The Role of the Chief Marketing Officer
What are small and mid-size businesses (SMBs) looking for when they hire a Chief Marketing Officer? I’ve worked for CMOs. I’ve been a CMO. I think I’m pretty well-acquainted with what the role entails. But, as a consultant offering my services as a fractional CMO, I want to be certain my services meet the needs in the marketplace. So, I set out to study the space.
Naturally, good CMOs work with data. So, I spent the better part of 2 days analyzing CMO job descriptions on LinkedIn to document what companies really want when they hire a CMO. I categorized the high-level role, duties and job requirements of posted CMO opportunities into 10 categories of functional areas. Within the 10 categories, I charted more than 100 types of working marketing knowledge that companies want from CMOs. Here they are.
The 10 Primary Areas of Functional Accountability for CMOs
Business. CMOs must have a well-rounded understanding of key business principles such as: profit, P&L, growth, EBITDA, CAC, LTV, corporate values, and reporting. On the top of the heap is the ability to translate business vision into marketing strategy. (More about strategy later.)
Leadership. CMOs must be able to lead teams, manage projects, collaborate, and communicate effectively at the executive and board level.
General Marketing Knowledge. This category is a catch all that includes: “deep marketing knowledge” requested on most job postings, go-to-market planning, B2B vs B2C, best practices, global marketing, marketing funnel, ROI, marketing automation, acquisition, retention, lead generation and campaigns.
Brand Management. CMOs are responsible for your brand. Job descriptions detail it as image, positioning, look and feel, tone, reputation, style, messaging, storytelling, competitive differentiation, and creative direction.
Digital Marketing. This critical job function weeds out the dinosaurs. Maybe you can get away with a few luddites in other functional areas of your company, but not with marketing. Digital marketing includes ownership of all your web properties, social, video, content, ebooks, blogs, email, SEO, SEM, UX/UI, and testing. ALL are consistently set forth as a primary function of the CMO.
Traditional Marketing. A CMO with deep digital experience will have less knowledge of print, television, radio and media buying, but working knowledge in traditional marketing is still important. Traditional also includes, PR and events which are frequently described as part of the CMO role.
Sales Enablement. Collateral for the sales team is a given part of sales enablement. Sales automation tools, email cadences, open rates, message performance, and outbound target list segmentation are more and more managed by the CMO.
Business Development. At a minimum, your CMO is responsible for inbound marketing to deliver online leads to the sales team. In the past 5 or 6 years, Account Based Marketing (ABM) has become a hot area of responsibility for CMOs with a host of enterprise tools to manage playbooks. In addition, CMOs also direct sales strategies, expansion strategies, and referral marketing. In some companies, the marketing leader is not only responsible for sales enablement, but also for managing part or all of the sales team.
Customer Experience. Your CMO should define the customer lifecycle, develop effective communications for the entire customer journey and gather customer feedback and insights. The purpose of a delightful customer experience is to produce retention, foster raving fans, and ultimately reinforce the brand. Great customer experiences are subsequently leveraged in testimonials and referrals for more business development and sales enablement. Your CMO understands how all of these moving parts work together to produce lift for your company.
Personal Profile and Character. There’s a long list of qualities you want in a CMO. Here are the top ones I documented from my research. Solutions oriented. Decision maker (look for the “high Ds” on the DISC profile.) Good communicator. (I’ve always thought that goes without saying, but it’s always in a marketing job description.) Proven evidence of increasing responsibility. Naturally, you wouldn’t give someone the title of CMO if they hadn’t earned their stripes…would you? Ability to meet deadlines. Inquisitive. Ability to organize. And someone who’s willing to roll up their sleeves and be a “do-er.”
How is a CMO different from a VP?
How is a VP of Marketing different from a CMO? I wondered that, too. So, I dove into job descriptions for the VP of Marketing position for dozens of SMBs across the US. And guess what? There’s surprisingly little difference. For small and mid-size business, the role of VP vs. CMO comes down to the level of leadership and influence on business operations at the executive level. Both roles typically report to the CEO, though some CMOs report to the COO.
