I usually pack this newsletter with a few different topics… marketing, leadership, parenting, podcasts, books, fitness, whatever's on my mind. But this week, I only want to talk about how not to get fired as a marketing leader.

Sounds dramatic, but it’s real. Marketing is one of the most scrutinized (and shat upon) functions in any company. We live in a world of short-term expectations, shifting priorities, and a constant need to prove our value.

Not to mention the context switching. THE CONTEXT SWITCHING!

And when things get tough, marketing is often the first place leadership looks to cut.

It doesn’t matter how good you are. It doesn’t matter how hard you work. If you don’t navigate the realities of managing up and gaining agreements correctly, you can find yourself on the chopping block.

I’ve been there. I’ve seen it happen. And I know how isolating this job can be.

I’m writing to remind marketing leaders that we must support each other. We’re all playing the same game; the more we share, the stronger we become. It would be worth it if I could help even one of you stay ahead and protect your role.

So this week, we’re going deep. No distractions. Just five ways to not get fired as a marketing leader.

❤️ kyle

I’m pleased to announce Share Your Genius as our first partner for the newsletter and podcast. I’ve known the team and their CEO for years. They are simply the best creative agency, helping brands build deeper relationships with their audience through binge-worthy podcasts and great content.

5 Ways to Not Get Fired as a Marketing Leader

If you don’t want to read the context, please download the full guide here. 🙂 

Let’s be real. Marketing leadership is one of the highest turnover roles in the executive team, regardless of the company's size. For example, the average tenure for a tech CMO is somewhere between 18 to 20 months which is f&$(@# brutal.

So the question is… why?

Marketing is the first thing leadership questions when revenue slows. And when that happens, the easiest decision in the world is to fire the marketing leader.

• Sales isn’t hitting their number? Must be a marketing problem.

• Retention is struggling? Maybe marketing set the wrong expectations.

• The CEO saw​​ a competitor’s campaign and got anxious? Time to rethink marketing.

Okay, before you smash the reply button to complain about something. I’m being overly dramatic. Yes, it’s an art form, and I’m good at it. 

But here’s the thing: if you don’t want to be the next marketing leader on the chopping block, you must align with revenue. 

Period.

This isn’t just theory. Believe me. I’ve experienced it. The following are lessons I’ve learned the hard way. From running content marketing at ExactTarget to leading marketing at Lessonly, Seismic, and now Jellyfish, I’ve been in companies at every stage… startup, scale-up, and post-acquisition.

Here’s what I’ve learned…

1. Own a Number that Ties to Revenue

At Lessonly, I led marketing for a growing SaaS company with a $5M budget and a lean team. After Seismic acquired us, that changed overnight, and I became the SVP of Marketing at Seismic. I suddenly managed a 70+-person team with a $40M budget in a complex, global company.

That shift taught me a critical lesson: marketing’s success isn’t about budget size or team structure. It’s about owning a number that drives bookings. If marketing isn’t directly accountable for revenue impact, it’s an easy target.

Across both companies, the constant was that sales needed pipeline to hit their number. And whether you're at a 50-person startup or a 1,500-person growth stage company, the fundamental question remains the same:

How much of our pipeline is created and supported by marketing, and is it converting into revenue?

If you can’t answer that, you don’t truly own your impact.

How to Own Pipeline as a Marketing Leader:

Track marketing’s impact on pipeline

• How much pipeline comes from marketing vs. outbound?

• How does marketing influence later-stage deals?

• Where are the gaps? What needs to be fixed?

Shift from “lead gen” to revenue influence

• If your CEO asks how marketing is doing, and you say, “We drove 5,000 MQLs last quarter,” you’ve already lost.

• The right answer: “Marketing-sourced pipeline is up 30% and is converting at 25%, driving $3M in closed revenue.”

Build a pipeline model with finance (more on partnering with finance later).

• If your CEO says, “We need to double revenue next year,” don’t just nod.

• Go build a pipeline model that shows how much demand you actually need to hit that number.

• If leadership’s goals aren’t realistic, show them the math.

Owning a revenue number makes you indispensable. But even more important, it’s how you align the entire GTM team.

2. Support Revenue Alignment

If you’re not directly tied to revenue, you’re an easy target when things don’t go as planned, especially in sales-led organizations. 

Here’s the reality:

The #1 growth driver in a sales-led org is quota capacity.
The #1 question the board cares about is, “Do we have enough pipeline to support that capacity?”

If marketing isn’t actively solving that, you’re disposable.

Most marketing leaders think their job is to run campaigns, generate leads, and build brand awareness. That’s all great and is needed, but if sales isn’t hitting quota, none of it matters.

So, again, it’s important to align to revenue. 

Establish a Cadence of Communication

I’ve established a communication cadence in almost every company I’ve been lucky to lead marketing. To simplify it, I’ll list the different versions below: (1) send a weekly email about pipeline production and conversion, (2) schedule a bi-weekly meeting to review the numbers. 

Weekly: A demand forecast email that clearly communicates pipeline progress using a weather report format:

• ☀️ Sunny: We hit our pipeline target.

• 🌤 Partly Cloudy: We’re close but need adjustments.

• ⛈ Rainy: We missed and need a course correction.

You would give a weather report depending on how the weekly production or quarterly goal progresses. Only finished at 75% to goal for the week? Maybe it’s Partly Cloudy? 

The rest of the email has the following: 

• Weather Report

• By the Numbers

• Gong Call of the Week

• Weekly Updates from Demand, Outbound, Product Marketing, Enablement

Want an example? Click here. 

