Why Your Marketing Team Needs a Strategic CFO
Why Your Marketing Team Needs a Strategic CFO
Your marketing team are the people that get your product or service in front of your ideal clientele. The success of your strategy depends on them. An excellent marketing team will get your product or service to market. They’ll carve out the niche for your product and show why its USP makes it an industry leader. Your marketing team bridge the gap between your company and customer.
It’s too easy to think that your marketing team works within a world of their own. A successful marketing team works in partnership with your finance department. These two teams should work in unison with each other. The most important leadership role within this is a strategic CFO. They’ll create a financial strategy and analysis that guides the marketing team in the right direction.
If you’re a new product or service to market, you might think it all falls on your marketing team to make it a success. Not having a strategic CFO on your team could prove to be your Achilles’ heel.
Whether it’s a fractional, interim, or full-time CFO, their skills are crucial to help you create a strategy that will make your business a success. At FD Capital, we connect businesses with highly skilled CFOs that can take their marketing strategy to the next level.
What feeds into your marketing strategy?
You need a strategy to take a product or service to market. It starts by identifying what problem you’re providing a solution for or the purpose of your product.
This go-to market strategy is about creating a roadmap that allows you to measure the success of your launch. It will allow you to analyse the viability of your product or service and predict its expected performance at market using data and other market research.
When you’re bringing together your go-to market team, you need to cover three areas. Marketing, sales, and product development.
Your marketing strategy should start by identifying your market position and the demographic of your customer. This analysis should deep dive into consumer behaviour to help you create an effective product messaging. You want to build on your existing online presence to optimise your digital ads and use SEO tactics to build brand awareness and drive organic traffic.
The sales aspect of your strategy should focus on analysing the sales cycle to optimise the sales funnel that you use to boost conversion rates. A successful sales strategy will reduce your customer acquisition costs through effective marketing.
The third pillar is your product itself. Your strategy should involve reviewing your product’s development for any final improvements before launch. A member of your product team should be working closely with your marketing team to create a customer support plan.
Most start-ups and SMEs will have their founder leading the go-to market team. However, this isn’t always possible. A founder and CEO isn’t always able to have a hands-on approach to the go-to market strategy. That’s where a strategic CFO can help.
The role of a strategic CFO in your go-to market team
As you start to grow your c-suite team, a CFO is one of the first appointments you should make. A strategic CFO will have skills that vary from e-commerce to auditing and financial strategy. If you’re a start-up, hiring an interim or fractional CFO can allow you to benefit from their industry-specific experience to feed into your go-to market strategy. You might be interested in: How the UK Fractional CFO Market is growing?
A CFO will be able to identify potential financial mishaps in your strategy, including unnecessary spending. They’ll work to build a relationship across your organisation, including with your marketing team, to deliver a cohesive and effective strategy.
In 2022, you need someone on your leadership team who understand SEO and e-commerce. These are skills most CFOs have in their portfolio and can allow them to further enhance your marketing strategy. CFOs offer a fresh set of eyes to marketing by feeding in a financial analysis into your strategy.
The data you need for a successful launch
Data is everything in the 21st century. Without it, you’re going in with your eyes closed. Your CFO is involved with more than just finance and oversight of your business. They play an important strategic role in gathering, curating, and analysing the data your business needs to create an effective go-to market strategy.
This approach is why your marketing team should work closely with a CFO. While your marketing team knows your customer and demographic, your CFO can take a results-based approach that focuses on the data. Some of the most successful companies in the world – such as Mastercard – have appointed CFOs to their marketing teams to create a cohesive strategy.
A strategic CFO can also feed into your marketing strategy by giving you a way of measuring its success, creating KPIs to track growth and overseeing the financing needed to give your product a successful launch. Your CFO can also identify areas for potential cost savings and provide financial forecasting based on your marketing strategy. Many of our CFOs are ICAEW qualified. You might be interested in: How to get your first CFO Position – with the help of FD Capital.
A data-driven CFO can give your marketing team an advantage over your competition. Without these financial metrics and insight, it can be difficult to paint a full picture for your go-to market team to succeed. If you are considering headhunting a CFO, then why not talk with the FD Capital Recruitment team today, we are a specialist FD and CFO boutique.
How your CFO and making team can work together
While finance and marketing may seem worlds apart, they need to work in unison to succeed. A strategic CFO is invaluable to your go-to market strategy.
If your marketing and finance teams work together you can choose the best price for your profit margins, create financial forecasts that identify growth opportunities, and develop a financial strategy that allows your marketing team to optimise their budget and recourses.
The best way to guarantee the optimum revenue from your launch is by having a CFO work in unison with your marketing team. Your CFO may be appointed on a part-time or interim basis to suit your company’s finances and strategic needs.
One of the best investments you can make for your company is to hire a CFO. They’re crucial to the success of your go-to market strategy and can be the missing piece of your puzzle. Are you interested in hiring a CFO? Contact FD Capital today for a no-obligation consultation.
Adrian Lawrence FCA with over 25 years of experience as a finance leader and a Chartered Accountant, BSc graduate from Queen Mary College, University of London.
I help my clients achieve their growth and success goals by delivering value and results in areas such as Financial Modelling, Finance Raising, M&A, Due Diligence, cash flow management, and reporting. I am passionate about supporting SMEs and entrepreneurs with reliable and professional Chief Financial Officer or Finance Director services.
