By Jay Bemis | Advertising Systems Inc.
What’s on chief marketing officers’ minds as we navigate our way through early 2025?
Foremost thoughts include changing corporate’s perception of the marketing department’s role, as well as dealing with more data-driven opportunities, according to the recently released CMO Council’s Marketing Vitality Index.
“Instead of being seen as a cost center, 2025 is the right time for (marketing) to become considered a strategy and command center,” the report said of CMOs’ roles.
“With new tech tools and the more strategic role CMOs are able to play, the opportunity is there. It’s just a matter of pulling these factors together to demonstrate the CMO’s power.”
But, the report adds, these are not easy tasks.
“While 65% of CMOs say that marketing needs to own and optimize a company’s revenue generation engine, they also need to demonstrate measurable ROI,” the folks at Forbes said in analyzing the Vitality Index report.
Forbes notes that there’s plenty of technology that can help CMOs with such chores as collecting potential customer data, gaining new information for targeting, using chatbots for interaction that may lead to customer retention, and, employing AI tools to help design campaigns.
“However, 86% of CMOs said a lack of resources or capabilities led them to miss out on revenue, growth or customer acquisition opportunities,” Forbes says.
“Statistics in the report show that last year, companies on average allocated 13.6% of their budgets to marketing, a piece of the pie that needs to be optimized.”
Other Findings in the CMO Council Report
The CMO also offered these insights in its vitality report:
- Martech Choices: With more than 14,000 marketing technology (martech) products on the market, “choosing the right solutions that integrate with existing and new technology is essential,” the CMOs found.
Such choices, they add, can be improved with more consultation with a company’s chief information officer — or, for smaller companies, perhaps, their chief marketing consultant.
- Other Challenges: Addressing data access, tech skills and proving ROI also are major challenges, “but with the right approach and support, these are manageable,” the index said.
“It follows that the key to changing the perception of marketing is getting a handle on the technology to really make the department powerful,” Forbes surmises. “Generative AI can do some of this — 57% of CMOs said this is the type of martech that could bring the most value and ROI — but it is not the only solution.”
Meanwhile, CMO Role Numbers Dwindling
Forbes also recently reported on a new study from consulting firm Spencer Stuart that analyzed C-suites at Fortune 500 companies.
That study found that the number of executives with the CMO title declined 8% in 2024 compared to the year prior.
Spencer Stuart told Forbes that “this most likely doesn’t reflect less emphasis on marketing at a corporate level.”
Instead, “It is the result of a broader look at a company’s marketing leadership function — perhaps placing those responsibilities under the title of chief growth officer or chief digital officer.”
The Spencer Stuart study also showed that the average CMO’s tenure is getting a bit longer — 4.3 years as opposed to 4.2 years in 2023.
Six in 10 CMOs, it said, “are either women or people from underrepresented racial and ethnic backgrounds, making it one of the more diverse positions in the C-suite.”
