[Research Round-Up] The Latest Edition of "The CMO Survey" and a New Survey by EMARKETER

 (This month's Research Round-Up features the Spring 2025 edition of "The CMO Survey" and a new survey of senior B2B marketers by EMARKETER, in association with StackAdapt.)

Spring 2025 Edition of "The CMO Survey"

Source:  "The CMO Survey"

• A survey of 281 marketing leaders at U.S. for-profit companies
  
• 99% of the respondents were VP-level or above
• 58.4% of the respondents were with B2B companies
• The survey was in the field January 21 - February 12, 2025

"The CMO Survey" has been conducted semi-annually since 2008. It's directed by Dr. Christine Moorman and sponsored by Deloitte, Duke University's Fuqua School of Business, and the American Marketing Association.

For several years, each edition of the survey has asked participants about overall economic conditions, current marketing spending patterns, and future spending expectations. Here are some of the findings on those topics from the Spring 2025 survey.

Economic Outlook

The Spring 2025 survey found that marketing leaders were less optimistic about the economy than a year earlier. The survey asked participants to rate their optimism regarding the overall U.S. economy on a 100-point scale, with "0" being the least optimistic, and "100" being the most optimistic. The mean rating given by respondents was 62.2, down from 67.0 in the Spring 2024 survey.

The survey also asked if participants were more or less optimistic about the U.S. economy compared to the previous quarter, and only 31.2% of the respondents reported being more optimistic. That was down significantly from 43.7% in the Spring 2024 survey.

Meanwhile, 48.2% of the respondents in the Spring 2025 survey said they were less optimistic about the U.S. economy compared to the previous quarter. That was up from only 25.3% in the Spring 2024 survey.

Marketing Spending

In the Spring 2025 survey, respondents reported that marketing spending represented 9.4% of total company revenue, which was up from 7.7% in the Spring 2024 survey. Respondents also said that overall marketing spending increased 3.3% over the 12 months preceding the survey, and they expected spending to increase 8.9% over the 12 months following the survey.

The relative change in spending on digital marketing vs. traditional advertising remains significant. In the Spring 2025 survey, respondents reported that spending on digital marketing grew 7.3% over the prior 12 months. In contrast, respondents said they expect spending on traditional advertising to decrease by 0.3% over the 12 months following the survey.

Marketing's Role in the Organization Has Grown . . .

The Spring 2025 survey asked participants how marketing's role in their organization had changed over the previous five years. The survey asked participants to rate the amount and direction of change using a numerical scale ranging from -7 (significantly narrowed) to +7 (significantly broadened). The mean value given by respondents was 3.2, which indicates that marketing's role has expanded substantially.

But So Has the Pressure to Prove the Value of Marketing

Sixty-one percent (61%) of the respondents in the Spring 2025 survey said they felt pressure from their CEO to prove the value of marketing. That was up from 51% in the Fall 2023 edition of the survey. Sixty-three percent (63%) of the Spring 2025 respondents reported feeling the same kind of pressure from their CFO, and that was up from 52% in the Fall 2023 edition of the survey.

*****

As always, "The CMO Survey" contains a wealth of valuable insights, and I encourage you to review the full report.

"B2B Marketing Makes Room for Brand in Budgets and Strategies" by EMARKETER in
partnership with StackAdapt 

Source:  EMARKETER

• Based on a survey of 110 B2B enterprise executive marketing professionals in North America
• 6.4% of respondents were CEOs, presidents, or founders, 14.5% were C-level executives, and 79.1% were executive vice presidents, senior vice presidents, or vice presidents
• The survey was conducted during March 2025

The primary objective of this research was to better understand how B2B marketers are allocating budgets between performance and brand marketing, where they plan to invest next, and what barriers exist to additional brand investment.

Here are some of the major findings from the survey.

Brand and Performance Marketing

Over half of the survey respondents (58.2%) said they devote at least half of their marketing budget to lead generation, with paid search and paid social being the top two lead generation channels.

However, 40% of the respondents said they expect to increase their brand-building budgets in the 12 months following the survey. In addition, 45.5% said that if budget weren't a constraint, they would allocate more than half their marketing spend to brand initiatives.

The Measurement Challenge

Sixty-three percent (63%) of the respondents agreed that brand is a critical long-term play, but they struggle to quantify its impact. When survey participants were asked what challenges were preventing them from increasing investment in brand marketing, "proving ROI" was the top barrier identified. 

In addition, over a third of the survey respondents (35.5%) said they expect to face greater pressure to demonstrate ROI in real time over the 12 months following the survey.

[Research Round-Up] NetLine's Latest Data On B2B Content Consumption

 (This month's Research Round-Up discusses the 2025 B2B content consumption report from NetLine Corporation. NetLine publishes this report annually, and it consistently provides a wealth of real-world insights about how business professionals actually consume marketing content.)

Source:  NetLine Corporation

Virtually all B2B companies now use content marketing in several forms, so understanding how business professionals consume content has become critical to marketing success. The 2025 State of B2B Content Consumption & Demand Report by NetLine Corporation provides valuable insights on this vital issue.

NetLine operates a content syndication platform, and this report is based on data from 7.9 million content registrations on the platform in 2024. The NetLine research is particularly valuable for two reasons.

First, it captures the real-world consumption behaviors of business professionals. The data used for the report was not derived from surveys or interviews, but from actual engagements with B2B content.

And second, the report is based on first-party data. The business professionals who use the NetLine platform voluntarily share information about themselves and the organizations they work for in exchange for access to the content resources available on the platform.

For these reasons, the report contains a wealth of detailed information about content consumption behaviors, and I encourage you to review the full 36-page report.

Content Consumption Continues Rising

As measured by registrations on the NetLine platform, overall B2B content consumption in 2024 increased 27% compared to 2023 levels. NetLine's data shows that total demand for B2B content has grown 84% since the 2019 edition of the research. 

Content consumption by C-level executives is also still on the rise, growing 27% year-over-year. In 2024, C-level executives accounted for 13% of the total demand on the NetLine platform.

Demand for content about artificial intelligence grew dramatically in 2024. The explosive growth began in 2023 when demand for AI-related content increased 6.6x compared to 2022. In 2024, demand for such content increased 2.9x compared to 2023.

Most Popular Content Formats

The ten most requested content formats in 2024 were:

• eBooks
• Guides
• Cheat Sheets
• White Papers
• Articles
• Research Reports
• Tips and Tricks Guides
• Book Summaries
• Webinars
• Newsletters

In 2024, content registrations for eBooks increased 71% year-over-year, and the report observes that eBooks represented more than half of all content formats requested on the NetLine platform.

The report also notes that eBooks are a very efficient content format. Every eBook asset uploaded to the NetLine platform in 2024 generated 983 registrations. In contrast, white papers generated only 60 registrations per asset.

