Every CEO Wants AI-Driven Growth. Most Are Looking in the Wrong Place

I spend a lot of time meeting with CEOs across industries and every single one of them is thinking about AI.

Some are already adopting AI tools. Others are deep in evaluations, building business cases, running pilots. A few are still in the exploration phase, trying to separate hype from reality.

But they all share the same goal: use AI to drive growth in 2026. What a number of them miss however is that the biggest unlock for AI isn’t the tools themselves but the data and context you feed them.

The Expensive Detour

The default playbook goes something like this: buy the latest AI tool, implement the newest model, chase what your competitors are doing.

New sales AI. New customer service automation. New analytics platform. Another AI layer on top of your existing stack.

Each promises transformation. Each costs five, six or seven figures. Each takes months to implement.

And most deliver incremental improvements at best.

Why? Because you’re trying to build on empty ground.

The Answer Is Already in Your Business

Most companies are already sitting on the raw material for AI-driven growth.

It’s in the thousands of customer conversations happening every week across the business. Sales calls. Support tickets. Implementation check-ins. Success reviews. Onboarding sessions.

These conversations contain insights that need to be unlocked:

  • Why customers aren’t buying
  • Where reps excel or struggle
  • What messaging actually resonates
  • What products are in demand
  • Which objections kill momentum
  • What is changing in the market

The insights that could transform your revenue trajectory are already there. You’re just not extracting them.

The Hidden Cost of Siloed Insights

Even when companies analyze conversations, most never capture their full value. The problem isn’t a lack of insight — it’s that insights are trapped, siloed, and disconnected from the people who can act on them.

Its a problem we are solving at Insight7.io and the result appears everywhere:

  • Leadership sees fragments, not patterns: Decisions on go-to-market, product development and training rely on anecdotes, not reality.
  • Managers can’t scale coaching: Feedback stays generic because they lack tools and context to develop each rep based on real performance.
  • Reps don’t improve: Delayed, vague feedback disconnected from actual conversations keeps performance flat.

When insights are siloed like this, AI tools alone won’t move the needle. Data is only valuable when it flows to the people who can act on it.

The Unlock: Conversation Intelligence Across Your Business

The companies that will succeed with AI in 2026 won’t be chasing the newest AI model. They will find ways to systematically unlock the intelligence buried in their customer conversations.

These companies will:

  • Evaluate 100% of customer interactions — not just a sample
  • Surface patterns across every touchpoint (sales, support, success, implementation)
  • Generate personalized coaching at scale so reps actually improve
  • Flow insights automatically to leadership for strategic decisions

This isn’t about replacing human judgment. It’s about giving your people the intelligence layer they need to perform at their best.

The Question for 2026

Instead of asking: “How do we use AI to grow?”

The better question is: “Are we using the data we already have?”

Before you buy another AI tool, ask yourself:

  • What percentage of our customer conversations are we actually learning from?
  • Do insights from those conversations reach the people who can act on them?
  • Can we turn conversation data into systematic coaching and strategic intelligence?

If the answer is no, you’re not ready for more AI tools. You’re ready for conversation intelligence.

The companies that figure out conversation intelligence won’t just win in 2026 — they’ll build an advantage that’s impossible to copy.

If you’re interested in unlocking your customer conversation data, we’re solving this at Insight7.io. Reach out.