The #1 CEO and CMO Red Flag

Marketing leadership faces a critical skills gap in data-driven strategy execution. Kathryn Rathje, Partner at McKinsey's Growth, Marketing & Sales Practice, specializes in sustainable growth transformations for consumer brands. She discusses combining quantitative analytics with creative marketing approaches to deliver personalized customer value. The conversation covers data-driven marketing evolution since 2009 and frameworks for making marketing a strategic champion within organizations. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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  From advertising to software as a service to data, across all of our programs and clients, we've seen a 55% to 65% open rate.

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  Getting brands authentically integrated into content performs better than TV advertising.

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  Typical life span of an article is about 24 to 36 hours.

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  If we're reaching out to the right person with the right message and a clear call to action, then it's just a matter of timing.

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  Welcome to the Martech Podcast, a member of the I Hear Everything Podcast Network. In this podcast, you'll hear the stories of world-class marketers that use technology to drive business results and achieve career success. Here's the host of the Martech Podcast, Benjamin Shapiro.

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  All right, I want you to put on your marriage counselor hat.

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  Okay.

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  And I'm sure as a career consultant, part of your job is being an advisor and part of it's being an operator. So let's talk a little bit about what is the telltale sign that a CEO and a CMO's relationship is beyond repair?

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  Two markers, I would say, and one of them we talked about earlier. But the marker that I've seen is when you have both of them saying they think the function's underfunded, but not willing to actually fund it, right? I think that's a concern. I think the second thing that I've seen is when literally they could be looking at the same piece of information or data and have the exact opposite takeaways from it and not figure out why each other has that exact opposite takeaway from it. And I've seen that happen a few times too.

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  It's funny. I thought you were going to say something the extent of the CEO experiences marketing, so therefore he knows how to market his brand just inherently as opposed to doing the research, understanding the customers, like getting the data. A lot of times it feels like marketing is driven out of intuition from an executive, not necessarily out of customer research. Am I totally pulling that out of thin air?

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  No, I mean, we hit that a little bit before too, but I don't think that means it's beyond repair because I think that means that the CMO can actually bring customer insights that are counter to what the CEO intuits, right? And I think that's actually a great opportunity for the CMO to seize, right? On those, when they see those things. And that, like we talked about before, the Monday morning marketer happens everywhere all the time. You're never going to avoid that. So it's more about how you bring the counterintuitive insight or the aha, or you bring the facts to bear against that. And I think that it's actually a great door opener for a marketer when that's happening in the building.

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  Okay. And that wraps up this episode of the Martech Podcast. Thanks again to Catherine Rasg, partner at McKinsey for joining us. If you'd like to contact Catherine, you can find a link to her LinkedIn profile in our show notes or on martechpod.com. You can always visit her company's website, which is mckinsey.com. And on mckinsey.com, you can find their recent research report, which they have partnered with the Association of National Advertisers as well. And if you haven't subscribed yet and you want a daily stream of marketing and technology knowledge in your podcast feed, hit the subscribe button in your podcast app or subscribe to us on YouTube and we'll be back in your feed next week. All right. That's it for today. But until next time, my advice is to just focus on keeping your customers happy.

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  Thanks for listening to the Martech Podcast, an I Hear Everything production. Looking to launch or scale a podcast like this one for your brand? Then visit ihereverything.com.