––-(Why CMOs Must Lead the Charge and What CEOs Need to Know)
According to Deloitte, 72% of CEOs now expect their CMOs to justify marketing spend in concrete terms: revenue, EBITDA, and long term enterprise value. Yet too many marketing departments still operate as cost centers — siloed from corporate priorities and accountability metrics.* Meanwhile, McKinsey finds that roughly 25–30% of marketing spend goes to waste every year due to redundancies, fragmented platforms, and low impact activity.*
In an era where precision, accountability, and scalability drive competitive advantage, CMOs must operate as growth architects, aligning every dollar with corporate priorities and extracting waste from every campaign. CEOs, COOs, and CFOs must ensure marketing operates like a precision engine — making every dollar an investment in long term enterprise value.
The New Growth Model for CMOs
“In today’s healthcare environment, marketing must evolve from a tactical, campaign driven role into a core growth discipline. CEOs expect CMOs to operate with precision, accountability, and a deep understanding of the enterprise priorities — aligning every dollar with clinical, operational, and financial outcomes.”
— Paul Keckley, Healthcare Economist and Policy Analyst
Modern CMOs must evolve from campaign managers to enterprise growth leaders, aligning marketing activity with corporate objectives, operational priorities, and EBITDA. At ab+a, we align this effort with our proprietary GiG Model:
G — Growth: Making marketing a precision engine for revenue generation, driving volume, margin expansion, and lifetime value.
i — Impact: Designing every campaign, channel, and initiative for measurable contribution to enterprise value — aligning marketing spend with EBITDA outcomes.
G — Good: Ensuring marketing operates within a governance discipline, making spend, platforms, and staffing decisions based on accountability, long term sustainability, and contribution to corporate priorities.
In short, the GiG Model turns marketing from an expense line item into an enterprise growth engine — making every dollar count, every campaign accountable, and every initiative aligned with corporate objectives.
The 7 Hidden Drains in Marketing Spend (and What CMOs Must Do)
Modern marketing departments often operate with waste and inefficiency, making it harder for CMOs to justify spend and harder for CEOs and CFOs to measure their long term value. Here are 7 Hidden Drains every C suite executive must recognize — and the actionable steps CMOs can take to fix them:
1. Misaligned Marketing and Sales Teams
According to Boston Consulting Group, firms with aligned marketing and sales departments experience 15–20% annual revenue growth, versus fragmented teams.*
Misalignment creates duplicated efforts, wasted spend, and lost opportunities.
The Fix
– Establish shared KPIs (such as CAC, ROAS, and LTV) across marketing and sales.
– Build joint dashboards that connect marketing efforts to revenue generation.
– Operate as one revenue team, aligning incentives and accountability.
2. Spending Too Much on Low Performing Channels
Deloitte finds that one third of CMOs spend up to 30% of their marketing budget on low performing or irrelevant channels.*
The Fix
– Evaluate every channel’s performance by CAC, ROAS, and long term customer value.
– Eliminate or refocus spend that doesn’t justify its cost.
– Invest in platforms and channels yielding high attribution and precision forecasting.
3. Redundant Marketing Technologies
According to Gartner, organizations utilize only 58% of their MarTech stack’s capabilities, leaving almost half of their platforms underused.*
The Fix
– Perform a MarTech Optimization Audit every 12–18 months.
– Consolidate platforms and renegotiate vendor relationships.
– Invest only in platforms aligned with EBITDA and long term enterprise priorities.
4. Misaligned Agency and Vendor Spend
PwC estimates that a well executed vendor review can save marketing departments 10–15% annually.*
The Fix
– Evaluate every agency and vendor for overlap, impact, and EBITDA contribution.
– Establish formal service level agreements (SLAs) tied to ROAS and CAC.
– Consolidate vendors where feasible and measure their impact like internal staff.
5. Focusing on Awareness Instead of Impact
According to HBR, one in three CMOs can’t clearly link marketing activity to EBITDA contribution.*
The Fix
– Build dashboards aligning marketing metrics with EBITDA, CAC, ROAS, and LTV.
– Evaluate every campaign for its role in corporate priorities.
– Adopt the GiG Model — making marketing a precision engine for Growth, Impact, and Good.
6. Under Leveraged Customer Insights
McKinsey finds that firms utilizing advanced customer analytics have a 93% higher likelihood of outperforming competitors.*
The Fix
– Build an enterprise level customer data platform for precision marketing.
– Leverage analytics platforms aligning marketing activity with EBITDA and long term lifetime value.
– Use deep customer segmentation to design precision marketing campaigns that optimize spend and deepen lifetime value.
7. Misaligned Internal Capabilities
According to Accenture, 40% of CMOs cite talent gaps as a key barrier to aligning marketing with enterprise growth.*
The Fix
– Perform a Marketing Capabilities Audit — evaluate staff experience, structure, and role clarity.
– Invest in training and enablement platforms that build precision marketing capabilities.
– Leverage interim or fractional leaders (CMOs, CGOs) to align marketing staff, platforms, and vendors with corporate objectives.
What CMOs Must Do Today
Modern CMOs must evolve from campaign managers to precision growth leaders, making marketing an integral part of enterprise growth. Here’s how:
– Run an Efficiency Audit every 12–18 months across platforms, vendors, staff, and campaigns.
– Revisit KPIs — align metrics like CAC, ROAS, LTV, and EBITDA with long term corporate priorities.
–Develop a Governance Framework — adopt the GiG Model for precision, accountability, and alignment across marketing platforms and staff.
What CEOs Must Do Today
Modern CEOs must recognize marketing as a core enterprise priority — aligning spend, platforms, staff, and vendors with EBITDA, long term value, and corporate priorities:
–Demand accountability and precision from the marketing function.
–Position marketing as an enterprise priority akin to supply chain, procurement, or clinical operations.
– Build trust between marketing, sales, service, and operational teams to enable precision, accountability, and long term sustainability.
The Outcome: Marketing as a Profit Engine
Modern CMOs have an unprecedented opportunity to operate as precision growth architects, aligning marketing spend and platforms with long term EBITDA and enterprise value. According to McKinsey, firms aligning marketing and operational priorities experience:
✅ 15–20% revenue growth within 12–18 months
✅ 25–30% EBITDA improvements across marketing driven lines of business
With the ab+a GiG Model, CMOs can:
– Operate marketing as a precision growth engine aligned with corporate priorities.
– Build accountability across platforms, staff, and vendors.
– Position marketing as a core contributor to EBITDA and enterprise value.
Final Thoughts
The era of marketing as a cost center is over. In its place is a new model — one where CMOs operate as precision growth leaders, aligning marketing spend, platforms, staff, and vendors with long term enterprise priorities.
The GiG Model — Growth, Impact, and Good — provides a roadmap for making every dollar count, every campaign measurable, and every initiative aligned with EBITDA and enterprise priorities.
According to McKinsey, firms making this shift experience 15–20% revenue growth within 12–18 months.* The takeaway? The future of marketing rests in precision, accountability, and governance. The future of marketing rests with the CMOs and CEOs bold enough to make it happen.
