The New Power Couple: How CMOs and CTOs Can Drive Innovation

With the proliferation of digital channels and devices, reaching consumers and driving business impact requires a lot of sophistication. Brands are rapidly adopting new technology, and with that comes an important question: At the intersection of marketing, advertising and technology, how can teams align internally to ensure they’re using the right tech to achieve cross-organization goals? Technology is integral to the work both teams do and should be vetted accordingly, with CTOs and CMOs working together to establish a shared vision across leadership and drive bigger returns overall. The cost of an unaligned relationship CMOs are under increasing pressure to create financial value and deliver return on investment. Marketing and advertising technology promises to better align, organize and operationalize marketing data and processes for the most effective activation in market. Gartner research shows that CMOs who use 70% of their martech stack’s capabilities achieve 20% better marketing ROI than their peers. But the implementation of these tools can require expertise that lies outside traditional marketing teams. Even though the tech is directly tied to their projects and responsibilities, marketing and IT teams may not share a unified goal: For example, where a top priority for IT may be integration with other systems, marketing could be most interested in innovative features. Ultimately, this affects the bottom line because it creates a fragmented vision. When these two teams work in tandem to find tools that work best for both, they build a foundation for a strong, unified marketing strategy. While today’s marketing requires more tech, it does something the marketing of yesterday couldn’t do at scale: effectively reach consumers with individually tailored messages. This level of personalization requires brands to harness their first-party data. This is why bridging the CMO and CTO gap is so important. Since first-party data may reside in different areas of an organization, the top priority is finding and aligning it for marketing use cases. Making first-party data usable and actionable is essential to marketing performance. Building tighter cross-team relationships To start laying the groundwork, CMOs should consider their current relationship with their CTOs and develop a path forward by kick-starting new, focused conversations. Create a shared vision. Identify the common goals and objectives to be achieved through collaboration, and consider what that vision could look like as it evolves. Then consider how frequently you want to reevaluate those goals as needs, processes and resources change. Take stock of the status quo. Address the current challenges each team faces, and identify potential challenges that may result from merging teams. Look at existing structures within the teams: What technology are you using? What are the existing processes for getting a new project off the ground? Understand (and outline) the benefits. Customer insights, measurement, personalization, operational efficiencies, revenue streams and innovation are some areas to consider. Develop proof points. Find specific case studies that highlight the effectiveness of collaboration in and outside of your organization. Lean on industry analysis and trends to examine not only best practices, but also what’s up-and-coming. Build a plan and measure success. Develop a joint project or business plan, outlining what success looks like for both teams. Make sure you’re considering what additional resources teams will need to succeed, including budget, training and tech investments. And once the new project (or team) is established, measure your true results against your desired ones. A collaborative CMO-CTO relationship sets the stage for transformation across the business. Not only does this create additional revenue opportunities, but it also improves company culture and creates a shared vision among C-suite leaders. This story is part of the Connections and Collaboration special feature.

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The New Power Couple: How CMOs and CTOs Can Drive Innovation Together

Building a foundation for a strong, unified marketing strategy

The cost of an unaligned relationship

Susan Rothwell

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Susan Rothwell