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Seismic Shift 2026 Day 2: A new era of selling takes shape

By Emily Gimpel — On October 15, 2026

Seismic Shift 26 event graphic with “Day 2” in white text on a dark red abstract background

There wasn't a cloud in the sky in Carlsbad, California, to kick off Day 2 of Seismic Shift 2026, and the energy inside was just as bright. From lively Braindates to engaging breakout sessions, the day was filled with meaningful connections, fresh ideas, and conversations that continued long after the sessions wrapped up.

Welcome to the selling renaissance

What happens to selling when buyers can get almost all the information they need from AI?

Seismic CMO Rob Pinkerton tackled that question in his keynote, The Selling Renaissance, challenging the assumption that AI and self-service will make human sellers less important. While buyers increasingly turn to AI to research solutions, compare vendors, and evaluate their options, they still rely on human judgment to navigate complex decisions with confidence.

Rob shared Seismic research showing that:

75% of buyers trust human guidance over AI when the two conflict
46% say they're more reliant on people relationships because of AI
19% of buyers using AI tools say unreliable information has made them less confident in their buying decisions.

His takeaway: as information becomes abundant, human judgment becomes more valuable.

"Because in the moments that matter, the seller is increasingly becoming the buyer's sense-maker."

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Rob Pinkerton

Chief Marketing Officer, Seismic

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Rob outlined three fundamental shifts in what buyers expect from sellers and the go-to-market teams supporting them.

Buyers increasingly need judgment rather than more information, with sellers helping them apply what they know to their specific circumstances.
They need guidance rather than persuasion, particularly when navigating ROI, implementation risk, security, and competing priorities across a buying group.
And GTM organizations need to move from preparation to performance, connecting marketing, enablement, managers, RevOps, IT and AI, so sellers can perform when consequential customer moments arrive.

The morning conversation also brought customer leaders into the discussion, including Betsy Matthies of GitHub, Carlos Rivera of Webster Bank, and Cody Sims of Spectrum, alongside Seismic CRO Hayden Stafford.

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The panelists shared how they're putting these ideas into practice. At Spectrum, Cody highlighted how the company's AI-powered sales intelligence tool, SAMI, has helped drive a 7% lift in quota attainment among middle-performing sellers. Betsy explained how GitHub is bringing content and insights directly into sellers' existing workflows, with approximately 90% of sellers accessing Seismic content through existing tools and systems.

Reflecting on Spectrum's own transformation, Cody encouraged GTM leaders to rethink how AI fits into their organizations, and joked that audience members should "throw their old operating model out the window."

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"Stop using AI to enable something you’ve always done and think about it at the center of how you behave."

Cody Sims

Head of Commercial Brand, Spectrum

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Expedia Group puts AI-powered coaching to work

In an afternoon breakout session, Expedia Group demonstrated how AI can help sellers build the skills they need to perform better. Beth Potter and Ernst-Jan de Planque shared how the company has embedded AI Role Play and conversational intelligence into everyday coaching — and connected those efforts directly to business KPIs.

Expedia Group grounded their AI role play scenarios in real commercial signals, making them feel authentic and mirroring the actual job of an Expedia salesperson. They also embedded role plays across the enablement ecosystem, from pages to Aura to learning courses. This makes learning and coaching more bite-sized, just-in-time, and available wherever the seller is working from.

Expedia is looking at how new skills and behaviors translate into better performance, and seeing its impact on average contact value and win rates. While strong adoption is a promising metric and nice to have, the ultimate outcome is strong GTM execution.

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"The goal is better client conversations, not more AI practice."

Ernst-Jan de Planque

Senior Director, Field Enablement, Expedia Group

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Royal London Asset Management (RLAM) turns fast adoption into client impact

Winners of this year's Fast Track Award, RLAM's Michelle Calcutt, Head of Client Group Services, and Ed Venner, Chief Client Officer, stepped onto the stage to share how their team has delivered meaningful impact with Seismic in months, not years. They credited three lessons for their fast start:

Deliver a minimum lovable product (MLP). Adoption, not implementation, is the primary goal.
Design for personas. RLAM asked what each person needs to serve clients, not which features to deploy.
Build secure foundations. RLAM prioritized gold-source data, a rigorous taxonomy, and clear ownership before the build.

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"Success is not defined by implementing technology. It’s defined by better quality client meetings and engagements."

Ed Venner

Chief Client Officer, Royal London Asset Management

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Together, Expedia and RLAM showed how AI and enablement can drive measurable business impact.

The courage to go further

To finish the day with a flourish, retired NASA astronaut, Artemis II pilot, and U.S. Navy captain Victor Glover took the stage for his keynote.

From breathtaking images of Earth and the far side of the moon to stories of navigating the pressures of spaceflight, Victor gave attendees a rare look at life beyond our planet. But his biggest lessons were rooted in something much closer to home: the power of teamwork, trust, and strong leadership.

In a conversation with Seismic Chief Legal Officer and General Counsel Celaena Powder, Victor reflected on the years of training and preparation that went into the Artemis II mission. He shared how four astronauts with different backgrounds and perspectives learned to work as one team, guided by a simple goal: "Launch as friends, land as friends."

One of his biggest lessons? Being a great leader starts with knowing how to follow. Victor challenged attendees to rethink what makes a successful team, emphasizing that collective success matters far more than individual recognition. He also spoke about the importance of building trust long before high-pressure moments arrive, giving teammates room to make mistakes, and showing one another grace when the stakes are high.

And while few of us will ever experience the pressure of traveling to space, his message resonated well beyond the walls of NASA: Great things happen when people commit to going further together.

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"The actual fuel of every mission is trust."

Victor Glover

retired NASA astronaut, U.S. Navy captain and Artemis II pilot

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That's a wrap on Day 2

And just like that, another Seismic Shift is in the books! After days of inspiring keynotes, insightful customer stories, hands-on learning, and meaningful connections, Shift 2026 has come to a close.

From the conversations on stage to those shared between sessions, this year's event brought together a community of GTM leaders and enablement professionals eager to learn from one another, challenge conventional thinking, and explore what's next.

A huge thank you to our customers, partners, sponsors and speakers, and everyone who joined us in Carlsbad and helped make Shift 2026 one to remember. Be sure to join us at Shift 2027 in San Diego. For real-time updates and insights from Shift, check out Seismic on social media (LinkedIn and Instagram) and stay up to date on all Seismic news by visiting our Newsroom.