The Consumption Gap Widens

One of the more useful insights provided by the report relates to the consumption gap, which NetLine defines as the time between the moment a content resource is requested and the moment it's opened for consumption. This data point is important because it provides a guide for timing follow-up contacts with potential buyers. After all, it makes little sense to contact a potential buyer about a content resource before he or she has reviewed the content.

In 2024, the average consumption gap was 39 hours, up from 31 hours in 2023. The consumption gap has varied over the years. Before 2024, the largest gap recorded by NetLine was 33.3 hours in 2021, and the smallest was 27.1 hours in 2018. The lesson here is that you should wait at least two days before you try to follow up with people who have requested your content via NetLine.

Content Consumption and Buyer Purchase Intent

For the past few years, NetLine's research has suggested that the content format a potential buyer chooses to consume is a good indicator of purchase timing. In the latest analysis, NetLine identified five content formats that are more likely to be associated with a buying decision within the next 12 months - playbooks, infographics, case studies, trend reports, and buyer's guides. 

One format that is notably absent from this list is eBooks. Despite being the most frequently requested type of content last year, eBooks were not strongly associated with shorter-term purchase intention. This shouldn't be surprising because most eBooks are designed to appeal primarily to potential buyers who are in the earlier stages of their buying journey.

*****

Again, the NetLine report contains several other valuable findings, and I recommend you take the time to review the full report.

[Research Round-Up] A Detailed Look at Real-World B2B Buying

(This month's Research Round-Up discusses the 2024 B2B Buyer Experience Study by 6sense. The 6sense study provides detailed insights regarding how business buyers make purchase decisions in real-world scenarios. This makes the study report a must-read for anyone involved in B2B revenue generation.)

2024 B2B Buyer Experience Report by 6sense 

Source:  6sense

• Based on a survey of 2,509 B2B buyers located in North America (37.46%). EMEA (29.77%), and APAC (32.76%).
• To qualify for the survey, participants must have bought at least $10,000 USD in annualized value within the 24 months preceding the survey. The average value of actual purchases made by the survey respondents exceeded $200,000 USD.
• More than 95% of the respondents were manager-level or above.
• Survey respondents were drawn from five industry verticals, with the largest cohort working at tech and software companies.
• 6sense released the study report on October 9, 2024; the report doesn't state when the survey was in the field.

The 2024 B2B Buyer Experience Study by 6sense is one of the most detailed examinations of B2B buying behavior that I've seen recently.

The study is based on a survey that produced more than 2,500 qualified respondents, and the researchers used various statistical techniques to analyze the survey data.

The study findings, combined with the insights from the statistical analysis, paint a picture of B2B buying that differs markedly from the conventional view. Therefore, this research should prompt B2B marketing and sales leaders to reexamine their strategies from the ground up.

The Basics

The 6sense researchers asked participants about several issues that earlier studies have also addressed. For example, the study found that for these survey respondents:

• The length of the average buying cycle was 11.5 months.

• The average number of individuals in the buying group was 10.9 people.

• The average number of prospective vendors considered by the buying group was 4.6.

• On average, the survey respondents were about 70% through their buying process before they engaged directly with representatives of prospective vendors.

These findings are similar to the results of numerous earlier research studies.

Extra Insights

What makes the 6sense study particularly valuable is that it also provides insights about issues that haven't been frequently addressed in previous studies. For example:

• 92.6% of the surveyed buyers had prior experience with at least one of the prospective vendors they considered. 84% had experience with the vendor that was ultimately selected, while 8.6% had prior experience with only a "losing" vendor.

• Buyers initiated contact with prospective vendors 81% of the time.

• In 85% of the buying scenarios represented in the survey, the buying group had their purchase requirements nearly or completely set before initiating contact with prospective vendors.

When Buyers Pick a Favorite

One of the most interesting topics discussed in the 6sense study report relates to when B2B buyers identify a preferred vendor.

At several places, the report's authors assert that most B2B buyers have identified a preferred vendor before they contact any prospective vendors. For example, on page 23 of the report, the authors write:

"Buyers devote nearly 70% of their buying journey to identifying a short-list of potential providers. They review content, have internal meetings and consult with outside resources to establish their requirements and agree on a shortlist and a favored vendor. Only then do they reach out to vendors to confirm that choice, starting with the preferred vendor. They end up buying from the initially preferred vendor 81% of the time."

While I suspect this statement is probably accurate, it's not clear from the study report that the survey data directly supports this conclusion.

The 6sense researchers asked survey participants ". . . whether their first interaction with a provider organization was with the ultimate winner or instead with one of the other providers." Eighty-one percent (81%) of the respondents reported that their first vendor contact was with the ultimate winner.

The focus of this question is who buyers contact first. However, it's not clear from the study report that the survey specifically asked participants (a) whether their buying group identified a preferred vendor before initiating content with prospective vendors, or (b) what percentage of the time the preferred vendor turns out to be the winning vendor.

I'm not sure why the researchers didn't ask these questions, and I hope they will be included in future editions of this research.

*****

The 2024 B2B Buyer Experience Report provides great insights into B2B buying behavior. I encourage you to take the time to review the full 65-page report.

[Research Round-Up] Two Surveys Take the Pulse of Senior Marketers

(This month's Research Round-Up features two recent surveys that examine the attitudes and plans of senior marketing leaders. While both surveys included B2B and B2C respondents, they provide several interesting insights particular to B2B marketing leaders.)

"2024 Global CMO Navigator - CX Edition" by Merkle (a dentsu company) 

Source:  Merkle

• A survey of 1,934 chief marketing officers from 13 countries (22% from the United States)
• Respondents represented more than 14 industry verticals
• 65% of the respondents worked at hybrid B2B/B2C companies, 19% were with B2C companies, and 16% were with B2B companies
• More than half of the respondents (54%) were with companies having at least 250 employees
• The survey was conducted in August 2024

The Merkle survey was designed to capture the attitudes and plans of global CMOs regarding several topics. One group of questions addressed economic and business conditions, and the surveyed CMOs were optimistic about both. For example:

• 88% of the respondents said the economy is in good or excellent shape

• 86% expected the economy to get somewhat or significantly better over the 6-12 months following the survey

• 87% said their company's revenue had increased compared to the previous year

• 89% expected their market budget to increase in the year following the survey

When the researchers asked survey participants what business results they are primarily responsible for as marketers, the top two results identified by the respondents were customer satisfaction and advocacy (54% of respondents) and growth of customer base (53%).

CMOs at B2B companies were 17% more likely than the average to say they are accountable for growing the customer base. B2B CMOs were also 6% more likely than the average to say they are accountable for median and long-term brand health.

The survey also asked participants what they expect the primary role(s) of the marketing function to be over the following 12 months. The top two roles identified by the survey respondents were understanding consumer/market trends (38% of respondents) and delivering business growth (36%).

B2B CMOs were 8% more likely than the average to identify delivering business growth as a primary role and 20% more likely than average to identify ensuring effective brand management as a primary role.

These findings are particularly interesting given that B2C marketers are usually seen as more focused on branding than B2B marketers.

Fall 2024 Edition of "The CMO Survey"

Source:  "The CMO Survey"

• A survey of 260 marketing leaders at U.S. for-profit companies
• 97.2% of the respondents were VP-level or above
• 58.3% of the respondents were with B2B companies
• The survey was in the field September 4-25, 2024

"The CMO Survey" has been conducted semi-annually since 2008. It's directed by Dr. Christine Moorman and sponsored by Deloitte LLP, Duke University's Fuqua School of Business, and the American Marketing Association.

For several years, each edition of the survey has asked participants about overall economic conditions, current marketing spending patterns, and future spending expectations. Here are some of the findings on these topics from the Fall 2024 survey.

Economic Outlook

The Fall 2024 survey found that marketing leaders were somewhat less optimistic about the economy than a year earlier. The survey asked participants to rate their optimism regarding the overall U.S. economy on a 100-point scale, with "0" being the least optimistic, and "100" being the most optimistic. The mean rating given by respondents was 63.8, down slightly from 66.7 in the Fall 2023 survey.

The survey also asked if participants were more or less optimistic about the U.S. economy compared to the previous quarter, and 37.0% of the respondents reported being more optimistic. That was down significantly from 49.0% in the Fall 2023 survey.

Marketing Spending

In the Fall 2024 survey, respondents reported that marketing spending represented 7.7% of total company revenue, which was down from 9.2% in the Fall 2023 survey.

Respondents also said that marketing spending increased 5.8% over the 12 months preceding the survey, and they expected spending to increase 8.6% over the 12 months following the survey. In the Fall 2023 survey, respondents expected marketing spending to grow 7.2% over the following 12 months, which shows that forward-looking expectations aren't always accurate.

The relative change in spending on digital marketing vs. traditional advertising remains significant. In the Fall 2024 survey, respondents reported that spending on digital marketing grew 11.1% over the prior 12 months. In contrast, respondents said they expect spending on traditional advertising to increase by only 0.8% over the 12 months following the survey.

An Emphasis on Brand Building

The survey also asked participants how much they expected their marketing spending to change over the following 12 months in five specific areas. The fastest-growing areas identified by respondents were marketing activities relating to new product introductions (8.1% expected growth) followed by brand building (7.0% expected growth).

One notable finding is that B2B marketers expect spending on brand building to grow at a faster rate than B2C marketers. Respondents with B2B product companies expected spending on brand building to grow 9.5%, and respondents with B2B services companies expected 6.2% growth. This compares to expected growth of 5.7% at B2C product companies and 4.8% at B2C services companies.

These findings suggest that B2B marketers are recognizing the importance of building strong brands.

Looking Back, Looking Forward - 2025 Edition

Source:  Shutterstock

The beginning of a new year is what behavioral scientists call a temporal landmark, a date that is more meaningful than others. Temporal landmarks often prompt us to make significant life changes or commit to pursuing new goals. 

If you doubt the power of temporal landmarks, just consider how often we make "New Year's resolutions" to lose weight or begin a regular exercise program.

Like many marketers, I used the final few weeks of 2024 to reflect on what happened during the year and plan for 2025. My objective for this blog has always been to provide information and insights that are timely, thought-provoking, and useful. To achieve this goal, the content of this blog needs to evolve to account for the always-changing landscape of B2B marketing.

Another Year Dominated By AI

Artificial intelligence, specifically generative AI, was the hottest topic in marketing in 2024, as it had been in 2023. OpenAI's release of ChatGPT in November 2022 triggered an arm's race among technology companies to develop generative AI capabilities.

Spending on AI exploded in 2023 and continued at a blistering pace last year. In a November Forbes article, Beth Kindig, the CEO and Lead Tech Analyst of I/O Fund, wrote that AI-driven capital spending by four tech industry behemoths - Microsoft, Meta, Alphabet, and Amazon - will total about $240 billion in 2024, an increase of more than 50% compared to 2023.

Ms. Kindig's article also noted that AI-related capital spending will likely continue at these nosebleed levels into 2025 as the big tech companies build out AI infrastructure to meet demand that currently exceeds supply.

The capabilities of the large language models that power generative AI also improved exponentially in 2024. For a great overview of these technological advances, I recommend you watch this video by Christopher Penn, the Chief Data Scientist of Trust Insights.

Generative AI is already having an impact on many aspects of business including marketing, even though we are still in the fairly early stages of AI adoption. AI will have an even greater impact on marketing this year as more AI-enabled software applications become available, the adoption of AI increases, and marketers become more adept at leveraging AI's capabilities.

How This Blog Will Change in 2025

I plan to make a few changes in my approach to this blog in 2025. Most of these changes are based on my decision to apply greater selectivity to the content I publish here. This means I will probably publish fewer posts in 2025 than in previous years.

Since 2023, I've published three types of posts here - research round-ups, book reviews, and general information/opinion posts. Here's what I'm planning for each of these types of posts in 2025.

Research Round-Ups

These posts typically include brief descriptions of two to four research studies. In 2024, my three most popular posts were research round-ups.

Most of the generally available research about B2B marketing consists of surveys of marketers. While this kind of research can be useful, research that focuses on the thinking and behaviors of business buyers is even more valuable.

This year, I'll be looking for surveys of business buyers, and I'll also be looking for studies based on research methodologies other than surveys, such as the study I discussed in my most popular post of 2024.

Book Reviews

I published eight book reviews in 2024, and while no book reviews made the 2024 "top 10" list, I believe books remain an important knowledge resource for marketers. I'll continue to publish book reviews this year, but I plan to be more selective when choosing books to review. Therefore, I'll probably publish fewer book reviews in 2025 than in 2024.

General Information/Opinion Posts

In January 2023, I published a post that made the following argument:

"Marketing success in 2023 and beyond will depend on marketers' ability to leverage the capabilities of technology and data science and to effectively apply the principles of behavioral science that describe how people make decisions. These two distinct, but complementary, abilities now constitute the yin and yang of high-performance marketing."

This argument is even more true today than it was two years ago. The smart use of artificial intelligence has the potential to drive remarkable gains in marketing productivity, but those gains won't be realized unless marketers also design and implement strategies that reflect how business buyers actually make purchase decisions.

I've published several posts discussing the cognitive aspects of B2B buying over the past few years, and I'll continue to address those topics in 2025.

Leveraging behavioral science principles in marketing is necessary, but some marketers believe more is needed. A relatively small but growing cadre of B2B marketers are arguing that the current paradigm of B2B marketing is out-of-step with how most B2B buying decisions are actually made.

These marketers contend that we need a fundamentally different approach to B2B marketing, one that is grounded in an accurate understanding of real-world market dynamics and buyer decision-making.

I largely agree with this point of view so I'll be discussing this topic in several posts over the next few months.

Here's to a year of successful marketing in 2025!

[Research Round-Up] New Insights on B2B Marketing and the World's Most Valuable Brands

 (This month's Research Round-Up features an overview of the latest "State of B2B Pipeline Growth" survey by Pipeline360 and Demand Metric and a discussion of Interbrand's 2024 ranking of the world's most valuable brands.)

H2 2024 State of B2B Pipeline Growth by Pipeline360 and Demand Metric

Source:  Pipeline360/Demand Metric

• Based on an online survey of 424 marketers with B2B (47%) and B2B/B2C (53%) companies in the United States (56%) and the United Kingdom (44%)
• 73% of the respondents were at the manager or director level, and 21% described their role as "CMO/head of marketing"
• 63% of the U.S. respondents were with companies having annual revenue of less than $250 million; 69% of the UK respondents were with companies having annual revenue of 200 million or less (British Pounds)
• The survey was conducted in July 2024

The objective of this study was to examine "the latest challenges, opportunities, and areas of interest that marketers are facing, including:  channel usage, sales and marketing alignment, generative AI usage, sales cycle length, and data privacy, all from a B2B perspective."

Here are some of the key findings from the survey.

Top challenges - The top three challenges identified by survey respondents were:

• Budget/headcount/resource cuts (48%)
• Economic slowdown (46%)
• Sales and marketing alignment (44%)

Marketing budget - 52% of the respondents said their 2024 marketing budget was slightly or significantly higher compared to 2023.

Marketing success - Over half (53%) of the respondents said they were meeting their goals for this year to a great or very great extent.

Sales/marketing alignment - 75% of the respondents said their sales and marketing teams were mostly or completely aligned, and 62% said the KPIs and/or objectives used by their sales and marketing teams significantly or completely overlap. Almost three-quarters (73%) of the respondents who reported complete sales and marketing alignment also said they were meeting their goals so far this year.

Generative AI - 85% of the survey respondents said they were using generative AI in one or more ways. The four uses most frequently identified by respondents were:

• To develop content (51%)
• To brainstorm new topics (45%)
• To personalize content (41%)
• To summarize meetings (41%)

This survey produced numerous other interesting findings, and I recommend you take a look at the full report.

Best Global Brands by Interbrand

Source:  Interbrand

Earlier this month, Interbrand, the global brand consultancy, published its 2024 ranking of the 100 most valuable global brands. Interbrand has been analyzing the value of large global brands for 25 years.

Interbrand's valuation methodology includes three key components.

• Financial Analysis - This component measures the economic profit of the brand. Economic profit is defined as the after-tax operating profit of the brand less a charge for the capital required to produce the brand's revenue and margin.

• Role of Brand - This component measures the portion of the purchase decision attributable to the brand as opposed to factors such as convenience, price, or product features.

• Brand Strength - This component measures the ability of the brand to earn customer loyalty and, therefore, create sustainable demand and profit in the future.

The five most valuable global brands in the 2024 Interbrand ranking were:

• Apple ($488.9 billion)
• Microsoft ($352.5 billion)
• Amazon ($298.1 billion)
• Google ($291.3 billion)
• Samsung ($100.8 billion)

In addition to the brand rankings, Interbrand's report includes several thought-provoking ideas regarding the role of brand as a driver of business growth. Interbrand noted that its research has shown that excessive reliance on short-term performance marketing tactics is detrimental to business growth. The report states:

"Utilizing our Best Global Brands data, we see that an increased focus on operational efficiency and short-term performance tactics over mid-term and long-term brand potential has cost the world's most valuable brands $3.5 trillion USD in cumulative brand value since we started our study. This equates to approximately $200 billion of lost revenue opportunity over the past 12 months."

Interbrand also argued that today's most successful companies take a fundamentally different approach to driving growth. Rather than finding customers for their products or services, they develop a deep understanding of customer needs and desires, and then build competencies to fulfill those needs and desires. Again, from the report:

"Now and next, the world's most successful companies start not with product, but with brand as their critical growth asset and engine. They use the utility and equity in their brand to drive exponential growth in new spaces, while continuing to capitalize on existing incremental sector gains."

Some of Interbrand's ideas are unconventional, and you may or may not agree with them or see their relevance for your business. Whatever the case, the Interbrand report will be a worthwhile read.

[Research Round-Up] Recent Studies Reveal the State of Revenue Operations

(This month's Research Round-Up discusses the major findings of two recent surveys addressing the current state of revenue operations. Revenue operations, a/k/a "RevOps," is a management system designed to align the activities of a company's customer-facing revenue teams to accelerate growth. The RevOps model has been gaining traction in B2B companies for several years, but it's still a relatively young management approach.)

Source:  Openprise

2024 State of RevOps Survey by Openprise in association with MarketingOps.com and the RevOps Co-op

• The survey produced 152 responses from operations professionals
• 47% of the respondents described their job role as "marketing operations," while 40% said "revenue operations"
• 37% of the respondents were at the "manager/senior professional" level, and 30% were at the "director" level
• Respondents were drawn from over 11 industry verticals; 44% were affiliated with information technology companies
• 47% of the respondents were affiliated with B2B companies, and another 19% worked at hybrid B2B/B2C companies
• 38% of the respondents were with companies having 100-499 employees, and 21% were with companies having 500-999 employees
• The survey report does not indicate when the survey was fielded

This survey explored a wide range of issues relating to revenue operations. Regarding RevOps implementation, 35% of the survey respondents said their company had a formal RevOps department, and 32.5% said their company had a functional RevOps team but not a formal department.

An overwhelming majority (89%) of the revenue operations survey respondents said their RevOps team supported all three of their company's go-to-market teams - marketing, sales, and customer success.

There was less agreement on who the RevOps team reported to. Forty-one percent of the revenue operations survey respondents said they reported to the chief revenue officer, while 21% said the chief financial officer, and 10% said the chief operations officer.

One particularly interesting finding in this survey was that organizations with formal RevOps departments did not experience better alignment among go-to-market teams than the overall average. This finding suggests that having a formal RevOps department won't in itself produce better alignment among revenue teams.

The Openprise survey also produced several interesting findings on other topics related to revenue operations, including how companies are managing data and technology and what skills are in high demand.

Source:  Revenue Operations Alliance

State of Revenue Operations Report 2023 by the Revenue Operations Alliance

• A survey of revenue operations professionals from all seniority and experience levels
• The survey report does not indicate how many responses the survey produced or when the survey was fielded
• Three-fourths (74.3%) of the survey respondents were drawn from two industries - software and technology information (53.6%) and technology and services (20.7%)
• Almost two-thirds (65.9%) of the respondents worked in North America, followed by 28% in the UK and Europe

Like the Openprise research, this survey provides data on a wide range of topics relating to revenue operations.

Six in ten (59.8%) of the organizations represented in the survey have only had a revenue operations function for 1-2 years, and nine in ten (90.3%) have had a revenue operations function for less than five years.

When survey participants were asked to identify the main activities they are responsible for, the top three activities selected were:

• Metrics and KPIs (89%)
• Pipeline strategy (81.7%)
• Tech stack management (79.3%)

Go-to-market strategy was a strong fourth at 78%.

When survey participants were asked which of their activities made the most business impact, the order changed slightly. the top three selections were:

• Metrics and KPIs (65.9%)
• Go-to-market strategy (51.2%)
• Pipeline strategy (43.9%)

Here are some of the other headline findings from the survey.

• Recurring revenue was the metric most frequently used by survey respondents to measure the success of their activities.

• 41.4% of the respondents said their RevOps team consisted of 2-4 individuals, and another 22% said they were the only person working in the revenue operations function.

• Four in ten (40.2%) of the respondents said their RevOps function has no dedicated budget allocation.

• Among the respondents with a dedicated budget, four in five (81.6%) said their budget is mostly spent on software.

• Three in ten (30.4%) of the respondents said they report to their company's chief revenue officer, and 25.6% said they report to their company's CEO.

This survey also produced findings regarding the value and influence of the RevOps function and the skills needed to be successful in revenue operations.

[Research Round-Up] Salesforce Survey Examines the State of Marketing

Source:  Salesforce

(This month's Research Round-Up focuses exclusively on the latest edition of the State of Marketing survey by Salesforce. The new Salesforce survey is a large global survey of B2B and B2C marketers, so it provides a broad perspective on the priorities, challenges, and attitudes of the marketing community.)

Salesforce recently published the findings of its latest State of Marketing survey. The latest survey is the ninth edition of the Salesforce research. It was in the field February 5 - March 12, 2024.

Survey Demographics

• The survey produced 4,850 responses from marketing decision-makers
• Respondents were drawn from 30 countries across North America, Latin America, Asia-Pacific, and Europe
• Respondents worked in 18 industry verticals
• 50% of the respondents worked in B2C companies, and 50% worked in B2B or B2B2C companies
• 39% of the respondents were VP-level or above
• 50% of the respondents were with mid-market companies (101 - 3,500 employees), 30% were with small and medium-sized companies (1 - 100 employees), and 20% were with large enterprises (over 3,500 employees)

Marketing Performance Levels

Salesforce classified survey respondents based on their self-reported level of marketing performance and used these categories to report some survey findings. The three categories used in the survey report are:

• High performers - Respondents who were completely satisfied with the overall outcomes of their marketing investments.

• Moderate performers - Respondents who were highly satisfied with the overall outcomes of their marketing investments.

• Underperformers - Respondents who were moderately or less satisfied with the overall outcomes of their marketing investments.

Marketers' Top Priorities and Challenges

Salesforce asked survey participants to identify their top priorities and biggest challenges, and the following table shows how respondents answered those questions.

It shouldn't be surprising that survey respondents identified "implementing or leveraging AI" as their top priority and their biggest challenge. Artificial intelligence, particularly generative AI, has been the hottest topic in marketing since OpenAI released ChatGPT in late 2022.

It's also notable, but not surprising, that the top priorities and the biggest challenges are nearly identical. These survey respondents clearly believe that for marketing to have the greatest possible impact on the business, they must successfully address their biggest challenges.

The State of AI

The survey revealed that the implementation of AI is still in its early stages. Thirty-two percent of all respondents said they have fully implemented AI in their operations.

Salesforce did find that high performers were 2.5x more likely than underperformers to have fully implemented AI. Forty-two percent of high performers said they have fully implemented AI, compared to only 17% of underperformers.

The survey also asked participants how they were using or planned to use AI, and the top five use cases identified by respondents were:

1. Automating customer interactions
2. Generating content
3. Analyzing performance
4. Automating data integration
5. Driving best offers in real time

While marketers are excited about the potential benefits of AI, they also have concerns about embracing the technology, particularly generative AI. The top five concerns about generative AI identified by survey respondents were:

1. Data exposure or leakage
2. Lack of necessary data
3. Lack of strategy or use cases
4. Inaccurate outputs
5. Copyright or intellectual property concerns

The State of  Marketing survey also provides valuable data on several other topics, including:

• The strategies and sources marketers are using to collect customer data
• Where and how much marketers are using personalization in their marketing programs
• How marketers are measuring marketing performance

The Salesforce State of Marketing survey is one of the research studies I pay attention to every year. I wish Salesforce provided a breakdown of responses between B2B vs. B2C companies and by country (or at least region), but even without this more granular reporting, the survey still provides important insights.

[Research Round-Up] Generative AI Has a Substantial Impact on Creative Jobs

Source:  Shutterstock

(This year, I'm devoting some of my Research Round-Up posts to a discussion of academic research papers relating to the use of artificial intelligence - specifically generative AI applications - in marketing. This post features an unpublished paper that provides an early look at the impact generative AI may have on marketing employment.)

The potential impact of generative artificial intelligence on the number of marketing jobs has been vigorously discussed in marketing circles since the public debut of ChatGPT in November 2022.

Some marketing thought leaders have argued that the capabilities of generative AI applications are advancing so rapidly that it's almost inevitable some marketing jobs will be eliminated.

Other commentators maintain that AI applications cannot possess the emotional intelligence required to create marketing content that will be effective with potential buyers, and therefore human marketers will always be needed.

One of my go-to resources for anything relating to artificial intelligence is Christopher Penn, the co-founder and chief data scientist at Trust Insights. Penn says that some companies will see the improved productivity created by AI as an opportunity to reduce costs, and they will eliminate marketing jobs that become "unnecessary." Other companies will view the increased productivity as an opportunity to expand the capabilities of their marketing function, and they will have their human marketers take on new tasks.

The reality is that it's impossible to know with certainty what impact AI will have on the overall number of marketing jobs. However, a recent paper by three academic researchers provides an early indication of what the impact of AI might look like.

Here are the paper's details:

• Title - "Who Is AI Replacing? The Impact of Generative AI on Online Freelancing Platforms" 

• Authors - Ozge Demirci, Harvard Business School; Jonas Hannane, German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin) and Technische Universitat Berlin; and Xinrong Zhu, Imperial College London Business School

• Date Written - October 15, 2023

Study Objectives and Methods

This paper describes the results of an analysis of job posts on a leading global online freelancing platform. The objective of the analysis was to identify the short-term impact of generative AI applications on the demand for freelance jobs in online labor markets.

The analysis included a total of 1,388,711 job posts that appeared on the freelancing platform from July 2021 to July 2023. So, the analysis period included approximately 17 months before, and about eight months after, the public release of ChatGPT.

The authors used a clustering algorithm to identify clusters of skills that frequently appeared together in job posts. Then they mapped each job post to the cluster with the greatest similarity in skills. This enabled the researchers to place the job posts in a manageable number of groups by type of job.

The authors focused their analysis on eight of the most prevalent types of jobs, which they grouped into three broad categories.

