Is the CMO role necessary?

I recently read a post on the Branding Strategy Insider blog about the Chief Marketing Officer role and whether it is justified. More and more companies are moving towards creating this role within the C-suite. While the article makes many valid points about the importance of the CMO in aligning the organisation with marketing and creating a more customer centric organisation, I do believe that creating a "position" that looks after "marketing" restricts it's role and influence to a certain extent. It is a paradox, isn't it?

Consider this:

1. If marketing's true role goes beyond sales & advertising, pervading through all functions of the company, what is the value in creating a single role that looks after marketing? Should this be a part of everyone's role in the company?

2. If marketing's true role is long-term profit and value creation, then don't business unit leaders or Chief Executive Officers play the role of a CMO anyway?

I feel that the creation of the CMO role is mainly driven by the insecurity of marketing to occupy a seat at the table. It is unfortunate that today, companies need CMOs to be proponents of the marketing philosophy - why can't this be embraced by everyone?

Marketing Crusader

Hi everyone!

Firstly, let me start by defining the vision of the blog. I think the title of the blog says a lot about the aim of this blog i.e. this blog is a crusade- a crusade to re-define 'marketing' and to re-establish marketing's position as a top-level strategic driver of the firm. The blog aims to build a community of like-minded marketing thinkers : thinkers who believe that marketing is more than just advertising, thinkers who believe that marketing impacts the bottom-line.

Having said that, I do not want to restrict this blog to any single topic or area. The idea of this blog stems from the belief that 'marketing' is an all-pervasive discipline and the more broadly marketing is defined or thought about, the closer you will be to truly understanding it. Hence, this blog will reflect my thoughts and ideas along the way, and hopefully arouse some similar thoughts and ideas from you as well.

Personally, my interests lie in commercially driven marketing practice i.e. improving the rigour of the marketing discipline and linking it to the metrics that really matter. I believe that my blog posts will ultimately reflect this mindset, and I am looking forward to making this blog a sounding board for thoughts and ideas that demonstrate the rigour and 'value' of the marketing discipline.

I look forward to sharing this journey with you!