Key Takeaways From The CMO Compensation Report

The chief marketing officers (CMO’s) who receive the highest pay are those who have managed to advance and transform the performance of a company’s digital marketing strategies, Marketing Week reports.

A new survey, undertaken by the CMO Council and titled the “CMO Compensation Report” questioned 345 marketing professionals from around the world. The survey found that over 50% of marketing executives who managed to improve the “digital marketing and online customer engagement capabilities” of their company earned more than average, which was measured to be around $200,000.

Donovan Neale-May, the executive director of the CMO Council, noted that with the ever increasing popularity of digital, if a CMO wants to see an improvement made to their salary they should focus on improving the digital marketing capabilities of a business. In fact, big data was used by a number of the top CMO’s to help companies’ measure customer analytics and gain valuable insights into certain campaigns.

More than 60% of the CMO’s who introduced a way of measuring the performance of digital marketing strategies, using data to prove ROI on content, websites and campaigns, for example, earned more than the $200,000 average salary.

Networking with executives from other areas, such as chief finance officers and chief information officers, also meant CMO’s could expect a higher-than-average salary, with more than 52% of those who “formed an alliance” with such figures being amongst the highest paid.

An article in Forbes notes that CMO’s tend to make between $100,000 and $350,000 in base compensation, however these figures are directly related to the size of a business. In order to reach the highest salary possible, CMO’s need to focus on reforming the marketing strategies of a business and growing its digital capabilities.