Monday, December 03, 2007
Tough Questions for CMOs
MarketingProfs asks, Are you ready for 2013? BusinessWeek asks, Will you have your job in 2013?
The two links above are strongly related. According to the MarketingProfs post by Paul Barsch, two factors loom large over the next five years for chief marketers: 1) the accelerating growth of information technology, and 2) the proliferation of data (it doubles every three years). Unless CMOs learn to partner with the IT department, and harness all that data into usable insight and cost-effective, revenue-producing marketing campaigns, their tenure will be short lived. That is the subject of the Business Week article. It reports the average longevity of the CMO position is now only 26 months. Lofty management expectations for quick results from the CMO position are partially to blame. Another major factor is the learning curve challenges faced by CMOs when it comes to understanding and utilizing the new media choices. As the Business Week article states: