These Are the Most Common Challenges CMOs are Facing Today

Being a Chief Marketing Officer, or CMO isn’t easy in the age of rapid digital transformation we live in today.

CMOs have always had to have exceptional leadership, management, and communication skills, but today CMOs must also bring technical knowledge to solving business challenges. Never before has data analysis, programmatic marketing, and digital ad campaigns played as large a role in marketing as it does today.

Many CMOs are doing their best to keep up with these recent trends, while young CMOs thrust into positions of authority struggle to learn how to lead a team and deal with a large bureaucracy. Generally, CMOs are tasked with overseeing every aspect of a marketing department to lead the team towards achieving strategic objectives for the company. However, the challenge of doing so today requires dynamic, agile teams with the ability to learn and adapt on the fly.

Since many people don’t realize the intricate problems that CMOs work to solve every day, let’s explore the most common challenges CMOs face.

Managing the Transition from Mass Media to New Media

Mass media isn’t what it used to be in terms of the size of audiences that it attracts. Increasingly, consumers’ attention is flowing towards new media, including digital publications, podcasts, and social media platforms. 

This is not to say that legacy media doesn’t have a place in companies’ marketing strategy, especially when it comes to building a brand or reaching older consumers. However, it would be tough to deny that companies that want to grow fast enough to outdo the competition can ignore digitization and new media channels.

It’s very important that CMOs carefully consider the exact goals of their online ad campaigns and tailor campaigns to get the most value possible for their ad spend.

Learning how to market a product or service through new media is a challenge for many CMOs that have a background in advertising through mass media channels. 

Programmatic Ad Buys and Automated Bidding Systems

For one thing, the structure for ad buys are significantly different in new media. Whereas companies in the past could negotiate ad buys with a human point of contact, marketers today must make use of programmatic ad buys when advertising on many new media channels. 

Social media platforms, for example, require advertisers to set daily budgets to reach specific demographics for different purposes. CMOs can create programmatic ad campaigns for the purpose of publicizing their brand, boosting sales, increasing their following, or converting specific calls to action. After inputting this information, most social media platforms work by automatically creating a bidding system that compares your budgets and ad specifications to those of your competition. 

In this sense, executing successful campaigns is more about analyzing data and conducting competitor analysis, than maintaining relationships with mainstream media executives or other traditional media channels. Most social media platforms do also offer a concierge service to advertisers spending large budgets on their platform, but technical expertise is still needed to ensure that your company is getting the most out of each dollar spent. 

Campaigns must be continually modified and adjusted to make certain that they are reaching the right demographic with the right messaging. Moreover, A/B testing must be done to make sure that campaigns are driven by data and consumer behavior. This can be a lot to consider for CMOs that rose to prominence in the age of traditional mass media marketing channels.

Aligning Marketing and Web Development Efforts 

Another challenge for CMOs today is to make sure that marketing KPIs are being integrated into the company’s web development strategies and best practices. Whereas in the past companies relied on billboards, signs, TV, or print ad placements, today the internet represents the modern marketplace of ideas that consumers use to make buying decisions. Therefore, in order to stand out from the competition, companies must stand out online with a compelling web presence.

Many CMOs and marketing departments are siloed or disconnected from the web development team in an organization. While developers might possess exceptional technical expertise, they might not be skilled marketers. 

That’s why it’s important that CMOs make sure that the marketing department is regularly interfacing with the development team to integrate the firm’s marketing messaging into the website. Marketers should also make sure that calls to action are straightforward and that they are optimized for the sales funnel and conversions.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

For many CMOs, implementing a successful SEO campaign can be challenging. That’s because SEO is a complex process that requires a mixture of skills including data analysis, web development, marketing strategy, content distribution, and analytics. 

A successful SEO strategy must integrate competitor analysis to determine which keywords the firm can compete for, technical SEO which relates to optimizing a website’s code for search engines, backlinking campaigns, and analytics. According to this San Diego Fractional Marketing Agency, most organizations will need to work cross-functionally, integrating the expertise of multiple departments to achieve results. 

It can be difficult for CMOs to understand all of these moving parts and facilitate cross-functional teamwork within the company.

 

In conclusion, the job of a CMO was never easy, but it presents some unique and modern challenges today which must be met with dedication and humility. By continually adjusting their knowledge base and skill set, CMOs will be well-equipped to lead their team towards leveraging our current marketing ecosystem to achieve results.