It is uncommon — and refreshing — to observe somebody who reduce their enamel in buyer loyalty rise all the best way to the CMO’s workplace. Kelly Mahoney did precisely that, constructing her profession in loyalty lengthy earlier than entering into the highest advertising and marketing seat at Ulta Magnificence.
Her path ran by Accenture, Hatch Loyalty, and Ireland Direct, adopted by retail-focused management roles at BP. Kelly joined Ulta Magnificence in 2015 and helped architect and scale the Ulta Magnificence Rewards program from the bottom up. A decade later, in 2025, CEO Kecia Steelman named her Chief Advertising Officer. The Clever Marketer discovered extra about her story on this 2022 Ladies in Loyalty
Interview.
That decade of groundwork is paying off in a giant method. In simply the previous 60 days, Kelly has walked the crimson carpet on the Cannes Lions Worldwide Pageant of Creativity — the advertising and marketing business’s largest stage, the place greater than 13,000 executives and creatives gathered from June 22–26, 2026, to have a good time the 12 months’s finest work. She’s additionally landed on the 14th annual Forbes World’s Most Influential CMOs listing, becoming a member of 50 advertising and marketing leaders acknowledged for shaping manufacturers, enterprise, and tradition on a worldwide scale. And he or she sat down with Jim Stengel — former P&G CMO and host of The CMO Podcast — for a dialog on considered one of advertising and marketing’s most revered exhibits.
However the second that claims probably the most about the place Kelly’s priorities lie got here in a separate interview with The Wall Avenue Journal. There, she defined how Ulta’s loyalty program — now 47 million members sturdy, up from 17 million simply over a decade in the past — has developed from a rewards program into what the corporate now calls a “relationship engine.” To assist clients navigate an amazing sea of selections, Ulta leans on a proprietary advice system, its “magnificence graph,” to anticipate wants and personalize the expertise at scale.
It is a dialog price watching in full — a transparent sign that buyer loyalty and personalization are not back-office features, however core drivers of enterprise technique on the highest ranges.
Watch the interview
WSJ: Ulta Magnificence CMO on Evolving a 47 Million-Member Loyalty Program
Additional studying
Cannes Lions Worldwide Pageant of Creativity
Forbes: The 2026 World’s Most Influential CMOs Record
The CMO Podcast with Jim Stengel
The put up Ulta Magnificence's CMO on Turning a 47 Million-Member Loyalty Program Right into a “Relationship Engine” appeared first on The Clever Marketer.