• Manual intensive jobs - those that require a large proportion of manual tasks

• Automation prone jobs - those involving tasks that are susceptible to digitalization or automation

• Image generating jobs - those that primarily involve the creation of visual content and 3D models

The final breakdown of jobs included in the analysis was:

• Manual intensive jobs
• Data and office management
• Video Services
• Audio services

• Automation prone jobs
• Writing
• Software, app, and web development
• Engineering

• Image generating jobs
• Graphic design
• 3D modeling

Writing and graphic design jobs are primarily marketing jobs, and the analysis revealed that generative AI applications had a substantial impact on the demand for those jobs.

The researchers found that the demand for writing jobs decreased by 30.37% more than the demand for manual intensive jobs within eight months after the public release of ChatGPT. The analysis also revealed that the release of AI text-to-image generators (such as Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, and DALL-E) led to an 18.49% decrease in the number of job posts for graphic design services, relative to manual intensive jobs.

Caveat

This paper provides an interesting perspective regarding the potential impact of generative AI applications on marketing employment, but I would be surprised if the findings described in the paper extend much beyond the freelance market.

I tend to agree with Christopher Penn that some companies will take advantage of generative AI efficiencies to cut costs, while others will use generative AI as a lever of growth.

[Research Round-Up] Insights From "The CMO Survey" and Nielsen's Annual Marketing Report

(This month's Research Round-Up discusses some of the major findings found in the Spring 2024 edition of "The CMO Survey" and a set of interesting perspectives from the "2024 Annual Marketing Report" by Nielsen.)

Source:  Christine Moorman

Spring 2024 edition of "The CMO Survey"

• A survey of 292 marketing leaders at U.S. for-profit companies
• 94% of the respondents were VP-level or above
• 62% of the respondents were with B2B companies
• Survey was in the field February 6 - March 5, 2024

"The CMO Survey" is a semi-annual survey of senior marketing leaders that has been conducted since 2008. The survey is directed by Dr. Christine Moorman and is sponsored by Deloitte LLP, Duke University's Fuqua School of Business, and the American Marketing Association.

For several years, each edition of the survey has asked participants about overall economic conditions, current marketing spending patterns, and future spending expectations. Here are some of the major findings on those topics from the Spring 2024 survey.

Economic Outlook

The survey asked participants to rate their optimism regarding the overall U.S. economy on a 100-point scale, with "0" being the least optimistic and "100" being the most optimistic. The mean rating given by respondents was 67, up from 58.3 in the March 2023 survey edition.

The survey also asked if participants were more or less optimistic about the U.S. economy compared to the previous quarter, and 43.7% of the respondents reported being more optimistic. That was up from 30.1% in the March 2023 edition of the survey.

Marketing Spending

Respondents reported that marketing spending represented 10.1% of total company revenue, which was down slightly from 10.9% in the March 2023 survey.

Respondents also said that marketing spending increased 2.5% during the 12 months preceding the survey, and they expect marketing spending will increase 4.7% during the 12 months following the survey. In the March 2023 survey, respondents expected marketing spending to grow 5.7% during the following 12 months, which shows that forward-looking expectations aren't always accurate.

The relative change in spending on digital marketing vs. traditional advertising remains significant. In the Spring 2024 survey, respondents reported that spending on digital marketing grew 8.9% over the 12 months preceding the survey. In contrast, respondents said they expect spending on traditional advertising to decrease by 2.1% over the 12 months following the survey.

Use of Marketing Technology

The Spring 2024 survey included several questions relating to marketing technology. One of these questions produced a result that is difficult to understand or explain. Nearly a fourth (24.7%) of the respondents said their company is not using marketing technology systems.

Scott Brinker (a/k/a chiefmartec) wrote that when he saw this result, "I fell out of my chair." He went on to write:  "So this is obviously false. If you have a website, you use marketing technology. If you have a database of your customers . . . you use marketing technology. If you create essentially any kind of content on a computer, you use marketing technology."

****

"The CMO Survey" consistently provides a wealth of valuable insights for B2B marketers, and I encourage you to read the full report.

Source:  Nielsen

"2024 Annual Marketing Report" by Nielsen

• Based on a survey of 1,514 global marketing professionals
• Respondents were brand marketers at or above manager level
• Respondents worked with annual marketing budgets of $1 million or more
• Survey was conducted December 5 - 21, 2023

This report takes an interesting approach. It describes the survey results, but the report's authors also point out several issues with the prevailing sentiments expressed by the survey respondents.

The report identifies four major themes based on the survey findings.

Advertising Spending

Seventy-four percent (74%) of the respondents expect their ad budget to increase this year, and on average, they expect to allocate more than 63% of their budget to digital channels. The survey results also show that a majority of the respondents perceive that digital channels are extremely or very effective.

The report's authors note that the effectiveness of any given channel varies significantly across brands. Therefore, what's effective for one brand might not work as well for another.

Marketing Misalignment

Seventy percent (70%) of the respondents said they plan to increase spending on performance marketing and decrease spending on brand building.

The report's authors note that marketers' most important KPIs are long-term ROI and full-funnel ROI and that a shift toward performance marketing (and away from brand building) won't fully support those goals.

Media Balance

The third theme in the report addresses the performance marketing vs. brand building issue from a media selection perspective. The report's authors note that globally, only 36% of marketing channels perform above average for delivering both sales and brand building. They also contend that using multiple, diverse channels improves campaign reach.

Measuring Performance

On average, 84% of the survey respondents said they are either extremely or very confident in their ROI measurement capabilities, but only 38% said they evaluate the ROI of their marketing efforts holistically by measuring traditional and digital media spending together.

The report's authors argue that holistic measures of marketing ROI are necessary to avoid blind spots that can result in an inaccurate picture of the true impact of a brand's total marketing efforts.

[Research Round-Up] The Latest From NetLine On B2B Content Consumption

(This Research Round-Up discusses the 2024 B2B content consumption report from NetLine Corporation. NetLine publishes this report annually, and it consistently provides a wealth of real-world insights about how business professionals actually consume marketing content.)

Source:  NetLine Corporation

Virtually all B2B companies are now using content marketing in several forms, and therefore understanding how business professionals consume content is now critical to marketing success. The 2024 State of B2B Content Consumption & Demand Report by NetLine Corporation provides valuable insights on this vital issue.

NetLine operates a content syndication platform, and this report is based on data from 6.2 million content registrations on the platform in 2023. The NetLine research is particularly valuable for two reasons.

First, it captures the real-world consumption behaviors of business professionals. The data used for the report was not derived from surveys or interviews but from actual engagements with B2B content.

And second, the report is based on first-party data. The business professionals who use the NetLine platform voluntarily share information about themselves and the organizations they work for in exchange for access to the content resources available on the platform.

For these reasons, the report contains a wealth of detailed information about content consumption behaviors, and I encourage you to review the full 38-page report.

Here are a few highlights from the report.

