A disconnect between chief marketing officers (CMOs) and chief
information officers (CIOs) threatens the ability of companies to
deliver effective customer experiences, according to a new study
by Accenture (NYSE:ACN). The study, based on a survey of 400 senior
marketing and 250 information technology (IT) executives in 10
countries, revealed that only one in 10 of the executives believes
collaboration between CMOs and CIOs is currently at the right level.
CIOs appear to be more committed to greater collaboration than CMOs,
according to the report, The
CMO-CIO Disconnect. More than three out of four CIOs surveyed – 77
percent – agree that CMO-CIO alignment is important, compared to 57
percent of CMOs participating in the survey. However, despite CIOs
appearing more open to engaging with CMOs, only 45 percent of CIOs say
that supporting marketing is near or at the top of their list of
priorities.
Regarding the use of technology, CMOs and CIOs agree that technology is
essential to marketing and that its primary purpose is to gain access to
customer insight and intelligence (60 percent of CMOs and 73 percent of
CIOs). But while CMOs claim that gaining customer insight is their
number one motivator for collaborating with IT, CIOs rank this tenth on
their list of reasons to work together. CIOs’ top motivation for
collaborating is to improve the customer experience, which CMOs rank as
their third most important motivator.
“The CMO and CIO continue to work in silos, but now more than ever
bridging the gap between those two organizations is critical for
success. With today’s multichannel consumer seeking highly relevant
experiences and with digital and analytics platforms emerging to help
companies respond, marketing and IT executives must work more closely
together,” said Brian Whipple, global managing director of Accenture
Interactive. “C-suite decision makers face a variety of challenges when
collaborating, ranging from a lack of trust to differing business goals.
These issues must be resolved to turn a company’s digital marketing
capabilities into a platform for market differentiation, business
growth, and profitability.”
Challenged Collaboration in Action
The report reveals that when collaborating on a marketing initiative,
neither the marketing executives nor the IT executives come away
satisfied. According to the survey, 36 percent of CMOs say that IT
deliverables fall short of the desired outcome, and 46 percent of CIOs
say marketing does not provide an adequate level of detail to meet
business requirements.
The survey also shows that a disagreement over the freedom and control
of the use of technology and data also prevents effective collaboration.
While 45 percent of CMOs say they want to enable their teams to leverage
and optimize data and content without IT intervention, 49 percent of
CIOs counter that marketing uses technologies without consideration for
IT standards.
A Positive Shift
Despite the issues in collaboration raised by the survey, both CMOs and
CIOs believe their relationship has improved over the past year: 45
percent of marketing executives and 47 percent of IT executives share
this opinion. Additionally, almost an equal number of CMOs (41 percent)
and CIOs (42 percent) believe that significantly more collaboration with
each other will be required to drive relevant customer experiences.
Steps to Improve CMO-CIO Collaboration
According to the Accenture report, CMOs and CIOs should consider taking
the following actions to strengthen their alignment and improve
collaboration:
-
The CMO should be identified as the Chief Experience Officer and IT
should be looked at as a strategic partner with marketing and not just
as a platform provider.
-
The skills mix in both organizations should be updated whereby the
marketing department would become more tech savvy and the IT
organization would become more agile and responsive to market demands.
-
Both teams should agree on key business levers and embrace tools,
processes and platforms to understand consumer intent and unlock
consumer value.
“To succeed in the digital age, CMOs must place an immediate focus on
technology to improve relevant customer experiences and advance
marketing practices,” Whipple said. “The good news is that CMOs and CIOs
agree technology is important. Now they must work together to agree on
how technology can be most appropriately applied to drive their
company’s specific marketing needs, and how it can ultimately result in
increased brand affinity, loyalty and sales growth.”
Learn more at: The
CMO-CIO Disconnect.
Methodology
The 2012 CMO-CIO Insights Survey is a global survey sponsored by
Accenture aimed at understanding the opinions, challenges and points of
view of senior and IT executives as it relates to marketing-IT
alignment. The results are based on 405 surveys across 10 countries with
senior marketing executives, and 252 surveys across the same countries
with IT Executives using the same criteria. All respondents are from
companies from the U.S., Canada, Germany, Italy, U.K. and China with at
least $1 billion in annual revenues, with companies in France,
Australia, Singapore and Brazil all having an annual revenue of at least
$500 million. Accenture conducted an online survey in August and
September of 2012.
About Accenture
Accenture is a global management consulting, technology services and
outsourcing company, with more than 266,000 people serving clients in
more than 120 countries. Combining unparalleled experience,
comprehensive capabilities across all industries and business functions,
and extensive research on the world’s most successful companies,
Accenture collaborates with clients to help them become high-performance
businesses and governments. The company generated net revenues of
US$27.9 billion for the fiscal year ended Aug. 31, 2012. Its home page
is www.accenture.com.
Accenture Interactive helps the world’s leading brands drive superior
marketing performance across the full multichannel customer experience.
Working with over 5,000 Accenture professionals dedicated to serving the
marketing function, Accenture Interactive offers integrated,
industrialized and industry-driven digital transformation and marketing
solutions. Follow @AccentureSocial or visit accenture.com/interactive.
Copyright Business Wire 2013