Pathway To Success

As chief marketing officer, you have a tremendous opportunity as well as challenge. Here are some tips to help you succeed.

Although you may feel alone, there are others you should get to know well and collaborate with. Look at others at your same level who can be invaluable. One is your counterpart in IT unless you’re already an expert in coding. That person can be invaluable in your SEO efforts and priceless in helping interpret your customer data.

According to a survey of 1,500 CEOs, collaboration is one of the main attributes they look at in today’s job environment.

The reason? The CEOs believe collaboration is the foundation of innovation in our rapidly evolving world.

One of the main responsibilities is not just maintaining success today but anticipating and being two steps ahead of the market and your competition. Foresee and get in front of what the next best trend will be and you’ll become a legend.

Communication was also cited by the CEOs as another major attribute. They cited the ability to connect with a variety of publics ranging from customers to senior staff and the board. How a company more quickly responds and connects with customers was viewed as being critical. And being able to communicate his/her vision to counterparts also ranked high.

Today’s wise CMOs look both externally as well as internally. Not only are they asking themselves how their company might be perceived as invaluable to customers, but also how they might fire up the culture within their own company.

One way to help achieve the latter is to embrace new ideas and discuss them openly among your staff. Most suggestions might not be viable but may lead to other ideas that are just as novel, but achievable.        Be open to learning and also embrace new ideas!

In spite of all of the above, at the end of the day, your success will be measured by the company’s revenue production. One of the keys to achieving this is by being a crusader for your customers. If you can echo what their desires and wants are and fulfill those needs, your company will profit.

Continue monitoring customer comments and feedback and nurture that relationship. Do you know what your churn rate is? For credit card companies, it’s 20%l. For banks, between 20 % to 25%. And remember that the cost of acquiring a new customer is 5% more than retaining your current one.

In a similar manner of how you might conduct an audit of your company’s marketing plan, do one of yourself. How do your counterparts see you?  What about your staff?

Are you perceived as open, accepting of new ideas and suggestions, and a team player or a top-down, my way or the highway type of leader?  Obviously, the former is what you likely are, but if you discern that certain things you’re doing or not doing are creating unfavorable perceptions of one thing or another, it may be time to re-evaluate yourself and make a change or two and reverse any such views.