Top Marketing Mandate: Accelerating Revenue Growth

September 25, 2017

Marketing isn’t just about demand generation – in fact it’s more about revenue growth, according to results from a new CMO Council study [download page] produced with SAP Hybris. Indeed, marketers surveyed for the report identified organizational revenue growth as their top mandate for the year, with customer experience strategy and customer-centricity following.

The results bring to mind recent research into the CMO role, in which top marketers indicated that the most important traits of an effective CMO include playing a key role in company growth initiatives and being the voice of the customer at the leadership table.

Free Download: 11 Things to Know About The CMO Role

Sales Assistance is Critical

    For marketers to achieve their top mandates, help from sales will be a critical component. In fact, 61% of respondents said that sales will be critical to achieving their goals. That’s almost double the share (34%) who said that sales will be important, but not the key to success.

    An accompanying survey of salespeople found a little less enthusiasm about marketers’ importance, though: 36% said that marketing will be critical in helping them achieve their top mandate, with another 50% believing that marketing will be important but not the key to success.

    On a positive note, it seems that marketing and sales will largely be working together towards a common goal: one-quarter of marketers surveyed said that marketing and sales priorities are in total alignment, and another 46% said that their priorities are mostly aligned. Salespeople surveyed were in agreement: 23% said they are in total alignment, and 47% felt mostly aligned.

    This is just the latest in a series of recent studies suggesting greater alignment between marketing and sales. A survey from Televerde, from example, found more than 6 in 10 B2B salespeople feeling that the marketing and sales functions are aligned at their companies. And earlier research from Salesforce discovered that marketers have a high level of confidence in their understanding of what sales needs to succeed.

    Article: How B2B Salespeople Feel Marketing Can Help Them Win More Deals

    Marketers Take the Lead in CX

      Marketing’s expansion into the customer experience has been well documented, and this latest report is no different. In fact, 40% of marketers surveyed describe their involvement in CX as “a decision maker and customer experience strategy developer,” with another 19% saying that they are “the front line in customer experience execution and delivery, engaging directly with the customer.”

      Even so, it’s worth noting that the ultimate responsibility for CX seems to rest with other departments, as just 9% described their involvement as owning the customer experience strategy.

      Generally speaking, marketers are quite confident in their organization’s ability to deliver great customer experiences, though many feel there is room for improvement.

      The main roadblock to improvement is another oft-cited barrier: actionable insights from data and analytics. The issue? Fewer than one-quarter have total access to a comprehensive view of the customer…

      The full report is available for download here.

      About the Data: The report is based on global surveys of 169 marketing leaders and 198 sales executives.

      Roughly half (49%) of marketing respondents come from companies with more than $100 million in revenues, while the vast majority are either B2B-focused (37%) or a hybrid of B2B and B2C (48%).

      About 6 in 10 sales executives come from companies with more than $100 million in revenues, with 52% from B2B companies and 33% from hybrid B2B and B2C companies.

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