5 Must-Have Skills for Modern CMOs

With the modern marketing skillset rapidly expanding, Lattice Engines CMO Brian Kardon pinpoints the attributes modern CMOs need to hone if they want to succeed.

Don’t bother rifling through your desk drawers for a CMO handbook that lays out the steps to success. It doesn’t exist. And even if it did, much of it would be outdated by the time you picked it up. But while there may not be a detailed outline that can guarantee you excellence in this role, Brian Kardon, CMO of Lattice Engines, does believe in developing a set of skills that you can learn to lean on over and over again.

5 Must-Have Modern CMO Skills

1. You have to be able to repeatedly nail your messaging (it’s one of the first things that sets you apart — until it isn’t). While Kardon stresses the importance of powerful messaging, he also warns that, as with any great thing you do, it will seldom go unnoticed (or uncopied) by your competition. Keep an eye out for imitation, and be ready to adapt and respond accordingly.
2. You need to be agile. You know those annual and quarterly marketing plans you have? Don’t get too attached. Odds are somewhere along the way market conditions will change, priorities will shift, and if you’re too rigid and and unable to quickly refocus and adapt you may miss out on unexpected but critical opportunities.
3. You must be comfortable with data. You’re likely sitting on a mountain of it, and in order to be best-in-class you really need to be able to dive in, understand, interpret, and create action plans around your data.
4. You should be relentlessly curious. These days, with a deluge of data to grapple with, not to mention new tactics, solutions, channels, and platforms constantly being introduced, it’s not realistic to expect you’ll always have the right answers immediately. That’s why having the right questions is more valuable than ever.
5. Keep your success close and your mistakes closer. It’s time to face facts — you can’t make the right move every time. And that’s just fine. In fact, you’ll usually find that your biggest successes piggyback off learning from your failures and being very transparent on what works and what doesn’t.

Photo by: University of Michigan