Predictions 2021: CMO

The circumstances of 2020 brought to a head the quagmire that has been brewing for marketing leaders over the last five years: Chief marketing officers need to drive customer obsession at their firms, rather than just guiding ad buying and promotions. The harsh economic climate coming in 2021 will overwhelm foundering marketing technology, systems, and processes that have survived (way) too long behind a strong economy. We expect successful CMOs to create new commercial and delivery models to keep their companies solvent, all while embracing diversity to fuel creative ways to continually reacquire customers. In this report, we explore Forrester’s predictions for CMOs in 2021.