BlackBerry loyalists were dealt a blow earlier this year when the company ended support of its iconic smartphones. Once hailed as the preferred devices for business executives, heads of state and other fans of handheld physical keyboards, the beloved “crackberry” is now a relic of the past.

In actuality, the company has not manufactured the phones for several years now, and for the past six it has been licensing other companies to do so. Marketing the services that it provides today is quite a different exercise. Effectively pivoting from a hardware focus to a software one, the company now specializes in providing cybersecurity software and embedded operating systems within vehicles, with an eye on securing automobiles within smart cities of the future.

We spoke with BlackBerry CMO Mark Wilson about the company’s pivot, the significance of competitor analysis in today’s business market, the role that brand equity plays in product differentiation and how compelling content marketing can help B2B businesses cut through the clutter.

Chief Marketer: Let’s talk about pivoting towards not producing BlackBerry phones. Were you involved in the messaging for sunsetting the product? What were the challenges of conveying that to the public?

Mark Wilson, BlackBerry CMO: It’s been six years since we manufactured a phone. Instead, we’ve licensed our brand to other people to manufacture phones and use our software. We’ve pivoted our business model from being hardware-focused to software-focused. It’s changed dramatically in terms of how we build things or support things. So in that pivot from hardware to software, we knew we would eventually stop supporting devices that were seven, eight, nine, 10 years old. We wanted to delay that as long as possible out of respect for our customers. In time, we needed to make a financial decision around what that meant, so eventually we ended support for those devices. We worked with our carrier partners to make sure that those customers knew that it was coming and they had ample time to kind of get ready for it.

CM: How are you involved in creating smart cities?

MW: Long-term, we see the IOT market and the cybersecurity market converging around the smart city. Everybody has talked about smart cities, but not a lot of people are actually delivering something for a smart city. But once you have all the automobiles and traffic signals and everything connected, in a highly secure way, we think that’s actually a sweet spot. Everything going on in the Ukraine right now is a great example of why you need that. They need to be secured because people can begin to take down the national power grids. The value of a smart city can quickly be eroded if that’s not secure.

CM: What’s the process for securing automobiles in smart cities?

MW: If you look at those electric vehicles, there’s more software in those cars than there ever has been. I think on average, there are a hundred million lines of software code now written into the car. So as these cars become more software-based, and as the experience becomes more software-oriented, you want to make sure you’re securing all of those types of smart things that are connected into the infrastructure of a city.

Our software is also in the signaling lights within cities. There’s something called vehicle-to-vehicle—how a vehicle is talking to another vehicle, as well as the cloud. We have a major partnership with AWS in terms of providing that car-to-cloud connectivity. Once you’re showing how all of those things are connected, that’s how you’re going to start to deliver into the smart city.

CM: When do you anticipate this becoming a reality?

MW: Things like vehicle-to-vehicle you can experience today. A lot of that will be government standards in terms of when those things get rolled out. We see it as several years away. It’s coming, and sometimes these things move very rapidly. With autonomous vehicles, it’s starting, but it’ll be a groundswell effect. We think that that’ll accelerate much faster. How far out is that? It’s difficult to predict. And then how quickly does it gain mass adoption? All of those things are to be figured out.

CM: Your business is primarily B2B at this point. Who are your primary customers and how are you marketing your services to them?

MW: Our customers are the largest banks, governments and auto manufacturers. In addition, we have a big focus on the mid-market, and we do this particularly around cybersecurity. We have an AI prevention-first approach to cybersecurity. We use AI algorithms to identify things that are coming into your organization that look like malware or ransomware. And then we stop them from actually executing in the first place. That works well with mid-market clients that may not have security operation centers or 24/7 support. Instead, we’ll deliver that as a managed service.

CM: What channels do you use to market your products and services to customers?

MW: We look at the buyer’s journey and then we map how we reach buyers at different parts of the journey. We’ll advertise in business publications like the New York Times, Wall Street Journal or Washington Post. We’ll do digital advertising and a lot across search marketing. We do a lot through social—organic and paid social, a lot of earned media. It’s omnichannel in terms of how we’re going after the market. We do a lot of thought leadership. We publish threat research reports that get picked up in the news and that’s also shared with our customers.

