The top 5 struggles for marketers this year
- Sat, December 24 2011
- Filed under: Marketing essentials
I just read some reports from the CMO Council, which is a professional think tank for marketing executives (CMOs=chief marketing officers) in the private sector. The striking thing was the areas in which CMOs struggle are so like our own in nonprofit marketing. It might make you feel better to know that the CMO at a Fortune 500 company often feels she doesn’t have her marketing act together on customer experience or social media or data management! We are not alone in our challenges.
In fact, a survey of CMOs found most companies still lack a “seamless multi-channel journey for the customer.” Translate this jargon to us and the story is the same. We don’t have one view into our donors across channels, and their experience is doubtless far from seamless. CMOs feel under enormous pressure to do better with engagement and social - and to measure those efforts in a far more sophisticated way. Sound familiar?
Since we apparently share struggles - and priorities - I thought I’d share the top five areas CMOs are seeking to master. This makes for a good to-do list for our own sector:
1. Making over digital marketing
2. Aligning marketing and sales (read: marketing and fundraising or communications and fundraising)
3. Integrate social media channels
4. Better analyze customer data
5. Better measure performance
It’s a tall order but there is some comfort in knowing everyone else finds it a challenge, too.