Leadership News, Features, and Interviews

At its most basic, innovation is the introduction of something new. And in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the process of innovating has flourished across Australian marketing and customer teams as they strive to keep up with the rapidly evolving crisis and its impact on customers, business models and market dynamics. CMO caught up with five marketing leaders from the 2019 CMO50 list of Australia’s most innovative and effective marketing leaders to find out more.

​It’s a process Maria Robinson has applied to every new role she’s held as a marketer since cutting her teeth in the dotcom era: The no-fly zone. And it’s one that’s particularly useful when you’re the first CMO appointed to a company like Nitro, looking to ride the rapid growth opportunity presented by COVID-19.

​Brand-led advertising is firmly on the agenda for the Allianz A/NZ team after the local business became a pilot market for the group’s global brand transformation.

McDonald’s Australia has appointed Chris Brown as VP and CMO for the iconic fast food business. With over 23 years’ experience leading creative and digital agencies in Australia and overseas, Chris will join the McDonald’s Australia senior leadership team, reporting directly to CEO, Andrew Gregory.

Every marketing leader is endeavouring to transform their marketing organisation to be more customer-led. But what does it really take to disrupt your approach to achieve success?Mastercard global CMO, Raja Rajamannar, has done just that, and he’s going to share his very valuable insights at this year’s CMO Momentum conference, reimagined as a virtual event and taking place 11-12 November 2020.

CMOs will need to drive customer obsession within their firms, rather than simply guiding ad procurement and promotions, according to Forrester’s 2021 prediction. This means marketing teams will need to put the customer at the center of everything they do, including leadership, strategy and operations.

Nick Adams’ remit upon joining Allianz as its marketing chief seems clear enough: Help drive growth, lift the insurance brand’s consumer business strength, and get the customer firmly on the agenda.

iSelect has promoted its chief marketing officer, Warren Hebard, to the top job after an external and internal executive search.

Creativity is about coming up with the ideas but data is the key to assessing if something is working,​ says Netflix co-founder and its first CEO, Marc Randolph.

With Australia entering the uncharted waters of a pandemic-driven recession, it is becoming harder and harder make predictions about future customer sentiment and behaviour. There are signals and trends, however, that are evident today which begin to describe likely scenarios and outcomes. So here are four factors marketers need to prepare for in the post-COVID recession.

CMO is delighted to confirm our unique conference for modern marketing leaders, CMO Momentum, will return in November as a fresh new and immersive online event.

The words ‘new normal’ have quickly emerged as the go-to phrase for describing the world created by the COVID-19 crisis and its impact on the economy and national psyche. But have we even reached the ‘new normal’ yet?

Cashrewards has appointed Steve Cuda as its new chief product and marketing officer. Cuda was most recently GM of digital, media and data at Woolies X, the supermarket’s digital, ecommerce, customer loyalty and customer services division.

Flexible work arrangements are here to stay, engagement and adaptability remain key priorities and nearly half of CEOs retain a more negative business outlook now than they did as the COVID-19 crisis hit, a fresh survey reports.

The companies winning the consumer race are the ones proactively engaging in digital transformation with aggressiveness, vigour, rigour and a commitment to continuous improvement.

ADMA has signed on as the first reseller for a regional version of the Thrive Global platform being provided under an exclusive agreement with Monash University.

An ambition to attach meaning to money through brave and purposeful brand work is the key to making an impact for Future Super’s chief marketing officer, Grace Palos. Here, she shares 9 elements key to the way the business builds out its brand strategy.

​Leadership resilience, startups scaling up, marketing best practices, customer insights - these are just a few of the topics we manage to explore in the latest episode of Conversations over a Cuppa with CMO featuring Craig Davis.

Nurturing SMEs through the COVID-19 crisis and recession using a combination of technology, customer insight and content are the cornerstones of growth for Employment Hero’s marketing director, Tasman Page.

Nearly half of Australian SMEs are looking to remove in-house marketing roles as a cost-reduction strategy and nearly one-third have shut down marketing all together, a new survey claims.

CMO asks four industry leaders to shake their crystal balls and share their thoughts about what the business landscape might look like as we make our way through the coronavirus pandemic. On the other side, how will things look?