The 3 Kinds of Marketing

The average tenure of a B2B CMO is 18-months. Anytime this stat is mentioned, the default case is to hate on CMOs. BUT. And this is an important but… Here’s another stat that doesn’t get mentioned as often but should: 62% of CMOs go on to a similar or bigger role at another company when they exit.

This means that the flaw isn’t the person in the role, they get “promoted” to better fit roles. The problem is in the role itself and more importantly, how CEOs view the CMO role.

Over the past ten years, I’ve worked intimately with CEOs at organizations from a little bit of revenue to public companies with hundreds of millions in revenue to work through solving their growth problems.

The biggest thing I’ve learned? C-Suites and especially CEOs, especially ones that don’t come from a Marketing background, they grossly misunderstand Marketing.

I found myself educating CEOs about the difference between Brand Marketing, Demand Acquisition Marketing, and even Product Marketing.

Because of this, the B2B CMO is expected to be a unicorn.

They are tasked with fixing the brand, driving short-term demand, attracting talent, while spearheading the strategic narrative on the new AI product offering so that the company can regain relevance.

Here’s the thing though. Exactly 0.01% of Marketers have a Product, Demand Acquisition and Brand background, let alone a capability. So as they take on this entire mandate, they can never recruit and hire fast enough, they can never deliver fast enough, and they churn out. In 18-months.

Who is to blame? Is it the CMO for taking the role? Or the CEO for thinking that hiring a CMO will be a silver bullet for solving their problems with growth? I think it’s the CEO and the C-Suite and the Board.

Before you hire a CMO, you should first read up on the 3 kinds of Marketing and figure out what you really need: Brand? Demand Acquisition? Or Product Marketing?