Content Consumption Continues Rising

As measured by registrations on the NetLine platform, overall B2B content consumption in 2023 increased by 14.3% compared to 2022 levels. NetLine's data shows that the total demand for B2B content has grown by 77% since the 2019 edition of the research. Content consumption by C-level executives is also still on the rise, growing by 7% year-over-year.

It's not surprising that demand for content about artificial intelligence exploded in 2023. The consumption of content relating to AI by NetLine registrants increased 5.5x year-over-year, and NetLine expects demand for AI content in 2024 will increase 1.9x over last year.

Most Popular Content Formats

The ten most requested content formats in 2023 were:

1. eBooks
2. Guides
3. Cheat Sheets
4. White Papers
5. Research Reports
6. Tips & Tricks Guides
7. Articles
8. Book Summaries
9. On-Demand Webinars
10. Live Webinars 

Collectively, these ten content formats accounted for 87% of all content registrations last year, and eBooks alone were 39.5% of total registrations. 

The Consumption Gap Widens

One of the more useful insights provided by the report relates to the consumption gap, which NetLine defines as the time between the moment content is requested and the moment it's opened for consumption. This data point is important because it provides a guide for timing follow-up contacts with potential buyers. After all, it makes little sense to contact a potential buyer about a content resource before he or she has reviewed the content.

In 2023, the average consumption gap was 31.2 hours, up from 28.7 hours in 2022. The consumption gap has varied over the past several years. The largest gap ever recorded by NetLine was 33.3 hours in 2021, while the smallest was 27.1 hours in 2018. The lesson here is that you should wait at least two days before you try to follow up with people who have viewed, listened to, or downloaded your content.

Content Consumption and Buyer Intent

For the past few years, NetLine's research has suggested that the content format a potential buyer chooses to consume is a good indicator of readiness to buy. In the latest analysis, NetLine identified six content formats that are more likely to be associated with a buying decision over the next year - playbooks, case studies, trend reports, analyst reports, white papers, and live webinars.

One format that is notably absent from this list is eBooks. Despite being the most frequently requested type of content last year, eBooks were not strongly associated with shorter-term purchase intention. This shouldn't be surprising because most eBooks are designed to appeal primarily to potential buyers who are in the early stages of the buying process.

*****

The NetLine report contains several other valuable findings, and I recommend you take the time to read the full report.

[Research Round-Up] New Study Shows the Continuing Value of B2B Thought Leadership

Source:  Edelman and LinkedIn

(This month's Research Round-Up discusses the sixth edition of the B2B thought leadership impact study by Edelman and LinkedIn. This research has consistently provided valuable insights about the impact of thought leadership content on the perceptions and behaviors of business decision-makers.)

Edelman and LinkedIn recently published the findings of their 2024 B2B thought leadership impact study. The study involved a survey of 3,484 business leaders (all LinkedIn members) from a wide range of industries and company sizes. The survey was conducted November 30 - December 14, 2023, and included respondents from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Singapore, Australia, and India.

The study defined "thought leadership" as "content that offers expertise, guidance or a unique point of view on a topic or in a field."

Some of the study results were reported by type of survey respondent. The three categories used in the study were: 

• B2B Decision-Makers - "Company executives who consume thought leadership and are involved in making final decisions on their company's choice of professional service providers or products."

• C-Suite Executives - "Company owners, partners and founders who consume thought leadership and who have complete or partial ownership of a company, or C-Suite-level executives with responsibility for a business function."

• Producers of Thought Leadership - "Managers (and higher) who both consume thought leadership and work for an organization that produces free thought leadership."

Here's a recap of some of the study's major findings.

As with previous editions of the study, the researchers asked survey participants about their consumption and overall view of thought leadership content.

• 52% of B2B Decision-Makers and 54% of C-Suite Executives said they spend (on average) an hour or more per week reading thought leadership content.

• 73% of B2B Decision-Makers said an organization's thought leadership content is more trustworthy than its other marketing materials for assessing the organization's capabilities and competencies.

• 48% of B2B Decision-Makers said the overall quality of the thought leadership content they read is good, but only 15% said it is very good or excellent.

Thought Leadership and Out-of-Market Buyers

A major theme of this study is the value of using thought leadership to engage potential buyers who aren't ready to buy. Findings in the 2024 study indicate that good thought leadership content can stimulate demand among out-of-market buyers by prompting them to rethink their status quo.

For example, more than 75% of B2B Decision-Makers and C-Suite Executives said thought leadership content had led them to research a product or service they hadn't previously considered, and of these respondents, 60% said thought leadership content had made them realize their organization could be missing out on a significant business opportunity.

The study also addressed the importance of providing thought leadership content to existing customers. The survey found that good thought leadership content (from a competitor) can lead many B2B buyers to question whether they should continue working with an existing supplier and realize that other suppliers had a better understanding of their challenges.

What Drives the Quality of Thought Leadership

The Edelman/LinkedIn study also asked participants about the attributes of effective thought leadership content.

Sixty-two percent of B2B Decision-Makers said that average or above average thought leadership content is produced or written by prominent or well-respected experts, and 66% said it has a unique format or style that makes it stand apart from other thought leadership content.

B2B Decision-Makers also identified three other attributes that characterize the highest quality thought leadership.

• 55% said it is supported by strong research and data

• 44% said it helps them better understand the challenges and opportunities their business is facing

• 43% said it includes concrete guidance and case studies

The Takeaway

Like its predecessors, the 2024 Edelman/LinkedIn B2B thought leadership impact study provides marketers important insights into the impact of thought leadership on the perceptions and behaviors of B2B buyers. It also confirms the continuing power and value of authoritative and well-crafted thought leadership content.

[Research Round-Up] The Effectiveness of AI-Generated Images for Marketing

Source:  Shutterstock

(This year, I'm devoting some of my Research Round-Up posts to academic research papers relating to the use of artificial intelligence for marketing purposes. This post features an unpublished paper that compares the performance of AI-generated vs. human-made images across three marketing use cases.)

"The power of generative marketing:  Can generative AI reach human-level visual marketing content?"

• Authors - Jochen Hartmann and Yannick Exner, Technical University of Munich; Samuel Domdey, Technical University of Hamburg-Harburg

• Date Written - July 12. 2023

This paper describes the results of three studies designed to evaluate the performance of AI-generated vs. human-made images used for marketing purposes. Specifically, the studies evaluated image performance across three dimensions relevant to marketing.

• Human perception of image quality and realism
• Social media engagement
• Click-through rates of banner ads

The studies used AI-generated images created with 13 text-to-image diffusion models, including DALL-E2, Jasper, Midjourney v4, and several versions of Stable Diffusion. Altogether, these studies collected more than 17,000 human evaluations of over 1,500 AI-generated images.

All of the AI-generated images in these studies were created using a two-step process. In the first step, the researchers employed an image-to-text AI model to create a textual description of each human-made comparison image. These textual descriptions were then used (without modification) as the prompts to produce the AI-generated images.

Here are abbreviated descriptions of the three studies and the high-level results of each study.

