Stop the CFO from Pillaging Your Marketing Budget

The days of Don Draper and Mad Men are gone. A profession that once revolved around big ideas, attractive models, and generating a buzz has transformed. It’s now about big data, predictive models, and generating a buck. Marketing departments no longer enjoy budget allocations that are based on a percentage of revenue or a certain level of market presence. As a marketer, you must now speak the language of your partners in sales, finance, and most importantly, the corner office: revenue. 

Leverage the How to Make Your Number in 2018  to access a revenue growth methodology to hit your number quarter after quarter, and year after year.

Download our SBI Magazine Special Issue: Revenue Attribution.

How to Fend Off Raids 

You are reporting marketing’s contribution to pipeline and revenue, but when times get tough, it’s your marketing budget that is raided first. Why? Because the high-level contribution numbers don’t quantify the elements of marketing at the individual touch-point level. When the CFO eyes line items, you have no grounds to determine whether or not budget cuts would impact marketing contribution. Cracking that code is the key to proving the effectiveness of marketing activities. 

Revenue attribution is the process of tracing each dollar of revenue back to the activity that originally sourced the revenue opportunity. The interactions may include marketing touch-points such as trade shows, content assets, webinars, and podcasts. Understanding how all the touch-points collectively and individually help influence the booking of revenue enables you to show the impact of marketing efforts. Of course, that’s easier said than done. 

Why It’s Imperative to Embrace Data-Driven Marketing Realities 

Data has both empowered and crippled marketers at the same time. Data-driven marketing has become an imperative. It’s here, and it’s real. If you have not jumped aboard, be prepared to see your marketing budget shrink year over year.

By harnessing the power of data to measure revenue attribution, you can prove the value of the marketing spend—and demonstrate how investments in marketing spur revenue growth. 

Would you like a hand with revenue attribution to make marketing more scientific? Plan a workshop with the SBI team of marketing experts in Dallas at , SBI’s multimillion-dollar, one-of-a-kind, state-of-the art, executive briefing center. The immersive sessions accelerate your adoption of revenue attribution and put you on the right path with a solution and implementation plan.