The Evolution of the CMO: Why Brand is More Important Than Ever Before
I've been noticing something interesting in how companies are structuring their leadership teams. More and more, the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) role is quietly disappearing and being replaced by Chief Growth Officers (CGO) or Chief Revenue Officers (CRO).
This C-suite musical chairs isn't exactly surprising. Growth and revenue roles are seductive. They promise clear, quantifiable results, which are easier to justify to investors and boards.
You can point to a CRO's work and say, "Look, revenue increased 23% this quarter."
Meanwhile, CMOs are seen as ‘creative types’ who talk about brand awareness and emotional connection—metrics that are considerably harder to measure and even harder to defend when budgets are tight.
The blind spot is thinking the CMO is a soft marketing role
Your CMO is actually your chief brand strategist. Brand isn't nice-to-have marketing, it's the need-to-have identity that powers your marketing.
One wish I have is for everyone to know the following about what brand is:
It's deep competitive analysis—understanding not just who you're up against, but where to focus your energy and where to let others lead.
It's market positioning that goes beyond features to create meaningful differentiation in how customers think about their options.
It's customer strategy that identifies not just who buys from you, but who you're truly built to serve and why.
It's pricing strategy, product development priorities, partnership decisions, and distribution choices all filtered through a coherent point of view about what makes you different and valuable.
It's building messaging architecture that understands and drives behavior.
It's creating guidelines that aren't just visual rules but decision-making frameworks that keep everyone aligned on what you stand for and how you deliver on it.
So when companies eliminate the CMO role thinking they're just cutting marketing fluff, they're actually eliminating critical business strategy.
Take a look at companies that have nailed it: Wildfang isn’t just selling clothes; they’re challenging gender norms and empowering people to express themselves authentically. Cotopaxi isn’t just selling outdoor gear; they’re building a movement around sustainability and global impact with their “Gear for Good” ethos. These are brands with values, purpose, and emotional weight.
A great CMO is asking the questions that matter most for long-term business success
What do we stand for beyond profit?
How do our customers actually experience us, not just buy from us?
What story are we telling, and is it true?
How do we show up when our values are tested?
What legacy are we building?
Who becomes possible because we exist?
Your competitors can copy your features, mimic your marketing, and match your prices. They can't copy the strategic choices that create your competitive advantage and staying power.
The research shows us how important this is. Companies that balance brand building with performance marketing consistently outperform those that don't. Neuroscience shows us that emotional engagement literally rewires how people make decisions. When someone feels something about your brand, they're not just buying your product, they're buying into your story.
The question isn't whether your company needs someone focused on growth. Of course it does.
The future belongs to leaders who understand that brand and growth aren't opposing forces, they're complementary ones.
Some companies are doing this through fractional CMO models that bring brand expertise without the full-time cost. Others are creating Chief Brand Officer roles—someone whose primary responsibility is brand stewardship and strategic alignment, separate from day-to-day marketing execution.
At Fearless Foundry, I wear both the CEO and CBO hats because we see brand as the heart of everything we do, with marketing strategy and creative execution as expressions of that brand. For me, brand leadership isn't separate from business leadership. It is business leadership.
The question is whether you can afford to grow without someone whose primary job is to ensure that growth builds something meaningful, something that lasts, something that matters, something that makes people feel.
In our rush to optimize everything, let's not optimize away the very thing that makes us human: our capacity to connect, to inspire, to belong to something bigger than a transaction.