CM: What tactics are working well for you right now?

MW: We do incredibly well with content marketing. I’ve seen content marketing evolve in my career, and I think it’s a great tactic. The hardest part for marketers doing content marketing is having something interesting to say. They might fall back and create content that is not that compelling, which I think is a huge mistake.

For BlackBerry, we lean into our threat reports. We’ve done things like uncovering hack-for-hire organizations where nation states would engage for-profit companies to execute hacking campaigns and social engineering campaigns, as well as private companies using hack-for-hire organizations to go after competitors. We have our own research team that identifies these exploits and vulnerabilities, threats and actors, and we basically package that up and then go out and tell the world about it.

We do something called Threat Thursdays, where every week we’re sharing new vulnerabilities out in the market. Some of them are really big, like exploits in the mobile space. Some things are small that are more bespoke in terms of tactics, but every week we’re publishing something new. On a longer-term basis, every quarter we come out with very extensive reports.

CM: Let’s talk about trends generally. Are there interesting or up-and-coming trends in B2B marketing that you have your eye on?

MW: The digitization of marketing has been a boon for so many marketers. And your ability to understand your market has never been better. It’s not new, because we’ve been focused on it, but it’s becoming more and more relevant every year. Our ability to understand trends based on more data coming in has only gotten better.

The other trend is something we lean into a lot: understanding your competitors. If you did a competitive study 10 years ago, you would probably hire a research firm and do it once a year to try and understand what’s happening in your market. Today, we understand what’s going on with our competitors on a weekly basis. We’re much smarter about understanding what our competitors are doing, what seems to be working for them, what doesn’t work for them. We’re much more mindful of having an outside-in perspective in B2B marketing. I see this trend only picking up.

CM: What excites you most about the marketing industry right now?

MW: What’s interesting about B2B is product differentiation. That cycle only gets more and more compressed. Years ago, you might have a product advantage for several releases. Now, you have product advantage for a release. The differentiation at that offer level is more difficult to maintain or extend. I think that brand becomes more valued in terms of where you see the differentiation. Your ability to provide that level of trust as an advisor or as a trusted solution, particularly in the markets we’re in, where privacy and security matters, that equation of trust means so much from a brand perspective.

There are things that you want to build more brand equity in. If we can move past it being a nebulous concept into something that’s more concrete, that makes it more of board conversation. All of this is getting to more quantification of marketing. And marketing becomes a more strategic conversation

CM: How should marketers think about measuring that brand equity?

MW: I would do it across three things. We measure our brand awareness, brand perception and brand preference. That’s at the highest level as it relates to brand. If you know awareness deeply, and your awareness relative to your competitors, and if you know perception and preference, you can begin to get an idea how valuable brand is in terms of creating pull in that journey. Are you just pushing opportunities through the funnel or are you pulling them through the funnel? Once you begin to quantify that you can start to be much smarter in terms of how you allocate your investments across push tactics as well as pull tactics.

CM: Where do you see the greatest opportunity for marketers today?

MW: There’s so much opportunity for marketers right now. A lot of it has to do with all the data that we have access to and how we use it. There are more things that we can do now that we never did. That competitive analysis example: any marketer who’s not doing that, it’s a huge missed opportunity. Of course, they need to know their value proposition and the best way to get their value proposition communicated out to the market. But there’s so much more richness that marketers can do beyond just that.

The post Brands on Fire: BlackBerry CMO on Pivot From Mobile Phones to B2B Cybersecurity appeared first on Chief Marketer.

The 2020 CMO Spend Survey, which fielded responses from 432 marketing executives in North America, the U.K., France and Germany at businesses that have between $500 million and $20 billion in annual revenue, indicates that this optimism held by CMOs is at odds with the expectations of their C-suite colleagues. While chief marketers appear to be upbeat about a recovery in 2021, 60 percent of CEOs surveyed by the World Economic Forum believe the recession will be U-shaped and 22 percent think it could be a double dip one. The contrast between CMOs’ optimism and CEOs’ more tempered predictions is stark—and, according to Gartner, should be cause for alarm.

