For many B2B firms hiring a CMO is the final piece of the puzzle. It is not uncommon for many businesses to have a chief revenue officer heading up sales and marketing together rather than a dedicated marketing lead.
B2B asset management firm Waystone was one such business. After a period of rapid growth, as well as several mergers and acquisitions, the company has greatly expanded its offering from when it was founded 20 years ago.
The appointment of Jamie Moran as its first CMO in July, then, represents a shift for the business from growing via mergers and acquisitions to growing organically.
For many B2B firms hiring a CMO is the final piece of the puzzle. It is not uncommon for many businesses to have a chief revenue officer heading up sales and marketing together rather than a dedicated marketing lead.
B2B asset management firm Waystone was one such business. After a period of rapid growth, as well as several mergers and acquisitions, the company has greatly expanded its offering from when it was founded 20 years ago.
The appointment of Jamie Moran as its first CMO in July, then, represents a shift for the business from growing via mergers and acquisitions to growing organically.
“Driving organic growth through better selling to clients and prospects, as well as upselling to new clients and retaining them, is the next wave of growth for the company and that requires a new approach to marketing,” he tells Marketing Week.
Currently, the company grows by around 15% year on year, which has led to rapid changes within the business. For example, the number of staff has doubled from nearly 1,000 to 2,000 inside the last three years.
We’re professional marketers. We know marketing better than anyone else in this organisation.
Jamie Moran, Waystone
The plan is to build up its marketing function to meet those growth targets without being so dependent on M&A activity. With that in mind, he has a clear plan for what he wants to accomplish within his first few months as CMO.
“The first priority is to get back to the basics of ideal client profile, customer journey, overlaying the product marketing capabilities that we have with those opportunities in the market, and driving some quick demand,” he explains.
Morgan explains that since the business is shifting to a marketing-driven model of growth, Waystone required more strategic leadership to make decisions around what to focus on, as well as what not to focus on, hence the introduction of the CMO role.
This needs to come hand in hand, though, with increased investment in marketing from the business, which, historically, has “not been in line with the growth of the business”.
“The marketing team is focused on delivering outsized growth for the entire business,” he says. “And sometimes that means placing bets on certain horses rather than placing bets across the whole field.”‘Get everyone playing on the same team’: B2B CMOs and CFOs on improving alignment
The ‘sommelier’ approach
On the all-important topic of the relationship between marketing, finance and sales, Morgan points to something he describes as a ‘sommelier approach’.
He says it is not the job of marketing to respond to specific instructions, such as ‘I need a brochure’, but rather to look at what people need and make a tailored suggestion, in the same way that a sommelier would make suggestions based on the food ordered.
“What we need to do is take a step back and say, ‘What’s your objective? Who’s the customer? What’s the audience? What’s the challenge?’”
He continues: “We’re professional marketers. We know marketing better than anyone else in this organisation so it’s about understanding what those stakeholders need and then acting as a sommelier, not just a waiter.”
Part of this challenge means filling in those gaps of knowledge in other stakeholders, especially those in the C-suite, when it comes to marketing.
“The marketing tech stack is changing, the customer buyer journey changes every day, our competitors throughout the market are changing things all the time,” says Moran. “Our job is to provide that lens for them and say we know you need something, but let’s figure out what it is you really need.” Finance has three main dialects, not one uniform language
Measuring success
When it comes to measuring success, he believes it is a common challenge in many B2B marketing teams to find and track the metrics that matter.
“Success has always been incredibly subjective around things like events and are we getting enough noise in the market? Did a client come up and say they liked our last report?” he explains.
“The key objective for us is how do we support revenue growth? How do we drive top line? And there are just some super clear, tangible metrics that we can focus on to drive pipeline in the first instance, and then in the second instance, what people feel about our brand.”
This marketing team 1755844317 is really focused on delivering outsized growth for the entire business.
Jamie Moran, Waystone
To that end, Morgan believes he is not a “traditional CMO”.
“I didn’t study marketing, but I did join a marketing graduate training scheme [at mobile phone brand Orange] after university in the early noughties. They were growing so, so fast and they were amazing marketers — they had a really clear brand proposition, really strong offerings, great channel marketing, great pricing,” he says.
This start in a rapidly growing company gave him the opportunity to find his footing as a data-driven, growth marketer.
“It’s all about the numbers, it’s about size in the market. It’s about our share. How can we get to the next level? What makes the customer tick?”
Aside from the rapid growth expected, Morgan has big aspirations for how marketing is perceived at Waystone – and wider still.
“Ultimately, I’d like us to be seen as the number one marketing organisation in the finance business,” he concludes.
