For more than a decade, IBM has built upon research to produce its C-suite Studies series, one of the largest collections of C-level executive insights. Its latest research Stepping Up to the Challenge: CMO Insights from the Global C-Suite Study focuses on how CMOs “are helping their enterprises become more ‘customer-activated.’”
IBM Institute for Business Value found that employing a revenue-generating, customer-centric strategy can stem from digital marketing capabilities. But despite digital being a current area of focus for CMOs, it’s a world many still struggle with. Specifically, less than 20% of CMOs interviewed for the study “have integrated their company’s interactions with customers across different channels, installed analytical programs to mine customer data and created digitally enabled supply changes to respond rapidly to changes in customer demand….” Such CMOs are segmented as “Digital Pacesetters” in the report.
The issue isn’t that the other +80% are fire-walling technology, but rather they grapple with maneuvering through the explosion of data, and tethering digital media to bottom line numbers. As one CMO (anon.) in the study explains, “We know what we want to do. Our biggest challenge is creating the data infrastructure.”
This translates into potential missed opportunities. IBM Institute for Business Value reports, “There’s a close link between the degree of digital acumen CMOs display and the financial performance of the enterprises for which they work.” The research revealed that many CMOs have de-prioritized monetizing social media. They are “presumably finding it too difficult or see social mainly as a tool for building awareness and forging connections.”
While CMOs are becoming a stronger force when it comes to influencing CEOs on strategy, second only to CFOs, it’s the CMOs’ relationships with Chief Innovation Officers that generate results. IBM Institute for Business Value reports that businesses are 76% more likely to outperform in terms of revenues and profitability when CMOs and CIOs effectively work together.
According to the study, analytics are top priority for CIOs. IBM Institute for Business Value suggests partnering with CIOs to create an infrastructure for scalable cognitive analytics that produce actionable customer insights. It cautions not to be “all things to all people,” but rather concentrate analytics on those customer lifecycle phases that will be of utmost importance to your business in the next few years.
Digital Pacesetters, notes IBM Institute for Business Value, are “actively investing in the later phases of the customer lifecycle, where digital channels make the biggest difference.” While traditional phases end with the transaction, Pacesetters look at the bigger picture – focusing resources on long-term relationships and cross-channel experiences to turn customers into loyalists and collaborators and encouraging them to share these experiences. Such companies, per the study, “are 59 percent more likely to be outperformers.”
Download the complete study to learn more about IBM’s findings and strategizing digital.
BY ALLIE ABODEELY
Brand Leadership Blog 