7 Mistakes Marketing Leaders Make When Proving ROI to the C-Suite (and How to Avoid Them)

#28 - Few conversations are more high-stakes for a B2B marketing leader than proving ROI to the C-Suite. Nail it, and you win trust, credibility, and budget. Miss the mark, and you risk being seen as a cost center instead of a growth driver.

In this episode of Growth Activated, host Mandy Walker shares seven mistakes marketing leaders make when proving marketing ROI to executives — and exactly how to avoid them. Drawing on her experience leading teams from $1M to $750M in revenue, Mandy reveals the pitfalls that derail even seasoned CMOs and VPs, and how to reframe your ROI conversations to strengthen executive alignment and support.

You’ll learn how to:

• Avoid poor data hygiene that undermines marketing metrics and trust
• Give the right context before showing results to the C-Suite
• Define marketing attribution in a way Sales and Finance will stand behind
• Show ROI without pitting Marketing and Sales against each other
• Calculate ROI the way your CFO expects
• Move beyond vanity metrics to business outcomes
• Prove incrementality — the true lift your marketing delivers

Whether you’re a CMO, VP, or aspiring leader, this episode will help you master boardroom presentations and earn the credibility every marketing leader needs at the highest levels.

If you’re heading into planning season and want to strengthen your executive presence while building a marketing strategy that gets buy-in from the C-Suite, check out Mandy’s Lead Like a CMO program at growthactivated.com.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to Growth Activated & Episode Overview
• 1:47 Why Marketing ROI Conversations Fail
• 2:13 Marketing ROI Mistake #1: Poor Data Quality & Hygiene
• 4:33 Marketing ROI Mistake #2: Skipping Context Before Numbers
• 5:54 Marketing ROI Mistake #3: Unclear Marketing Attribution
• 7:11 Marketing ROI Mistake #4: Pitting Teams Against Each Other
• 8:55 Marketing ROI Mistake #5: Fuzzy Cost Calculations
• 10:22 Marketing ROI Mistake #6: Leading with Vanity Metrics
• 11:34 Marketing ROI Mistake #7: Ignoring Incrementality
• 14:22 Recap & Key Takeaways

Transcript

00:00 – Welcome & Episode Overview

Welcome to Growth Activated.  I'm Mandy Walker, your host with 15 years of experience leading marketing teams ranging from small startups to large service organizations.  I've built high performing teams of all sizes and have seen firsthand how fast the landscape is evolving,  making marketing leadership more complex than ever.  Today, I help marketing leaders elevate their strategies,  lead with confidence and build careers they love.

00:28
If you're ready to drive impact and unlock growth for yourself and your company, you're in the right place.  Let's get started.  Few conversations are more high stakes for a marketing leader than proving ROI to the C-suite. Nail it and you earn trust, credibility and budget. Miss the mark and you risk being seen as a cost center instead of a growth driver. And here's the thing, even experienced CMOs and VPs trip over the same pitfalls.

00:57 – Why Marketing ROI Conversations Fail

seen it in companies from 1 million in revenue all the way to 750 million in revenue. It's rarely because they don't have results. It's because of how they present them.  And so today I'm sharing seven mistakes to avoid when proving marketing ROI to the C-suite and exactly how to reframe the conversation. So you walk out of the boardroom with alignment, trust, and support. We'll talk about what to watch out for, how to prepare,

01:23 – Mistake #1: Poor Data Quality & Hygiene

And how to present in a way that makes the conversation about business impact, not defending marketing's existence. Let's get into it. Mistake number one that I've seen happen so many times  and frankly have even done it myself is poor data quality and hygiene. So if you're in your meeting presenting your data and metrics and some of your data and metrics are off, or you're arguing about the validity of the numbers, you've already lost the room and nothing else matters.

01:53
You've lost their trust and credibility for the numbers you've put in front of them. This could include anything from pulling data straight out of the CRM without checking for duplicate accounts or inconsistent fields. It could be that we classify certain customer wins or deal types, or frankly, even revenue different than the way finance does. And then the numbers don't match up. Or it could be that we've got different definitions between marketing and sales between

02:22
certain stages in the funnel.  And so when we say that we've booked X amount of meetings and sales says, no, we haven't even had that many meetings. What are you talking about? Um, we're not speaking the same language or, or leveraging the same definitions. Or it could even be lever leaning on manual data sources that, um, or fields that sales enters in. And when they see that we're using that source, they immediately jump in and say,

02:49
But hey, wait, we don't use that accurately or we don't believe in that data ourselves and therefore you shouldn't.  So it can come in a lot of different flavors, but ultimately this is probably the number one mistake I see happen  that is really hard to come back from, at least in that meeting, if not rebuilding credibility and beyond that meeting with the teams that were in that room with you. So just some quick tips in order to make sure this doesn't happen.