Additional highlights from the report include:

*More than half (57 percent) of respondents across all industries believe that business performance will return to normal in 18 to 24 months. But only 22 percent of travel and hospitality CMOs predict a positive impact will occur by that time. Consumer products was another industry that was less optimistic, with 33 percent predicting a positive outcome.

*The top three actions that CMOs have taken in response to COVID-19 were: launched special COVID-19 communications to customers (61 percent); deployed listening tools to monitor customer COVID-19 sentiment of trends (47 percent); and developed scenarios for planning purposes (42 percent).

*Seventy-nine percent of CMOs will fuel growth in 2021 with existing markets, suggesting that CMOs’ priorities are trending toward conservative. Moreover, 69 percent said they will conserve the status quo or take limited risks.

*In terms of strategic marketing capabilities, brand strategy holds the top spot, with 33 percent of respondents, behind market analytics (29 percent) and marketing operations (28 percent).

*The most important brand metrics were brand health (44 percent ranked it in the top two) and competitive benchmarks (41 percent). And ROI (19 percent) and marketing qualified leads (18 percent) topped the list of CMOs’ most valuable metrics.

*A third of marketing work has shifted from agencies to in-house, but future plans may be interrupted by budget cuts.

*Martech spending has stayed strong, accounting for 26.2 percent of marketing budgets.

*Digital channels represent nearly 80 percent of budgets in 2020, and 62 percent of CMOs surveyed expect media spend to bounce back in 2021.

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We spoke with Ewan McIntyre, Vice President Analyst at Gartner for Marketers, about the survey’s key findings and what strategies CMOs should employ to further economic recovery.

Chief Marketer: Do you have a theory on why CMOs’ optimism conflicts with the business reality they’re facing, such as budget cuts?

Ewan McIntyre: The challenge is that CMOs are just not looking at the right signals when considering the long-term outlook. This is not a new thing—CMOs have reported in previous Gartner surveys that they rely on near-term, and often internal indicators, when considering the environment. This is a different mindset and mentality from that displayed by other members of the C-suite. Marketing is considered being the enterprise’s optimist in chief. Positivity is a virtue—an essential attribute for marketing success. But only when married with pragmatism and a realistic view of the world outside the four walls of the marketing department.

CM: Why is there such a discrepancy between CMOs’ view of the recovery and CEOs’? Do you see this as a serious issue?

EM: This is a serious issue. As we move through the stages of the COVID crisis, marketing is fundamental to enterprise recovery and renewal. But marketing needs to firstly ensure that it has focused on optimizing its costs and built the right capabilities based on the fundamental changes that have occurred, not just to customer journeys, but also to the prevailing economic environment. The challenges have just started—the COVID-19 pandemic is a health crisis that precedes an economic crisis. Focusing on the right customers, strategies and resources to deliver recovery is of paramount importance. This requires strategic alignment across the enterprise.

CM: Do you think recent surges in COVID-19 cases across the U.S., and the fact that many states have reversed their course on reopening certain businesses, would influence CMOs’ responses if the survey was fielded today? If yes, how might they differ? 

EM: We anticipate responses will evolve throughout the year. Gartner has been tracking CMO sentiment, strategies and budgets right from the start of 2020 and will continue to do so as the crisis evolves. Like consumers, CMOs are struggling to understand the implications of COVID-19, and how it will continue to impact journeys and demand. Furthermore, the budget challenges we reported in the survey are the first of a set of cuts. Those marketers who saw their budgets increase in the face of COVID may find their budgets normalize in the back half of 2020, as abnormal demand falls away. And even the almost half of CMOs who had to cut their budget in the first half of 2020 are likely to see further cuts in 2020 and 2021. This is likely to further dent the confidence of CMOs and their teams. But, by focusing on agile, adaptive strategies, re-prioritizing their spend commitments and maintaining a laser-sharp focus on their customers, CMOs can take positive steps to weather the storm ahead.