Study 1 - Human Perception of Quality and Realism

The objective of this study was to compare the perceived quality and realism of AI-generated vs. human-made images across three marketing use cases - product design, social media, and print ads. 

Each image was rated by five human evaluators for quality and realism using a 7-point Likert scale (1 = low, 7 = high), resulting in a total of 7,830 ratings.

The ratings for quality and realism varied depending on the specific image being evaluated and on the model used to create the AI-generated image. Overall, however, the study revealed that the AI-generated images outperformed or were on par with the human-made images in the product design and social media use cases.

In the print ad use case, the AI-generated images were significantly less likely to perform on par with the human-made images in terms of perceived quality and realism.

Again, the ratings varied significantly depending on the model used to create the AI-generated image. So, the choice of model matters.

Study 2 - Social Media Engagement

This study's objective was to compare the ability of AI-generated images vs. a human-made image to produce engagement in a social media setting. In this study, engagement referred to the "likelihood to like" an image and the "likelihood to comment" on an image.

This study included one human-made image and 13 AI-generated images. The researchers recruited 701 participants who were randomly assigned to one of the 14 images. Each participant was asked to rate how likely they were to like or comment on an image using a 7-point Likert scale (1=low, 7=high).

The results of this study showed that the AI-generated images generally performed on par with the human-made image in terms of social media engagement.

Study 3 - Click-Through Rates On Banner Ads

The objective of this study was to compare the effectiveness of AI-generated images vs. a human-made image when used in an online banner ad. The measure of effectiveness used was click-through rates (CTR).

This study was a randomized field experiment that consisted of a real-world online banner ad campaign run on a leading display advertising platform. The human-made image was a professional photo purchased from Adobe Stock. The campaign ran December 28-29, 2022, and generated 702 clicks on 86,809 impressions.

Of the 14 images tested, the human-made image ranked 10th in terms of CTR. The best-performing AI-generated image achieved a 21.5% higher CTR compared to the human-made image.

This study also demonstrated that model choice matters. The best-performing AI model (Stable Diffusion v1-3) outperformed the worst model (Disco Diffusion) by 65.5%.

My Take

The three studies described in the Hartmann et al. paper demonstrate that generative AI models can create visual content that is on par with - and often better than - human-made images for a variety of marketing use cases.

If anything, these studies probably underestimate the ability of generative AI models to produce human-level visual content. The prompts used to create the AI images for these studies were produced by an image-to-text AI model, and the researchers didn't modify those prompts. Prompts engineered by experienced marketers would likely have resulted in more effective AI images.

These studies also probably underestimate the quality of images generative AI models can currently produce because new, more capable versions of some of the models used in the studies have been released since the studies were conducted. For example, these studies used DALL-E2 and Midjourney v4, but DALL-E3 and Midjourney v6 are now available.

At minimum, the results of these studies suggest that AI-generated images are likely to play an increasingly important role in marketing.

[Research Round-Up] What CEOs Think of Marketing/CMOs and How Much Tech Buyers Trust Marketing

(This month's Research Round-Up features a study by Boathouse that reveals what CEOs actually think about marketing and CMOs, and a survey by Informa Tech that addresses how much trust B2B technology buyers actually place in marketing.)

The Third Annual CEO Study on Marketing and the CMO by Boathouse 

Source:  Boathouse

• Based on a survey of 150 CEOs at U.S. companies; 55% were with public companies, and 45% were with private companies
• Survey respondents were with companies having $250 million to more than $1 billion in annual revenue
• Survey respondents represented 17 industry sectors
• The survey was in the field September 9, 2023 - October 4, 2023

This survey explored the perspectives of U.S. CEOs regarding the performance of their marketing function and their CMO. It also addressed how CEOs view their job and the major issues they are facing.

Overall, this survey contains good news for CMOs and marketers. On most points, the survey found that CEOs have a more favorable opinion of their marketing team and CMO than they did when earlier versions of the survey were conducted in 2022 and 2021.

To set the stage, the survey asked participants about the problems they want marketing to help them solve. The top five problems selected by respondents (from a list of 15) were:

1. "Create new customers, retain existing customers, and drive revenue growth" (52% of respondents)
2. "Drive sales and grow market share" (45%)
3. "Stay ahead, differentiate, grow faster than our competition" (44%)
4. "Improve our brand/reputation" (41%)
5. "Transform the company's narrative in the marketplace" (40%)

Nearly half (49%) of the surveyed CEOs rated the performance of their marketing function as Best in Class. That was up from 24% in the 2022 edition of the survey.

The latest survey also found that CEOs view their CMO more favorably. In the 2023 survey, 26% of the respondents gave their CMO a grade of "A" for the overall performance of their role. That was up from 16% in the 2022 survey.

Concerning artificial intelligence, over half (57%) of the surveyed CEOs in the 2023 survey gave their CMO a grade of "A" or "B" on their ability to integrate AI/machine learning into their marketing efforts.

Despite the high grades for overall performance, the latest Boathouse survey identified areas where CEOs aren't as pleased with CMO performance. For example, only 23% of the surveyed CEOs gave their CMO a grade of "A" on strategy, and the lowest number of "A" grades given to CMOs was on their "ability to drive company growth."

2023 Trust in Marketing Index:  How B2B marketers can fill the trust gap by Informa Tech

Source:  Informa Tech

• Based on a survey of 150 B2B technology buying decision-makers
• 68 of the respondents were at the C-level or executive level of seniority; 82 were at the director level
• Respondents were located in the United States and the United Kingdom
• The survey was conducted in the summer of 2023

The purpose of this research was to assess the level of trust that B2B technology buyers have in marketing and identify factors that will increase or reduce that level of trust. To quantify the level of trust, Informa Tech created a "Trust in Marketing Index."

The survey used to develop the index included five index questions with numerical values assigned to each potential answer. The researchers calculated the average score for each index question and then added the average scores together to create the overall index score.

The resulting index showed that B2B technology buyers' level of trust in marketing is at 61 on a scale of 1 to 100. So, while the level of trust isn't horrible, there is significant room for improvement.

Here are the five index questions and the key survey finding for each.

• "In general, how much do you trust the information marketers provide in B2B content?" - 62% of the survey respondents said they trust all or a majority of the content B2B marketers provide.

• "How often are you disappointed with the value of B2B gated content?" - 71% of the respondents said often or sometimes.

• "How much do you trust personalized content . . . from B2B marketers you've already shared your data with?" - 59% of the respondents said they trust all or a majority of such personalized content.

• "How good of a job are all B2B brands doing in general when targeting you with content and offers?" - 62% of the respondents said good or outstanding.

• "How good of a job are all B2B brands in general doing when it comes to sending content and offers at the right time?" - 64% of the respondents said good or outstanding.

The survey also identified several factors that increase or reduce buyer trust in marketing. For example, 85% of the respondents said high-quality B2B thought leadership content improves the perception of a brand. In contrast, 42% of the respondents said content that is too general reduces trust.