What the future CMO role will be

Per­haps we should feel sor­ry for the future chief mar­ket­ing offi­cer (CMO). The expo­nen­tial knowl­edge growth in the mar­ket­ing world, the explo­sion of poten­tial tools will con­tin­ue to increase in com­plex­i­ty and choice. And any senior mar­keter needs to take cal­cu­lat­ed risks to suc­ceed, to be dif­fer­ent, dis­tinc­tive and dynam­ic, which can be per­son­al­ly chal­leng­ing.

How­ev­er, per­haps the future CMO could take inspi­ra­tion from one of the most inter­est­ing entre­pre­neurs in his­to­ry. The wid­ow Veuve Clic­quot was a tiny, 4½ft woman who trans­formed the world of cham­pagne with game-chang­ing tech­no­log­i­cal and mar­ket­ing inno­va­tions, while wran­gling wid­ow­hood, war and immense social dis­ap­pro­ba­tion.

Towards the end of her life, she wrote to her grand­daugh­ter with some advice: “The world is in per­pet­u­al motion and we must invent the things of tomor­row… act with audac­i­ty.” 

As we look to the future CMO near­ly 200 years lat­er, we oper­ate in a busi­ness world which has been mov­ing at a super-fast rate for over a decade. Tech­nol­o­gy lay­er­ing on tech­nol­o­gy leads to expo­nen­tial growth and oppor­tu­ni­ties which can be over­whelm­ing. Curve balls hit, per­son­al, polit­i­cal, pan­dem­ic-relat­ed. 

Now more than ever “the world is in per­pet­u­al motion”, so great mar­ket­ing lead­ers need to get the pace right. One way to do this is to recog­nise they’re not alone. At the heart of the mar­ket­ing indus­try is a com­mu­ni­ty who come togeth­er to help each oth­er, to share ideas and inspi­ra­tion, to sup­port and speed up suc­cess.  The future CMO knows a net­work of “brains to bor­row” can be an accel­er­a­tor.

Fre­quent­ly those who suc­ceed in mar­ket­ing are those who not only val­ue con­nec­tions out­side the busi­ness, but act as the ulti­mate con­nec­tor inside, the con­duit between the wants, needs and desires of the cus­tomer and the busi­ness, the bridge across dif­fer­ent parts of the organ­i­sa­tion.

Under­stand­ing the organ­i­sa­tion­al psy­chol­o­gy involved in build­ing rela­tion­ships is a crit­i­cal skill which can be learnt and prac­tised. They’re the sto­ry­teller who weaves the future from today’s insight with tomorrow’s imag­i­na­tion. With the right influ­ence inside the organ­i­sa­tion they can make incred­i­ble inno­va­tions that make an impact and make a dif­fer­ence.

The great CMOs of tomor­row are influ­encers, but they’re also the inno­va­tors; it is the mar­ket­ing func­tion that can tru­ly help “invent the things of tomor­row”. The CMO is the one who dri­ves how brands piv­ot and evolve, share clar­i­ty around oppor­tu­ni­ties, and who has to ensure cal­cu­lat­ed com­mer­cial risks are tak­en. Courage is need­ed to be a leader; it’s the per­son­al brav­ery that allows you to change the way things are done.

Barbe-Nicole Clic­quot cre­at­ed new prod­uct inno­va­tions, expand­ed her brand glob­al­ly and com­plete­ly rein­vent­ed the typ­i­cal busi­ness mod­el. Her mantra res­onates for the future CMO. We must be will­ing to take bold risks, to “act with audac­i­ty”.

And it’s this courage that’s inher­ent in great lead­er­ship that means the future CMO should take pride in being a mar­keter. Sara Ben­ni­son, CMO of Nation­wide, win­ner of The Mar­ket­ing Society’s Brave Mar­ket­ing Leader 2020, speaks pas­sion­ate­ly about the pride in the mar­ket­ing title she holds. “Busi­ness­es need peo­ple who can trans­fer insight into propo­si­tions and put great com­mu­ni­ca­tion at the heart of the busi­ness, and that’s mar­ket­ing,” she says.

Being a CMO is a com­plex role, with the need to con­nect up audi­ences and oppor­tu­ni­ties, to inspire and influ­ence peo­ple to action, inter­nal­ly first and then with their audi­ences, to con­nect up the cre­ative with the com­mer­cial. But it’s the abil­i­ty to shape a busi­ness in a suc­cess­ful and excit­ing way that is some­thing to take pride in, to cel­e­brate and toast. With the finest cham­pagne, of course.