TL;DR (The “No-Fluff” Summary)
Who: Stefan Chiriacescu, Co-founder & CEO of eCommerce Today, Shopify Plus Partner and Klaviyo Master Platinum Partner.
Where: RARE Conference 2026 — free online event hosted by Stripo & Yespo CDP.
When: August 26, 2026. Conference starts at 11:00 CEST — 25-minute session.
The Big Idea: Stop buying isolated AI tools. Start assigning specialised AI partners to the CRM team you already have.
Core Message: AI deployed as a cost-cutter produces the “AI Hangover” — generic output, hallucinating systems, and broken customer experiences. AI deployed as a teammate produces a superhuman workforce.
The Trap: The AI Hangover Nobody Warned You About
Walk into most eCommerce companies in 2026 and you will find the same pattern. Leadership bought AI tools to cut costs. The team was told to “use AI more.” Six months later, the results are in: generic email campaigns that sound like everyone else’s, chatbots confidently inventing return policies, and customer experiences that feel cheaper because they are.
This is the AI Hangover. It happens when AI is treated as a replacement for people instead of a multiplier of them. The tools were never the problem. The organisational model around them was.
At eCommerce Today, we ran this experiment on ourselves first. We did not buy isolated tools and hope. We redesigned the org chart.
The Solution: The Mixed Org-Chart
In this 25-minute session at RARE 2026, Stefan shares the contrarian blueprint we use internally and with clients: an organisational model that maps specialised AI assistants to existing human roles — not around them, not instead of them.
What you will take away:
- Why the “AI as cost-cutter” mindset predictably produces hallucinations, generic output, and churn — and what the math looks like when you flip the model.
- The Mixed Org-Chart framework: how to pair each CRM and eCommerce role with a specialised AI partner that knows the role’s context, standards, and goals.
- A step-by-step deployment roadmap: how to move a team from task executors to AI strategists without mass layoffs — and without the six-month adoption stall most companies hit.
This is not theory. It is the operating model behind how our own team of 30+ specialists works today, and the same approach we bring to Shopify and Shopify Plus brands across North America, Europe, and the Middle East.
RARE 2026 packs 8 live presentations and 2 panel discussions into one focused day, with speakers including Kath Pay (Holistic Email Marketing), Kate Barrett (eFocus Marketing), Jordie van Rijn, Des Brown (Prebo Digital), and Kevin Steba (SEINO). Stefan also joins the panel “AI in eCommerce: which technologies are worth investing in for 2026.”
1. Is this session only for large companies?
No. The Mixed Org-Chart model scales down well. If you have even a two-person CRM or eCommerce team, the framework shows you how to pair each role with a specialised AI partner. Smaller teams often see the impact faster because there is less organisational friction.
2. Who should attend this session?
Founders, CEOs, eCommerce directors, CRM managers, and marketing leaders who feel the gap between AI hype and actual results in their organisation — especially anyone who has already bought AI tools and is not seeing the promised productivity.
3. Do I need a technical background to apply this?
No. This is an organisational and leadership framework, not a technical tutorial. The roadmap covers role mapping, upskilling sequence, and adoption governance — decisions made by leaders, not developers.
4. Is RARE Conference free, and will there be a recording?
Yes on both. RARE 2026 is a free online conference — registration takes one minute at rareconf.com. Registered attendees receive recordings of all sessions after the event, so you can watch the replay even if you cannot join live.