The post Gartner Survey: CMOs’ Optimism Toward Recovery From Pandemic at Odds With CEOs’ appeared first on Chief Marketer.

According to the report, CMOs are still missing out on tremendous opportunities for cross-functional collaboration within the C-suite. It might have to do with the fact that other C-suite executives don’t rate the performance of CMOs nearly as highly as CEOs now do. Particularly when it comes to CFOs, that’s a major problem that needs to be remedied.

As keepers of the money, CFOs are one of the most influential people in any given company—and they’re also the likeliest gatekeepers to true cross-department collaboration and acceptance. By making them an active part of the marketing process and fostering them as advocates and allies, CMOs can gain greater respect and attention among the rest of the C-suite. Here are three key steps to developing a successful relationship with your CFO.

Position Marketing as an Investment

CMOs need to clearly convey to their CFOs that marketing is not a cost center. It must be seen and treated within the company as the revenue-generating investment that it truly is. This might seem like a simple shift in mindset, but from the CFO’s vantage point, this transition has real-world implications for how marketing is managed financially. Viewing marketing as an investment implies that there is going to be some ups and some downs. Not all investments work out.

Any good investment should be diversified among long-term, short-term, lower-risk and higher-risk plays. From a budget standpoint, that means spreading marketing spend among long-term branding strategies, short-term tactics and various “test and learn” initiatives. This diversification, when viewing marketing as an investment, stands in stark contrast to today’s typical CFO belief that all dollars should correlate to performance today.

Work with the CFO to Develop KPIs

Once CFOs understand marketing as an investment, CMOs should collaborate with them regarding marketing KPIs to ensure they support the company’s goals. Specific marketing KPIs—such as increasing brand sentiment, website conversion or store traffic—are important. However, if they ultimately don’t align with finance’s goals, they are counter-intuitive and not going to be part of the conversation in the board room.

CMOs should collaborate with their CFOs to determine marketing goals that, when achieved, increase investor and shareholder value while generating a healthy cash flow statement. By bringing marketing into financial discussions of this nature, CMOs can elevate their power and role within the company.

Display a Solid Financial Acumen

Underpinning all of their CFO conversations, CMOs need to display a solid grasp of the basics of finance. Nothing wins over a CFO faster than realizing the marketer they’re talking to understands the fundamentals of a financial statement and has read the company’s latest Form 10-K.

Beyond basic understanding, it’s also imperative that CMOs demonstrate that they’re fiscally responsible. That means making cuts when necessary, taking a hard look at every cost and knowing your marketing budget inside and out. It also means highlighting and promoting instances in which the marketing department saves money. Illustrating that the marketing department values every dollar it has will go a long way to winning the heart (and mind) of the CFO.

Ultimately, the CMO-CFO relationship should be reciprocal. By gaining the trust of their CFOs, CMOs can then advance their education on marketing by illustrating:

• The financial benefits of brand building and the balance between long-term and short-term marketing strategies
• That marketing isn’t a single campaign, but a journey building an ongoing relationship with consumers
• The long-term effects of price incentives and sales on your brand equity

The CMO and CFO have a great deal that they can learn from one another. By embracing their CFOs and helping them feel ownership of marketing decisions, CMOs can instill in these colleagues a sense of shared accountability for marketing results. Done right, the above foundational conversations can be the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

Danielle DeLauro is executive vice president at VAB.

The post CFOs: The Marketer’s Key to the C-Suite appeared first on Chief Marketer.

Gone are the days when the technology team looked at marketing as the team that does the hoo-ha—slick advertisements, flashy websites, and puts logos on t-shirts and water bottles—and marketing saw technology as the team in the basement that does laptops and stuff.