Bi-Weekly: A pipeline council with sales, marketing, revenue ops, and finance to diagnose and fix pipeline gaps.

• Review pipeline health, conversion rates, and deal quality.

• Crucial: The meeting should NOT be run by sales or marketing. Revenue operations should own it to prevent bias. Feel free to own the meeting if you don’t have a revenue operations function, but be aware. 

Quarterly: A Revenue Handbook, a contract between sales, marketing, and CS that documents SLAs, follow-up timelines, and responsibilities. Get your template here. 

• How fast does sales need to follow up on a lead? Who owns what stage of the pipeline? What counts as a qualified opportunity?

• Get leadership sign-off so when things go south, no one points fingers—they go back to the agreement.

Own the hard conversations.

• If marketing isn’t generating enough pipeline, flag it before the CEO does.

• If sales isn’t following up on leads, show the data and fix the process together.

• If conversion rates are slipping, diagnose why and make changes.

Alignment isn’t just about reporting on the numbers. It’s about fixing problems before they become leadership issues.

3. Enable the Hell Out of the GTM Team 

Your job isn’t just to generate leads. It’s to make sure those leads close. I’ve seen this play out over and over again:

1. Marketing runs a killer campaign.

2. A ton of great leads come in.

3. Sales doesn’t follow up properly, and conversion rates tank.

4. Marketing gets blamed.

That’s why sales enablement and training aren’t optional. They’re the difference between a good marketing leader and a great one. Before we get into the tactical aspects of revenue enablement, I suggest you check out this quick guide to refresh your understanding of building a revenue enablement function…from team structures to goal setting.

Are you just starting with enablement, or do you want to bring it to your organization? Click here for the Quick Guide to Revenue Enablement. 

Now that we have the primer out of the way (feel free to make a copy and steal it), let’s look at what you can do as a marketing leader to implement revenue enablement at your company. 

Quick Tips on Implementing Revenue Enablement:

Make content usable

• Most sales reps don’t read the reports marketing creates.

• Use NotebookLM to create one-page study guides so they actually understand what they’re pitching.

Turn Gong (or a similar tool) into an enablement engine

• Track competitor mentions, winning talk tracks, and objections.

• Update battle cards every week so reps always have fresh intel.

Close the loop

• If marketing-sourced leads aren’t closing, diagnose why.

• Are they the wrong audience? Is messaging off? Does sales need a different pitch?

• Fix the gaps instead of blaming sales.

If sales aren’t enabled, the pipeline doesn’t convert. If pipeline doesn’t convert, leadership cuts your budget. And if the budget gets cut? You’re next.

4. Think Like a CFO

Let’s be honest: most of us avoid finance like the plague. Well, that’s a huge mistake. Your budget will always be at risk if you don’t understand how finance sees marketing.

It’s important to think like a CFO in order to work with them productively. 

How to Win Over Finance:

Know your company’s growth model

• How does your CFO forecast bookings?

• How much pipeline do you actually need to hit those goals?

• What’s the top-down bookings model, and how does it tie to headcount capacity on the sales side? 

Use the 80/20 budget rule

• 80% of spend is tied directly to demand generation and revenue growth.

• 20% is for brand, creative, and strategic bets.

• If finance sees that marketing’s budget directly drives revenue, they’ll protect it.

Understand How Your CFO Views Efficiency 

• Does your CFO care about payback period? What about an acceptable CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost) payback timeline?

• What’s the ROI ratio to pipeline and bookings when driven by marketing? $1:$20 or $1:$40? 

Marketers who understand finance are in a better position to be successful. Marketers who understand and WORK with finance don’t lose their budget. And if your budget is safe, so is your job (for the most part). 

5. Build Alignment to Revenue, Then Take Big Brand Bets

Okay. That’s plenty about revenue impact. I know most brand marketers reading this are making collective eye rolls. And I can type it because I am a brand marketer.

Let’s just get it out of the way. Brand matters. 

But again, proving the brand’s value to your CEO or CFO is an uphill battle because it’s hard to justify the investment in “brand” when the focus is on driving pipeline and bookings. 

So, let’s pretend the world is perfect, and you’ve tied marketing’s impact to pipeline and revenue. You’ve earned the right to make big brand bets.  Now it’s time to double down. 

When to Swing for the Fences

There’s a moment in every company’s growth when the focus needs to shift from just being pipeline-driven to creating a category-defining brand. The companies that do this well (and don’t get stuck in a sea of sameness) recognize that:

Revenue marketing only gets you so far. Your competitors can outspend you. The algorithms change. The cost of acquisition increases. At some point, growth slows if you don’t invest in brand.

Brand influences the entire funnel. Customers buy from companies they trust, recognize, and respect. If your only marketing strategy is demand gen, you’re missing the opportunity to pull demand forward by making your brand unforgettable.

Timing is everything. If you start investing in brand too early, you risk being seen as “fluffy” and missing revenue targets. If you wait too long, you risk being outplayed by competitors who already invested. The right time to make big brand bets is when you have momentum and credibility. This is the hardest one to get right and has taken down plenty of marketing leaders (and market leaders) in the past.

The best CMOs aren’t just marketers. They’re business leaders. The ones who thrive aren’t waiting to be told what to do. They own revenue impact, align with sales and finance, and build brands that create long-term value. That’s how you stay off the chopping block.

Good luck, and I hope the marketing gods shine down upon you.