The Top 8 Job Requirements SMBs Want from a CMO
It doesn’t matter what the title is…the role of the Chief Marketing Officer is to lead the marketing function for an organization. The job is all about getting people interested in your company's product or service.
In addition to the 10 areas of functional marketing accountability listed above, here are the top 8 job requirements SMBs want from a CMO.
Strategy and Planning. An ability to plan an organization’s marketing strategies was required by 100% of the open CMO job descriptions I reviewed.
10+ Years Experience is another attribute 100% of hiring companies agree on. Every Chief Marketing Officer job description I reviewed required 10+ years experience in marketing. Some wanted 12.
Deep marketing knowledge was mentioned or inferred in ALL job descriptions and a high percentage also required a heavy dose of public relations. Many different types of marketing were regularly mentioned and an important one is B2B vs B2C. Your marketing leader should have experience in one or the other or both. “Deep marketing knowledge” acknowledges that marketing is a really broad discipline. But, your CMO can specialize in some of these areas: Brand Marketing, Customer Marketing, Channel Marketing, SaaS Marketing or even Product Marketing. And, of course, Digital Marketing is essential and means everything from Content Marketing, to SEO, Email Marketing, Social Marketing, and even Account Based Marketing. How can one team member possess such deep marketing knowledge? See requirement #2.
Analytics is a must-have skill and hiring companies know it. This was the #3 most frequent job requirement I saw. No one wants a CMO who can’t provide empirical evidence for measurable marketing performance. The ability to establish appropriate metrics and KPIs for an organization’s marketing investment is a non-negotiable critical skill.
The ability to collaborate across departments and with other team members was high on the list of CMO requirements. There’s no “I” in marketing. Well… there is, but you know what I mean. And it makes perfect sense. Marketing is a team sport that supports every area of your organization starting with business operations and vision, materializing with sales and closed business, moving along the customer journey, and ending with testimonials and referrals. Your CMO needs to have the heart of a servant with the backbone of a strong leader and the ability to play nice in the company sandbox.
People management was also required. I agree. Marketers need to be good people people. The role of CMO usually requires an ability to manage people, not just projects. Hiring, firing, and motivation of team members was consistently mentioned. And, not just internal team members. Many job descriptions explicitly require the CMO to be able to vet, select and manage external agency relationships. For this reason, I think it’s important for a CMO to have either worked for an agency in the past, or to have managed many agency relationships in their career.
Project management was mentioned less frequently, but was not omitted from job descriptions. In my experience, the ability to manage projects is lacking on most marketing teams - especially those comprising junior employees - and a good CMO can affect a lot of positive change with classic project management and production processes.
Industry experience, like a master’s degree, is often preferred. But it’s rarely necessary. If you find a great marketer who checks all your other boxes, grab them. They’ll apply their deep marketing knowledge to your four Ps and you’ll be glad you didn’t let “industry experience” keep you from tapping terrific talent. Besides, as one CMO who hired me to launch a SaaS product in new US markets said: “I don’t care about industry experience. Industry experience just means you’ll come here and do what you did there. I want people with good marketing experience.” Take that to heart.
Why Do Companies Need CMOs?
With the role of the CMO defined, the bigger question is: does your company need one? That’s a topic for another blog. But briefly here, a CMO is an experienced, senior leader you can trust to build, manage or maintain your marketing programs that support many, many functions in your organization. Growth and revenue are important. But, so is your brand, your customer experience, and all your digital properties. (Re-read afore-mentioned lists above.)
Without a marketing leader, who will run the marketing activities for your small or mid-size business? The sales team? The CEO? Junior marketing specialists who execute… what?
Sure, you can run your organization without a CMO or marketing leader. But then, you’re in one of two positions. Either a) someone is making marketing decisions who’s not holistically focused on the marketing function, may not have time for it, and …worse…may not be qualified or b) no one is making marketing decisions. Either way, you’re losing. And, FWIW, I’ve never seen a high-growth company without a marketing leader. Just sayin…
If you’d like to explore working with a professional CMO who checks the boxes, let’s have a conversation.