Tracy Wehringer and Tenisha Griggs | Fractional CMOs & The 90-Day Win
This video is a podcast interview with Tracy Wehringer and Tenisha Griggs discussing the role and strategies of fractional Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs) in achieving significant business wins within the first 90 days of engagement.
Conclusion
Fractional CMOs focus on assessing data and resources, ensuring strategic alignment, and achieving early wins to build momentum. They emphasize the importance of understanding the company’s goals, addressing departmental silos, and developing a comprehensive marketing strategy tailored to the specific needs and goals of the company.
Key points
🔍 Initial Assessment: Conducting a thorough evaluation of the company’s marketing and sales data to identify key problem areas.
📊 Resource Allocation: Assessing marketing resources and identifying redundancies or gaps in roles and responsibilities.
🗣️ Strategic Vision: Ensuring a clear and strategic vision for the company to align marketing efforts effectively.
📈 Early Wins: Identifying and implementing early wins, such as optimizing marketing processes and aligning with customer needs, to build credibility and momentum.
💡 Customer Insights: Conducting customer research to understand their needs and preferences, which helps in tailoring marketing strategies.
🤝 Silo Breakdown: Addressing departmental silos to ensure a unified approach to marketing and customer needs.
🚀 Execution and Resources: Ensuring that marketing plans are realistic and executable with the available resources.
👥 Stakeholder Engagement: Engaging key stakeholders early on to ensure alignment with the company’s vision and strategy.
🧠 Marketing Education: Educating clients on the complexity of marketing and setting realistic expectations regarding timelines and outcomes.
📋 Long-term Objectives: Developing a comprehensive marketing strategy that includes both short-term and long-term goals.
Summary
- Introduction: The podcast introduces the topic of fractional CMOs and their impact within the first 90 days.
- Tracy’s Background: Tracy discusses her extensive experience in marketing, focusing on strategy and numbers to drive revenue growth.
- Initial Challenges: Tracy highlights the importance of understanding data from marketing and sales perspectives and assessing marketing resources.
- Data Trust: Tracy emphasizes the importance of having trustworthy data and understanding marketing attribution to revenue.
- Tanisha’s Background: Tanisha shares her experience in marketing and sales, focusing on the importance of having a clear strategic vision and alignment within the executive leadership team.
- Early Wins: Both guests discuss the importance of establishing a clear go-to-market plan and marketing roadmap to achieve early wins.
- Alignment with Sales: Tracy highlights the need for alignment between sales and marketing goals to ensure a unified approach to revenue generation.
- Understanding ICP: Both guests emphasize the importance of defining and continuously refining the ideal customer profile (ICP) to ensure marketing efforts are targeted effectively.
- Maximizing Value: Tanisha discusses the importance of integrating the CMO into other areas of the business to maximize their value and ensure alignment with business goals.
- 90-Day Plan: Tracy highlights the importance of creating a 90-day plan with realistic milestones and goals to guide the CMO’s efforts and ensure accountability.
Quotes
- 00:28: “There’s so much variety, it’s valuable to just listen to what opportunities they look for and what they tackle first.” – Dean Waye
- 01:02: “I dive deep into the numbers to really understand prior history and what the future growth looks like.” – Tracy Wehringer
- 01:45: “Understanding their data from a marketing and sales lens is crucial.” – Tracy Wehringer
- 02:35: “Is there trust in data right now? Does the CEO trust the reporting they are looking at?” – Tracy Wehringer
- 03:10: “Looking at the velocity of awareness all the way through to closed won, there are specific areas of latency.” – Tracy Wehringer
- 04:00: “I want to make sure we all have a compass that we are working towards.” – Tenisha Griggs
- 04:35: “It’s really easy for startup brands to bring in a fractional CMO and expect metrics and KPIs to be hit without having a strategic vision.” – Tenisha Griggs
- 05:10: “I’m really in a learning mode that first 90 days.” – Tenisha Griggs
- 06:25: “From a fractional CMO standpoint, where is the true alignment with sales?” – Tracy Wehringer
- 07:20: “Many times, they haven’t done the right due diligence to understand who is the actual buyer.” – Tracy Wehringer
- 08:00: “Defining your ICP is not a one-time exercise. Over time, your product evolves, market dynamics change.” – Tenisha Griggs
- 09:10: “How do you get the most value out of your CMO? It’s about integrating them into other areas of the business.” – Tenisha Griggs
- 09:45: “Marketing has so much more value to add as a stakeholder to other parts of the business.” – Tenisha Griggs
- 10:35: “Customer retention became the new acquisition focus during the pandemic.” – Tenisha Griggs
- 11:20: “I’m a huge fan of a 90-day plan with short-term and long-term goals and wins.” – Tracy Wehringer
- 12:30: “A fractional CMO should have the underlying experience of different departments and how they really bring into marketing.” – Tracy Wehringer
- 13:10: “From acquisition to expansion, a fractional CMO should look holistically across all tech, resources, strategy, and data.” – Tracy Wehringer
- 14:10: “A red flag for me is if they haven’t fully baked their services or product offering.” – Tracy Wehringer
- 15:00: “You don’t want to hire a fractional CMO prematurely if you don’t have a strategic vision.” – Tenisha Griggs
- 16:30: “Identify what type of CMO you need for the stage in which your business is in.” – Tenisha Griggs