SAN JOSE, Calif. (Feb. 21, 2014)—Chief marketers must master a multitude of skills to achieve success, but a global assessment of more than 1,200 senior marketers across 72 countries and five continents—conducted by the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council in collaboration with Thomas Barta Consulting—reveals that certain qualities may carry more weight than others in furthering effectiveness.

These and other findings have been extracted from the CMO Council’s new “4P CMO Leadership Footprint” study, which is part of its “Succeed by the Way You Lead” campaign. Highlights of the research appear in the latest edition of PeerSphere—the CMO Council’s peer-inspired, peer-driven and peer-influenced quarterly journal. This issue is available for download today and also features insights from global marketing executives at companies such as Strauss Coffee, Denver Center for the Performing Arts, IntelliResponse, the Center for Multicultural Science, iAcquire and many more.

The cover story for the new issue asserts that CMOs who are able to become engines for growth, energize their organizations around the customer agenda and build world-class marketing teams are best equipped to become leaders and create value for their organizations.

Furthermore, the article reveals that certain factors—such as having top management support, sufficient resources, clarity of role and purpose in the organization, the right cultural fit and the alignment of marketing teams with business goals—are among the most critical factors in determining CMO success.

“The findings explored in this article have been developed from what is likely the most comprehensive and academically sound study that has been conducted on this subject to date,” noted the CMO Council’s Executive Director, Donovan Neale-May. “It reveals that the most successful CMOs actually have aspirations to become CEOs—or, at the very least, leaders who create meaningful value for their organizations. However, sources like SpencerStuart reveal that many CMOs still have trouble gaining and maintaining their seat at the leadership table. This article uncovers some of the obstacles involved as CMOs work to demonstrate their value and achieve their desired levels of leadership effectiveness and group performance.”

The latest PeerSphere edition covers a wide range of subjects relevant to global marketing leaders and features articles on a variety of pertinent subjects, among them:

• The potential of social media as an effective listening tool in creating a more seamless, multi-channel customer experience


• How connecting all of a brand’s touch points across every department can help create a consistent brand experience across every channel of engagement


• Strategies, tips and tools to help spread your brand’s content virally online


• Interviews with Gennady Jilinski, Chief Marketing Officer for Strauss Coffee, and Jennifer Nealson, Chief Marketing Officer for Denver Center for the Performing Arts

PeerSphere is now available to download for $9.95 and is provided on a complimentary basis to premium CMO Council members. For more information or to download the issue, visit http://www.cmocouncil.org/thought-leadership/peer-sphere.

About the CMO Council

The Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council is the only global network of executives specifically dedicated to high-level knowledge exchange, thought leadership and personal relationship building among senior corporate marketing leaders and brand decision-makers across a wide range of global industries. The CMO Council's 7,000-plus members control more than $350 billion in aggregated annual marketing expenditures and run complex, distributed marketing and sales operations worldwide. In total, the CMO Council and its strategic interest communities include more than 35,000 global executives in more than 110 countries covering multiple industries, segments and markets.  Regional chapters and advisory boards are active in the Americas, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Middle East, India and Africa. The council's strategic interest groups include the Coalition to Leverage and Optimize Sales Effectiveness (CLOSE), Mobile Relationship Marketing (MRM) Strategies, LoyaltyLeaders.org, CMOCIOAlign.org, Marketing Supply Chain Institute, Customer Experience Board, Digital Marketing Performance Institute, GeoBranding Center and the Forum to Advance the Mobile Experience (FAME). More information on the CMO Council is available at www.cmocouncil.org.

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Media Contact:

Crystal Berry

Director, Marketing Programs and Communications

cberry@cmocouncil.org