Today, you are either embracing or getting kicked by digital transformation. With much of the buying journey complete before a customer engages a live person from your company, your technology and your brand are indistinguishable to your customers. That is pushing CMOs and CTOs from backstage roles supporting sales and operations to starring roles in revenue growth. A 2016 study by Deloitte and the CMO Council found that 68% of CMOs say their boards and CEOs expect them to lead revenue growth. And according to CIO’s 2019 State of the CIO research, 62% of CIOs say creating new products or services that drive revenue is part of their job responsibilities.

If your CMO and CTO only see each other at board meetings, you may be missing revenue opportunities and letting your customers down. Here are three best practices that will have you finishing each other’s sentences in no time:

1. Work backward to move forward
Change is a feature of modern business—and so is the transformative tension that comes with it and pressures performance. While boards eagerly await ROI for in-flight changes, leaders face the new normal of pitching the board on even more change to remain relevant. Every leader in the c-suite has a wish list of projects that can move margins and missions. By forming an alliance, the CMO and CTO can approach the CEO and board with a single wish list.

It sounds easy, but finding common ground can mean carving it out of protected territories—a chance to use those “healthy conflict” skills your life coach taught you. For us, that alignment came quickly (and painlessly) by collaborating on a common vision for our customers before we started talking about initiatives. That gave us the shared perspective we needed to step back and survey what was working and what to change to move forward.

Other articles you might enjoy:

• Brands Need to Consider Martech Investments Wisely: Report
• Infographic: Why Martech Investments Aren’t Optimized
• Getting to the C-Suite: How Six CMOs Rose to the Top

2. Hire for harmony
Building good team chemistry is hard enough within a department but can feel more like alchemy when mixing talent across siloed subcultures. One way to make it a more exact science is to include leaders from both technology and marketing in the interview process when hiring roles with frequent inter-team interaction. These are not courtesy interviews. The interviewers have an equal vote on the final hiring decision.

This practice helps ensure we get the right cultural fit for both teams as well as the skills we need. With large corporate centers in Tacoma, Chicago, and India, TrueBlue competes for talent with the biggest companies on the planet. We used to view that as a disadvantage. But in working together on hires we found that marketers and technology pros want to be part of a company that makes a difference in the world. Our purpose is simple: Everyone understands the importance of having a job. During the interview process, marketing and technology leadership show applicants how what they will do everyday changes lives by connecting people with work. Add in the opportunity to use their talents to transform the industry and we have a pretty compelling story to tell recruits.

3. Team up on transformation
CMOs report a 27% increase in the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning over 2018 levels. This buzziest of hi-tech buzz powers content personalization, predictive analytics for customer insights, and targeting decisions, among other marketing goodness. And marketers want more: CMOs expect to increase their marketing analytics spend 61% in the next three years.

They are not alone. IDC forecasts worldwide AI spending to hit $35.8 billion this year, up 44% over 2018. Your CTO no doubt has CFOs and other chiefs who want to be his or her BFF, too, with AI needs of their own. (They are important friendships: 91% of CFOs say it’s their job to ensure tech benefits happen).

This is where the CTO seat at the corporate crossroads becomes a forcing function. When a vendor invited our CTO to an AI/Machine Learning envisioning exercise, he brought the CMO and sales leaders to the exercise, but also brought detailed requirements from other company divisions. This 360-degree view means no blind spots and ensures a clear-eyed decision that delivers the best ROI.

With digital dependence soaring for brands, marketing and technology teams frequently find themselves in the same lane. Rather than swapping paint in a battle for the lead, CMOs and CTOs who forge a tight bond can team up to draft their way past the competition.

By Maggie Lower, CMO, and Jeff Dirks, CTO, for TrueBlue, Inc.

The post Three Ways Marketing and Technology Can Collaborate on Digital Transformation appeared first on Chief Marketer.

Every CMO has a story about how they rose to the top. So, Chief Marketer spoke with six CMOs about their journeys, and in particular the lessons learned, skills required and the steps along the way that mattered. Read on for your roadmap to the corner office.

The post Getting to the C-Suite: How Six CMOs Rose to the Top appeared first on Chief Marketer.