This month, Forrester published “The Evolved CMO, 2012,” a 15-page study highlighting the salient data and issues facing today’s Chief Marketing Officer. The joint research project by Forrester Research and Heidrick & Struggles presents four critical opportunities for CMOs:
Chief Marketing Officer, PHD:
Overlapping skillsets, ambiguous job functions and technological innovation requires that the CMO role evolve – and keep evolving. Understanding digital behavior has become a prerequisite and the CMO must be a “technologist” as well as marketer so they can understand key data and strategically target their markets effectively.
The CMO is evolving into “the professor” of the company; someone CEOs look to for sage “company IP” or knowledge of the customer lifecycle, direction on targeting the market and positioning of moving the customer conversation into the digital world. The Chief Information Officer is arguably the over-qualified assistant professor; battle-tested and a wealth of technical resource and support. Both must collaborate regularly to execute sound strategies based on interpreting an increasingly complex and real-time set of data. What’s more, if the CIO can’t understand the customers pain points (through the eyes of the sage CMO), they most likely fail.
Only a symbiotic, trusted relationship where the talents of both the CMO and CIO are applied, will result in a successful tenure. As the CMO role continues to expand with more responsibility (and BOD participation) so will their average tenure follow (or so I think…).
Flexibility and Support from Within:
CMOs must remain flexible and nimble as their very job description is changing. At closer analysis, increasingly, the evolved CMO resembles the CEO. Therefore, it’s no coincidence many CMOs go on to become successful CEOs of their organizations when they have years of business leadership, revenue, advocacy and technical adoption acumen under their belt. Skills essential to customer engagement and retention come in handy when leading an organization too.
Don’t forget the Chief Financial Officer. The CFO needs to show the attention and respect to the CMO now more than ever. This isn’t an entirely popular idea. Customer-driven organizations with CFOs who don’t recognize that importance should consider a new CFO that sees the customer and brand value on par with the CMO. They are far more critical today to the overall growth of the company based on the customer and brand value – and thus no longer that easy to replace. However this may be the only viable solution. Hey, it’s just business.
Mark Nardone
http://socialmediatoday.com/
- Beef up digital and technical understanding
- Partner with and lead peers on the executive team
- Increase focus on retention in addition to acquisition strategies
- Align with sales and service leaders to drive the brand experience throughout the organization.”
Chief Marketing Officer, PHD:
Overlapping skillsets, ambiguous job functions and technological innovation requires that the CMO role evolve – and keep evolving. Understanding digital behavior has become a prerequisite and the CMO must be a “technologist” as well as marketer so they can understand key data and strategically target their markets effectively.
The CMO is evolving into “the professor” of the company; someone CEOs look to for sage “company IP” or knowledge of the customer lifecycle, direction on targeting the market and positioning of moving the customer conversation into the digital world. The Chief Information Officer is arguably the over-qualified assistant professor; battle-tested and a wealth of technical resource and support. Both must collaborate regularly to execute sound strategies based on interpreting an increasingly complex and real-time set of data. What’s more, if the CIO can’t understand the customers pain points (through the eyes of the sage CMO), they most likely fail.
Only a symbiotic, trusted relationship where the talents of both the CMO and CIO are applied, will result in a successful tenure. As the CMO role continues to expand with more responsibility (and BOD participation) so will their average tenure follow (or so I think…).
Flexibility and Support from Within:
CMOs must remain flexible and nimble as their very job description is changing. At closer analysis, increasingly, the evolved CMO resembles the CEO. Therefore, it’s no coincidence many CMOs go on to become successful CEOs of their organizations when they have years of business leadership, revenue, advocacy and technical adoption acumen under their belt. Skills essential to customer engagement and retention come in handy when leading an organization too.
Don’t forget the Chief Financial Officer. The CFO needs to show the attention and respect to the CMO now more than ever. This isn’t an entirely popular idea. Customer-driven organizations with CFOs who don’t recognize that importance should consider a new CFO that sees the customer and brand value on par with the CMO. They are far more critical today to the overall growth of the company based on the customer and brand value – and thus no longer that easy to replace. However this may be the only viable solution. Hey, it’s just business.
Mark Nardone
http://socialmediatoday.com/
Δεν υπάρχουν σχόλια:
Δημοσίευση σχολίου