03:15
Of course, audit all of your data, look for duplicates, align with rev ops and finance and frankly your sales team and make sure we're all using  shared  definitions and looking at the true source of data that everyone should be referencing at the end of the day. And if needed also, I find it really helpful to create documented definitions as well as documented data sources  for each of the numbers that we're pulling that we all agree upon.

03:43 – Mistake #2: Skipping Context Before Numbers

so that in future meetings, if there's a question or a dispute, we can point right back to that documentation. And if we need to update the documentation based on new relevant data, we can do that without our credibility taking a hit. So one of the second mistakes I see often is that we skip providing context when we share the numbers. And so oftentimes marketing leaders will do a great job and they'll share what's increasing, what's decreasing.

04:10
Right. And even the timeframe in which that that is happening. But so often I find I have to dig deeper with my leaders  or with my business peers  in terms of  the why behind the what. So why are those numbers decreasing? Why are they increasing? Is it due to seasonality? Is it due to a big campaign we have? Is it due to macroeconomic conditions or budget cuts?

04:35
The more specific we can be and even being able to point to what we think is correlation versus causation, it just provides more credibility to you as the leader who's presenting the report that you really know what's going on within  the data and within your team and how your team is functioning. And so don't forget to add the context. The context are the insights. The context is what makes the data come to life  and  it helps it be understood with your executive team.

05:04 – Mistake #3: Unclear Marketing Attribution

Mistake number three is being unclear on what's attributed to marketing. So let me start by asking, does your executive team know what you count as marketing sourced or marketing influenced as it relates to pipeline? Do you and your team know? Do you guys have a set definition on it? Because one of the mistakes I see that we often make as marketing leaders  is that we have loose definitions for what each of these mean and yet we report against them all the time.

05:31
So if you don't already, you should define some attribution categories  and all of the channels and experiences and tactics that your entire executive team can align around being counted as marketing sourced or marketing influenced. And one thing that I just encourage us all to remember here is that  revenue is a team sport. And so unless you're in highly transactional, high velocity sales, it's likely that

05:58
Closing a deal is a team sport and a team effort.  It's probably a combination between marketing sales and your biz dev team in most instances to make that deal come to life. And so rather than just trying to take ownership over certain pipeline or opportunities, it can often be a reframe  for us to be the voice of the customer and instead.

06:21 – Mistake #4: Pitting Teams Against Each Other

show which channels and tactics and activities across the go-to-market teams are really resonating and pushing prospects to buy our product or our solution. And this actually ties really closely in with mistake number four,  which is pitting teams against each other. Now, I don't know about you, but I have totally made this mistake before. And it does not feel good when sales and marketing feel like they're pitted against each other  to...

06:45
battle for who created the most pipeline and who's getting credit and ownership over pipeline creation. It is not a great look and that's really the opposite of us being one revenue team and rowing in one direction.  So a few tips here that I've personally implemented is when I look at sources in terms of what's contributing to pipeline, we reframe it more as inbound versus outbound versus partnership revenue. And that can be really helpful because everyone can contribute to

07:13
inbound and outbound and partnership revenue,  all three teams might have their own ways of contributing to that. And it still shows us which motions are working for the customer and for the buyers  without necessarily saying BDRs drove X amount of pipeline, marketing drove X amount of pipeline, and account executives drove X amount, right?  When really we likely all work together and it was more of a combined effort to drive that revenue.

07:39
I know this one is tough because a lot of times CEOs, especially today, want to know exactly how much marketing sourced pipeline is being created. But I would just encourage you to be really thoughtful about how you present that data  and try not to pit marketing against the other go-to-market teams. Mistake number five, fuzzy cost calculations. Now in order to show ROI, you have to be including cost, right?

08:05 – Mistake #5: Fuzzy Cost Calculations

And so if you're using unclear or inconsistent cost inputs, that can make ROI feel really misleading, especially to finance leaders. So some of the areas we tend to get this wrong is we don't necessarily include things like headcount costs or agency costs. Maybe we're only including paid advertising costs, or maybe we have a different ROI calculation formula than finance does. Maybe they're measuring against gross margin and you're measuring against top line revenue.

08:34
Or maybe the way they're accounting for sales is a different timeframe than the way you're accounting for sales. So just be thoughtful in terms of ensuring that you and your CFO are on the same page in terms of what ROI looks like and how they're thinking about it so that you can provide the data back in a way that makes sense. And certainly not every marketing cost needs to be included in an ROI calculation. I to Darrow and I talked about this back in episode five.

