Stop talking marketing at the C-suite

One of the biggest problems in marketing? We love talking about... marketing. But the C-suite don't care about marketing speak. They care about business speak.

So here's an extremely practical, yet extremely underused guide to get out of that bin.

Stop doing this:

• Seeing the CFO as the enemy who only wants to reduce budgets

• Talking about top of funnel brand awareness as a marketing goal

• Trying to sell in the creative for brand platforms or advertising campaigns

• Allowing for subjectivity, including your own, what any one person likes is irrelevant

• Saying yes or no to suggestions based on current workload or even your expertise

• Obsessing over the inputs, trying (and failing) to explain marketing theory and practice

Start doing this:

• Seeing the CFO as the most powerful ally you can have in any boardroom

• Talking about future sales and projected bottom of funnel incremental growth

• Talking about creativity being the single biggest ROI multiplier within our control

• Championing objectivity, only what research has identified will work is relevant

• Putting suggestions on a priority list to be discussed at planning meets, as product teams do

• Obsessing over the outcomes, framing what marketing will deliver in business terms

A guest micro piece by Fractional CMO John Lyons.