Why banks are saying goodbye to the CMO
One of the major issues facing CMOs is showing the value they bring to their organizations. While the impact of a chief revenue officer or chief financial officer can be easily demonstrated with data points, the value of marketing is much harder to analyze.
Chief marketing officers may have forgotten the power of telling a good story.
A string of recent high-profile CMO departures has renewed the debate over the value of the position in the banking industry and has led to questions about the importance of the role in the C-suite. Global companies — like UPS, Walmart and Etsy — have not only parted ways with their chief marketers but terminated the positions altogether. Prominent financial services firms including Bank of America and Wells Fargo were some of the first movers, making similar announcements to retire the positions in recent years.
A central problem is demonstrating the value CMOs are bringing to their organizations. While the impact of a chief revenue officer or chief financial officer can be easily demonstrated in data points, the value of the marketing position — and the benefits of building a strong brand — are much harder to quantify. Marketers need to illustrate the importance of the top marketing role to other executives and board members. That often means crafting a detailed story about the value they’re bringing to the table.
“Marketing has a marketing problem,” says James Robert Lay, founder and CEO of the banking consulting group the Digital Growth Institute. “If you are a CEO or CFO, you think: ‘I’m spending millions of dollars on marketing, but what am I getting for that?’”
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