachni. Pavlína is also the lead mentor for Google for Startups across Europe, Africa, and the Middle East.
Her work has earned multiple awards, including the European Citizen's Prize awarded by the European Parliament. In her spare time, she runs Singles Club, a speed-dating community for curious minds.
Networking
Thursday - 1 / 10 / 2026
Registration, networking
Part A
Invisible Purchase, Invisible Brand: Why Strategic Slowdown Matters
What will it be about?Today's market is racing toward making customer decisions as effortless as possible. Technology and artificial intelligence can remove almost every point of friction from the customer journey, increasingly taking over routine purchasing decisions. But this creates a fundamental paradox: when the purchase becomes completely invisible, the brand becomes invisible too—and with it, customer loyalty.
Consumers naturally value simplicity and efficiency. Yet if a brand focuses solely on creating the smoothest possible path to checkout, it risks becoming nothing more than an interchangeable option in the algorithm of a major marketplace. So how can brands ensure that customers actively choose them and build a genuine relationship with them?
Drawing on fresh insights from VML's global research, we will introduce the concept of strategic slowdown. We'll explore where technology should seamlessly handle routine tasks—and where brands should intentionally pause the customer journey to create meaningful moments that foster emotional connection. A truly great customer experience is not about removing every possible obstacle; it's about recognizing which moments are genuinely strategic for your brand.
Kristýna leads the Strategy team at VML. She has spent more than 15 years building brands, with experience spanning global network agencies such as DDB, the strategic boutique YYY agency, and the client side at Air Bank. She is passionate not only about shaping brand strategy but also about bringing it to life through implementation across services and employee experience.
At home, she is raising Generation Alpha, giving her firsthand insight into today's digital culture—from brainrot to the latest online trends—while still remembering the days of dial-up internet and growing up without a mobile phone. She enjoys sharing her experience, but is just as happy to learn from the younger members of her team. After all, the greatest strength lies in diversity of perspectives.
Adam Láska
Adam is a Senior CRM & Digital Growth Strategist at VML. With more than ten years of experience in marketing, digital strategy, and technology, he has built a diverse career spanning agency roles as well as executive leadership of customer communications at Česká spořitelna.
In his current role, he connects data, automation, and modern technologies with a clear objective: maximizing customer lifetime value. He believes that sustainable business growth is driven not only by customer acquisition but also by exceptional care for existing customers and the thoughtful application of technology that genuinely makes people's lives easier.
The Gen Z Myth: Will the Rules of Customer Experience Change?
What will it be about?Generation Z is often labeled as overly sensitive or unpredictable. However, findings from an extensive Škoda Auto study conducted in the Czech Republic and the UK reveal a very different picture: these consumers are highly pragmatic.
So how do you build brand value when traditional marketing no longer works? The answer lies in delivering an uncompromising customer experience. Drawing on real research data, we'll explore whether touchscreens or physical buttons win in Gen Z's world—and uncover the key differences in customer behavior between Western and Central European markets.
Kristina is the head of quantitative research with over 20 years of experience. She has worked at TNS Factum and GfK, where she led teams and departments focused on branding, advertising, finance, and automotive. She has extensive experience with both local and international research, particularly in tracking studies, consumer behavior, and advertising effectiveness measurement. Today, she leads a team of analysts and consultants developing new research methodologies and products.
Show Me the Money: Why Invest in Your Brand and When Will It Pay Off?
What will it be about?How to get media, strategy, and creativity pulling in the same direction so your brand doesn’t just win hearts and minds, but drives business results too.
Robert Renč
Martin Kuděla
The Heart, the Mind and Distinctive Assets
What will it be about?What matters more for brand growth: creating passionate brand lovers or ensuring your brand comes easily to mind and stands out at the point of purchase?
In this keynote, Professor Rachel Kennedy of the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute will unpack the evidence behind one of marketing's most enduring debates. Drawing on the work of the Institute and decades of research into brand growth, she will explore the role of emotional connection, brand love and loyalty alongside Mental Availability and Distinctive Brand Assets.
Attendees will discover how brands grow by reaching and being remembered by more category buyers. The session will provide practical insights into creating and leveraging Distinctive Brand Assets to build and refresh memory, to build brand value and support both immediate sales and future growth.
Professor Rachel Kennedy is one of the founders of the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science, which specialises in the discovery and dissemination of knowledge on how to grow brands.
Rachel ranks globally in the top 1% of advertising researchers and has been awarded a number of prestigious awards (e.g. Incorporated Society of British Advertisers award for the paper that best increases understanding of the way in which advertising works). Rachel has been recognised as one of “Advertising’s Big Thinkers” by the Advertising Association (UK).
Rachel is a regular speaker on the global stage including at Cannes Lions, ARF conferences for WARC and others. She has decades of industry engagement across categories and markets, regularly working with and presenting to many of the world’s biggest advertisers and media players including Unilever, Mars Inc, Google, HSBC and many more.
Through the Institute’s sponsorship program, executive programs (How Brands Grow Live!) and market research projects, Rachel helps embed evidence-based research into marketing practice.
Rachel’s role as Director (Product Development) sees her translating the Institute’s R&D into products and services for industry supporters.
Coffee break
Part B
What Agencies Leave Out of Their Reports: An Unfiltered Look at Regulated Online Campaigns
What will it be about?Are you an advertiser in the alcohol, telecommunications, financial services, or automotive sector? If your campaigns are subject to strict regulatory restrictions, achieving reach can quickly become an expensive challenge.
Petr Srna (WOO) will open the session by presenting the agency's benchmark data from regulated industries and beyond, demonstrating why traditional performance metrics often fall short in these environments. He will also show how event activations featuring influencers in person can significantly reshape campaign results.
Lenka Stachová (Heineken) will then share insights from the successful Heineken Watch Party project, offering a client's perspective on turning these challenges into measurable success.
Petr Srna is one of the leading figures in Czech influencer marketing. As the Founder and CEO of World of Online (WOO), one of the country's leading influencer marketing agencies, he has led dozens of successful campaigns for brands across industries ranging from beauty to FMCG. He is known for his analytical approach, deep understanding of the market, and ability to combine data-driven insights with creative concepts that deliver measurable impact.
Through WOO's close relationships with influencers, Petr became increasingly aware of their dissatisfaction with the lack of transparency in talent representation. This inspired him to establish Heroes of Online, an agency built on trust, fairness, and open communication. He is also deeply committed to educating the market and advancing influencer marketing as a fully recognized marketing discipline. This vision led to the creation of the Annual Influencer Marketing Report, which, under his leadership, aims to become the industry's leading source of insights. By combining robust data, consumer behavior analysis, and business outcomes, Petr helps position influencer marketing alongside traditional communication channels as a strategic part of the marketing mix.
Lenka Stachová is an experienced marketer at HEINEKEN Slovakia. In one of the most competitive FMCG sectors, she is responsible for developing international brands including Heineken, Desperados, and Strongbow. Her work combines long-term brand strategy, innovation, and marketing campaigns with a strong focus on delivering measurable business results.
As a representative of the new generation these brands engage with every day, Lenka believes that successful marketing begins with a deep understanding of consumers and the ability to build brands that are relevant, authentic, and meaningful.
Authenticity Can't Be Briefed
What will it be about?Martin Filip, Head of Brand at Tipsport, will explain why it sometimes makes more sense to adapt a campaign to the person rather than the other way around. He will reveal how Tipsport works with influencers, athletes, and brand ambassadors to ensure they remain authentic—not simply vehicles for advertising messages, but credible voices for both their audiences and the brand.
You'll also get a behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to recover when an absent-minded streamer accidentally derails the CLV of your campaign.
Martin Filip, a journalism graduate and former sports editor at Lidové noviny, has been with Tipsport for nearly 20 years. Over the course of his career, he has progressed through a range of communications and marketing roles to become Head of Brand. Today, he leads a team of 30 professionals and is responsible for the marketing communications of all brands within the Tipsport Group.
Branding in the Age of AI: From Promises to Experiences
What will it be about?AI is fundamentally reshaping customer loyalty—and with it, the very concept of branding.
Efficiency, seamless service, and personalization are becoming the new baseline. Brands that compete solely on these dimensions risk blending into the crowd.
In this keynote, Steven Van Belleghem explores how branding is shifting from visibility and promises to relationships and meaning. He introduces three levels of loyalty and explains why strong brands in the AI era will not be built through campaigns alone, but through thoughtful decisions that genuinely resonate with customers.
After all, the value of a brand lies not only in what it says, but in what it makes people feel—and what they remember about it.
Steven Van Belleghem is one of the world’s leading thinkers in customer experience. He is the author of six bestselling books and a globally sought-after keynote speaker. His latest book A Diamond in the Rough was named by Forbes as the number one must-read business book of 2024.
Steven has inspired global brands including Disney, Mastercard, Mercedes-Benz, Booking.com, Heineken, and Salesforce. He is the co-founder of Nexxworks and a part-time marketing professor at Vlerick Business School, as well as a guest speaker at London Business School.
Lunch
Part C
How the Subconscious Drives Your Customers' Decisions
What will it be about?Research shows that up to 95% of customer decisions are made subconsciously. But what really drives those decisions—and how can you influence them?
Matej will take you on a fascinating journey into the subconscious mind of your customers, revealing how customer psychology can become one of your most powerful tools for driving more effective marketing and stronger business results.
One book changed his life. Inspired by the power of behavioral economics, former mathematician Matej decided to leave the corporate world and found Mindworx. Today, after more than a decade as its CEO, he is recognized internationally as an expert in customer psychology for sales and marketing.
From the very beginning, his mission has been clear: to help businesses apply insights from customer psychology to drive sales growth. Together with his team, he advises leading banks, insurance companies, and telecommunications providers on how to increase sales, improve conversion rates, and develop products that customers genuinely want.
