Key Takeaways

• “Most marketers have crossed the digital business threshold to the point where it is no longer a differentiator. They need to shift their energy and resources elsewhere.”

• “CMOs are surrounded by dangerous siren calls of short-term thinking: 71% agree that short term execution pressures keep the marketing function from focusing on long term strategic goals.”

• “There are two key skills CMOs need to embrace and evolve to accelerate the value they bring to the business:  

• Scaled judgement: marketing’s ability to use data-driven insights to help the enterprise identify and act on market signals.

• Empathetic influence: marketing’s ability to motivate others to take action on the solutions that drive positive change.”

• “Those who effectively evolve these skills into marketing superpowers are 11% more likely to report organizational revenue growth.” 

  Learn more in the Gartner press release "Gartner Says CMOs Who Embrace Scaled Judgement and Empathetic Influence Are More Likely to Report Revenue Growth."

Key Takeaways

• “Marketing budgets have climbed to 9.5% of total company revenue in 2022, an increase from 6.4% in 2021.”
• “Seventy percent of respondents reported their budgets had increased this year, however they’re still down from the average budget between 2018 and 2020 of 10.9%.”
  
• “Average marketing spending has increased across almost all of the industries surveyed with the exception of consumer goods.”
  
• “CMOs are not particularly concerned about inflation. The majority thought that increasing costs would have a positive impact on their business.” 
  
• “CMOs have made the shift from digital-first to hybrid multichannel strategies: The survey shows they are dedicating the largest portion of their budget (56%) to online channels and a more equitable split (44%) to offline channels.”
  
• “Marketing is experiencing a historic surge in talent demand in 2022, with the majority of CMOs reporting that their teams lack the capabilities required to deliver their strategy.
  

Learn more in the Gartner press release “Gartner Survey Reveals Marketing Budgets Have Increased to 9.5% of Overall Company Revenue in 2022.”

Key Takeaways

• “There are three challenges that marketers face when implementing third-party digital commerce strategies: resources are spread too thinly, digital sales channel capabilities vary and execution quality is inconsistent.”
• Assess: To address these challenges, marketers must assess the total picture (i.e. growth opportunities and partner capabilities).
• Prioritize: Marketers must also determine key growth channels, partner areas and battlegrounds.
• Execute: Marketers should establish execution excellence through the digital shelf and selective commerce marketing.
• “When executing, marketers must also utilize four digital shelf value levers to address third-party digital commerce challenges: product content, visibility, price and promotion, and availability.”

Key Takeaways

• “AI algorithms are equipping enterprises and marketers with new tools to automate and learn elements of how to influence at scale and achieve MarComm influence objectives.”
  
• “The ‘yin and yang’ of influence engineering includes generative AI and emotion AI:
  
• Emotion AI is how machines learn to interpret reactions and predict consumer behavior.
  
• Emotion AI is transforming market research and has its roots in neuromarketing. It recognizes emotions from neural and biometric inputs such as focus, arousal and valence to predict actions.
  
• Generative AI is how machines learn to create realistic artifacts such as audio or visual content and designs for new products.”
  
• There are four ways marketers can use generative AI: 1) scale up content creation, 2) generate synthetic data for testing and training purposes, 3) generate code to automate decision making and 4) create new embodiments of brands such as virtual influencers and avatars.”