09:04
where there are certainly some costs such as your CRM and your marketing automation tool and some other things  where that's just the cost of doing business. That doesn't need to be factored into your ROI calculations. But then there are very specific costs associated to driving pipeline and to achieving your goals that should be accounted for. At the end of the day, just be transparent about what you're calculating, how you're calculating it, what you're not including in your cost.

09:32 – Mistake #6: Leading with Vanity Metrics

Make sure you justify your approach. And if you need to show multiple views so leadership can see the full picture. Mistake number six, and this is a bit of a softball one, but leading with vanity metrics. And I know we're still doing it. I still see it where our dashboards are filled with impressions and clicks and opens.  And I've seen  board reports that list almost every marketing KPI the team is looking at. And there's really no story.

10:02
There's no headline. So strip out the vanity metrics, really focus on the key marketing goals you're looking to achieve and the relevant KPIs directly tied to those marketing goals. Now, certainly things like impressions or social followers.

10:18
might be tied directly to your goal. If your goal is to drive brand awareness this year or drive brand awareness within a particular market, but just make sure that it is specifically tied to the goal that you are achieving that the board and your C-suite cares about  and that you are at the end of the day, providing the headline for what is happening and why it matters. Okay.  Now, mistake number seven, our last mistake until we wrap up here today.

10:44 – Mistake #7: Ignoring Incrementality

And this is ignoring incrementality. Now this is kind of a fun one because honestly,  in probably the first 10 years of my career, I didn't really think about this perspective.  And this is the idea that if marketing wasn't contributing to the go-to-market team, what would they achieve regardless of you being around? So if sales,  let's say your company is at 50 million this year,  and if marketing disappeared, what would they hit next year?

11:12
What would they hit without having a dedicated marketing function? Would it be 60 million, 70 million, 55 million? Would they retract? And while I believe marketing is a critical business function, of course, that's why I'm here and that's why I do the work I do. There is something to be said that sales will continue to sell without marketing. And so when we think about reporting back on the impact to the business that we're making, think of it from the view of

11:39
What are the incremental wins we are picking up and seeing through our marketing efforts that would not have been possible  without us running these campaigns or without our department focusing on these goals? And there really isn't an exact formula here. mean, part of this is you have to know the business, you have to know the history of  marketing's involvement in the business or lack of involvement in order to kind of make an estimation. But at the end of the day, businesses will grow.

12:06
They will find a way to grow with or without marketing  and marketing really should amplify the growth in a lot of ways. And so how can we prove that what we're doing is additive to the business and that they would not have seen that growth without the investment that they made in marketing or in that specific campaign that we ran. And this is actually a great tactic in general  to be able to show the impact of hard to track brand activities. If you run a pilot or an experiment,

12:35
Let's say you're going to test LinkedIn personal branding for one of your markets and you go all in with your New York market with the sales team. If during that time, instead of New York growing 5%, which is maybe what they were on track to do, they grow 10 % or 7%, you can actually point to the incremental lift of being 2 % or 5 % or whatever the difference was in the growth that they were already going to do.

13:02
And we can reasonably suggest or say that their additional incremental growth was directly contributed to something that marketing did. Awesome. Well, that wraps up our seven mistakes that I've personally made and that I've seen marketing leaders make time and time again when looking to present data and build credibility with the C-suite. And remember, proving ROI to the C-suite isn't just about the data. It's about trust. The way you set context, define your terms and frame your impact

13:32 – Recap & Key Takeaways for presenting Marketing ROI

determines whether leadership sees you as a strategic partner  or just another department asking for budget. So to quickly recap the seven mistakes to avoid, number one, poor data quality and hygiene. Number two, not sharing enough context to support your numbers. Number three, being unclear on what's attributed to marketing. Number four, pitting teams against each other. Number five, fuzzy cost calculations. Number six,

14:01
leading with vanity metrics and number seven, ignoring the idea of incrementality. And if you take nothing else away from today, remember this, lead with clarity, align on definitions before you walk into the room and focus on business outcomes first. And if you're heading into the planning season and want support in building a marketing plan and an executive presence  that earns buy-in at the highest levels, check out my Lead Like a CMO program.

14:30
growthactivated.com. And until next time,  keep activating growth for yourself and your company.  Thanks so much for tuning into this episode of Growth Activated.  I hope this conversation sparked new ideas,  challenged your thinking, and gave you practical tools to help elevate your impact as a marketing leader.  If it did, I would love for you to pass it along to a friend or a colleague in B2B marketing.  The more we grow together, the more we raise the bar for what marketing leadership can look like.

14:59
And as always, in the meantime, keep activating growth for yourself and your company. See you next time.