He is the creator of SURF™, a pioneering framework that has helped establish Mindworx as a global leader in customer psychology education. Today, the company operates through licensed trainers across four continents. Matej is also the author of The Hidden YES, in which he translates more than ten years of experience into practical strategies for increasing sales in financial services and insurance.
In his spare time, you are likely to find him hiking in the Dolomites, reading historical fiction, or perfecting his latte art.
From the Shelf to the Screen and Back Again
What will it be about?What does a brand need to get right before a successful campaign can truly deliver results? Using the story of the Ontario brand, we'll trace the journey from a highly visible campaign back to the less visible work happening in stores, at the shelf, and across every customer touchpoint.
This practical retrospective from Super zoo and MediaSafari will demonstrate how product, customer experience, creativity, and media work together and what needs to be in place for a brand promise to translate into both purchases and lasting customer loyalty.
Kristýna Černá leads the marketing of the Super zoo brand in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. She joined the company in 2020 and is responsible for brand development and marketing activities across both markets.
Marketing has been at the heart of her professional career from the very beginning. She has built extensive experience in brand marketing, marketing communications, and content marketing. Combining strategic thinking with expertise across multiple marketing disciplines, she now plays a key role in the growth of one of Central Europe's leading brands in the pet care sector.
A digital marketing expert with more than two decades of experience. He represented Facebook in its early days and spent years leading media planning and buying for some of the market's biggest brands. Today, as Co-founder and Strategy Director at MediaSafari, he brings world-class expertise to tailored solutions for business owners who want to maximize the value of their media investments.
From Voyo to Oneplay: Transforming the Brand, the Product, and the Rules of the Game
What will it be about?The rebranding of Voyo to Oneplay was far more than a new name and visual identity. It marked one of the biggest marketing transformations in the Czech media market—bringing together Voyo and O2 TV into a single platform that combines streaming, live television, sports, and premium local content.
How do you transform a well-established brand without losing its existing customers? How do you turn a rebrand into a catalyst for growth? And how do you build a new brand with the ambition to redefine the way people in the Czech Republic watch television and enjoy entertainment?
Jakub Folauf joined TV Nova in December 2021 as Senior Brand Manager. In April 2025, he became Chief Marketing Officer of Oneplay, and since 2026 he has served as Marketing Director of the Nova Group.
Throughout his career, he has been instrumental in building and developing brands such as Voyo, Zonky, Jägermeister (Czech Republic & Slovakia), and Mattoni. In his current role, he is responsible for advancing the Nova Group's marketing strategy, overseeing the continued growth of the Oneplay brand and the Nova family of linear TV channels, while driving the ongoing digital transformation of marketing.
Sex and Death (and Mathematics?)
What will it be about?We're still apes. And we respond most strongly to just two things: sex and death. These evolutionary drivers determine what people actually pay attention to in advertising—and why so many high-budget campaigns fail to capitalize on them.
This session explores attention measurement, the limits of human decision-making in media planning, and how mathematical optimization can achieve what the human brain simply cannot. You don't need brilliant creative. You need to know when to lean into death—and when to lean into sex.
Over the past 11 years in the media industry, Pavel has progressed from digital execution to developing cross-media strategies and attention planning for some of the market's leading brands. At WPP Media, he leads the Growth & Strategy team, successfully connecting clients' business needs with effective campaign delivery. He understands that modern marketing is no longer just about compelling visuals—it's about integrating innovation in ways that create real value, whether through the smart use of artificial intelligence or the design of outstanding customer experiences.
His primary goal is to ensure that every media innovation delivers a tangible, measurable impact on clients' businesses rather than remaining just another concept in a presentation. He enjoys challenging established assumptions and bases every decision on solid data rather than intuition. This data-driven approach enables him to maximize the return on media investments and help brands achieve meaningful business growth.
Your Brand Will Go Bankrupt and You'll Be the Last to Notice
What will it be about?The million-dollar question: how do you capture the attention of Generation Z and Generation Alpha? According to Jaroslav, no Czech brand has found the answer yet. Perhaps because there isn't one. There is only one undeniable truth: fear of the unknown limits you far more than you're willing to admit.
Through real-world examples, Jaroslav will demonstrate how a single “leap of faith” can transform the customer experience and save a brand from failure before you even realize it's in trouble.
Jaroslav Salon launched his career with the social media phenomenon In Czechia We Don't Say, which attracted more than 150,000 followers within just a few weeks and earned coverage in Forbes. The project's success opened the door to the advertising industry, and he chose to join TRIAD Prague, where he now serves as Creative Lead.
He has worked with brands including Plzeňský Prazdroj, Kozel International, Wolt, Seznam, Notino, IKEA, T-Mobile, Bohemia Chips, Sedita, Renault, the Czech Insurance Association (ČAP), and Netflix. Jaroslav has twice been nominated for Talent of the Year, placed third in Young Lions Czech Republic, and writes a newsletter dedicated to helping different generations better understand one another.
