CMOs are under tremendous pressure to produce results from marketing spend.   In fact, the average tenure of a CMO is under two years.   It seem like all eyes are looking at you.

Why is this happening and what can we do about it?

In this post, I share how I recommend you speak with your CEO and CFO in this new world.  In a nutshell, I believe the conversation needs to change.  If I may, I’d like to explain how to do this.

If you’ve read my white paper How to Find New Customers or listened to the recent podcast on demand generation with CMO Club members Brian Harmon, Paul Dunay, Jon Miller and me, you heard how the world of B2B marketing changed.  You learned how we live in a “self service” world today and how important it is to have a good understanding of customer buying cycles, as well as the need to nurture leads and create thought leadership content so your firm can become the trusted advisor they turn to in time of need.

CEOs and CFOs look for quarter to quarter revenue — they turn to Marketing to produce ROI on marketing spend.  They want a strong flow of qualified leads for salespeople to work on and, unless the money you’re spending produces leads, the pressure quickly mounts.   Your marketing programs might be making progress, but without leads, no one cares.

But since buyers are in control, your ability to directly influence them is minimal.  You need to patiently build relationships and convert those to buyers.  But your CFO and CEO have numbers to deliver.  The mismatch between the world of today and the demands of leadership is why turnover and pressure are so high.

In the face of that pressure, how should you deal with your CEO and CFO?

I believe you need to do three things right away.

1. Educate your CEO and CFO on what is happening and why in the world of B2B Marketing and Sales.  (You can start by reading How to Find New Customers)
2. Set realistic expectations of what can and cannot be accomplished (realistic timeframes)
3. Most importantly, you need to measure different things.

In order to understand how measuring needs to changes, we need to begin by taking a look at customer buying cycles in How to Find New Customers.  The four steps are:

1. Untroubled/Unaware
2. Have Problem
3. Need Solution
4. Consideration

In order to get someone to buy from us, he or she must move through each of those steps.

If we understand the process, then we can  measure the progress through it.  We can measure the number of people in each step periodically and, more importantly, track them as they move from step to step in the buying process.

We should still track leads — particularly in detail like this: Raw Lead, Marketing Qualified Lead, Marketing Accepted Lead, Sales Qualified Lead, Sales Accepted Lead, and Won/Closed.  But we need to measure process flow too.

Using analytics (which web pages are they visiting, for instance), telesales (ask them) and other techniques, we can classify our prospective customers as to which  of the four steps they are in.  Even more importantly, once we start collecting data like IP addresses and emails, we can watch and qualify movement from step to step.  Also, since Marketing is trying to develop trusted relationships, that too is a metric we ought to measure.  We can have telesales call our prospects and get feedback on how we are perceived.  (Do they trust us?)

This approach offer several advantages for Marketing.

1. It shows process rather than raw statistics, so we can track prospects long before they are passed to sales as leads — giving us ammunition to show our CEO and CFO.
2. Since we are tracking movement through a process, we can demonstrate real progress — progress that builds confidence — even before leads start flowing.
3. Since our goal is to be perceived as a trusted advisor so they turn to us in time of need, we measure our success.
4. Lastly, because the customer buying process is universal, this method works regardless of what marketing or lead nurturing program we use.

So here are my action items for you.  Educate your CEO and CFO on the new realities of B2B sales and marketing.  Share with them your new approach and measures.  Explain how this will give them far greater insights into longer term results.  And put the new metrics and measures in place.

If you need help, just let me know.

For companies looking for best practices in b2b lead generation who wish to improve the way they acquire new customers, Find New Customers is the place to go.  CSO Insights says companies need to improve the way they generate leads and implement processes for business to business lead generation.

Jeff Ogden, the Fearless Competitor, is a demand generation expert and sales leader, as well as the President of Find New Customers, a lead generation company, who helps businesses create lead generation campaigns and continually publishes the best lead generation ideas, so his readers can determine the best lead generation strategy to find new customers.