Before now, the Chief Marketing Officer’s work was tied to working on creative ideas and intangible goals, like creating brand perception. However, in recent years, the role of the CMO has changed.
Today, digital technology has generated opportunities for marketing efforts.
Now, any successful CMO is expected to use data in making decisions and should be able to point to the specific costs and returns of their marketing activities.
All these are possible because they now understand their customers and keep track of customer engagement.
As a result, CMOs are making bigger, data-driven marketing investments that need bigger marketing budgets to work with. This means that they need to strengthen connections with the Chief Financial Officers (CFOs), who control the company’s cheque book.
Nevertheless, you can’t assume the CFOs and CMOs will automatically align because they work in the same office.
It is important to note though, that the relationship between these two heads (marketing and finance) is needed to effectively drive business growth.
There are various ways to foster the relationship between these two heads, let's take a look at a few:
- Align individual goals
One of the ways to bolster your CMO-CFO relationship is to align individual goals into shared objectives that drive business growth.
This is where it’s important for the marketing team to understand and communicate the financial significance of their marketing plans (via media channels and campaigns) to the finance team.
In other words, marketers should be able to paint a clear picture of how marketing goals will directly translate into financial gains.
- Learn and understand each other’s language
When the two individual teams (finance and marketing) understand and speak the same language, a strong relationship is formed and each leader is on the same page about important business objectives like lead generation, paid media and investment allocation.
One way to achieve this is by sharing trends data, news articles, reports, poll results and much more from each other’s field.
The relationship can be taken further by inviting each other to their respective departmental meetings and organizing short training and brainstorming sessions.
- Build trust, based on transparency
A true long-lasting relationship/partnership is built on transparency and trust. The CMO and CFO must be open and show empathy for each other’s challenges and concerns. With trust, both leaders will have the freedom to work together, brainstorm and adapt together.
Traditionally, marketing and finance teams have always worked in silos. However, to deliver outstanding business results, it is crucial for both teams to collaborate and work closely together.
This is necessary because, when CFOs and CMOs have a smooth and positive relationship where they understand and speak each other’s language, align individual goals, and build a leadership relationship based on trust and transparency, the whole business reaps the rewards.
In conclusion, business revenue can be accelerated and financial improvements of nearly 20% to 40% can be achieved if there’s a positive relationship between CMOs and CFOs.