“Our CFO just wants to see spreadsheets,” shared an advice-seeking CMO from a $135mil SaaS company. Other Huddlers expressed similar sentiments about their CFOs, noting “You’ve got to translate marketing into language finance can understand.” Yes. But. And.

Yes:

• CMOs need to articulate how the totality of marketing connects to revenue.
• CMOs need to show that data helps inform their decisions.
• CMOs need to share simple dashboards that track agreed-upon KPIs.

But:

• If CMOs only show spreadsheets to their CFO they will end up over-investing in short-term activities (as has happened in the last few years).
• If CMOs just focus on the data they will mislead their CFOs to believe that every dollar invested can be directly connected to revenue (as Jon Miller says, “Marketing is not a gumball machine”).
• If CMOs only talk numbers they risk being seen as tacticians, not strategic thinkers.

And:

• Every conversation with your CFO is an opportunity to demonstrate business acumen (not just marketing acumen).
• Every conversation with your CFO is an opportunity to partner, share hypotheses, and plan experiments.
• Every conversation with your CFO is an opportunity to help lead your company, reinforcing the importance of building sustainable differentiation.

Leaders lead.

For CMOs, that means not going into your CFO’s office begging for handouts. In theory, you are peers in the C-suite. You are co-contributors to the company’s success. You both bring expertise and blind spots. While it might be unreasonable to expect a CFO to understand the nuances of marketing, you can educate them about how great brands are built. You can explain how a better reputation impacts everything from click-through rates on Google ads to close rates on enterprise deals to pricing power. This will take time. Maybe years!

Reputations aren’t built in a day.

Kay Moffitt, CMO of Amplify, an EdTech company, explained on a recent CMO Huddles Studio episode that their podcast is having a material impact on their business. But all the evidence is anecdotal. Like the CEO hearing “nice things” about it from customers. Like the salespeople saying, “XYZ prospect talked about our podcast!” Some CMOs call this “anecdata” since they are hard to quantify but highly believable examples of reputation growth. Importantly, the podcast has been running for more than 6 years and was a slow build.

Marketing is an investment not an expense.

Imagine your joy when your CFO believes this too. And like the great investor Peter Lynch (long-time manager of Magellan Fund), you don’t expect a 10X return on every pick, and certainly not in Year 1. In fact, for Lynch, the goal was one “10-bagger” out of 7 investments every 5-7 years. Lynch ran the fund for 13 years and averaged a 29.2% annual return, more than 2x the S&P 500.

Written by Drew Neisser