CMOs’ Status Symbol: Commercial Growth

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CMOs’ Status Symbol: Commercial Growth

18 October 2024 / Article

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Chief marketing officers (CMOs) want to communicate their team’s business impact in financial terms, but connecting customer action to marketing activities can be difficult, making better attribution models marketers’ number-one wish list item to improve performance measurement.

This article describes where CMOs stand on marketing performance measurement based on insights from interviews with CMOs, CEOs, and executive recruiters; a CMO roundtable and survey; and third-party sources.

This article is part of a series of insight articles on the CMO role.

Key Insights

CMOs need to quantify their teams’ contributions in financial terms and establish suitable metrics with the CEO and CFO to align with company goals and speak their language.
While digital tools offer marketers a wealth of data, attributing customer action to specific marketing initiatives remains challenging.
Showing financial returns on marketing efforts is the best way to secure budget, but during economic slowdowns, marketers might need to get creative to achieve more with less.
CMOs can support their communications colleagues in tracking financial impact—and can learn from them about their more holistic consideration of stakeholders.

Author

Denise Dahlhoff, PhD

Denise Dahlhoff, PhD

Director, Marketing & Communications Research
The Conference Board

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