The CMO Council says the index analyses critical business, economic, market, customer, operational, employment, training, outsourcing, channel, budgetary, media spend and technology investment indicators. 

For the 2025 Marketing Vitality Index, the CMO Council says it has curated statistics from trusted third-party sources and centres of domain knowledge, including proprietary data from quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews, to inform an analysis of five core marketing categories. 

According to the council, these categories comprise: 

  • Marketing Mix and Spend
  • Organisational Dynamics
  • Market Outlook and Trends
  • Customer Affinity and Attachment, and
  • Technology Adoption and Execution. 

The CMO Council says its 2025 Marketing Vitality Index includes expert commentary and in-depth insights from industry leading organisations, including Clickatell, Chief Outsiders, Wise Marketer Group, InMarket, Analytic Partners, Brand Finance and others. 

The inaugural Marketing Vitality Index forecasts waves of vitality, volatility and velocity in 2025. Its annual assessment of leading MPIs evidences a defining, milestone year ahead, adds the council. 

The CMO Council says that key findings of the report include:

  • Gen AI and data utilisation technologies will enable significant marketing momentum and customer engagement moments to be tracked, attributed and measured for business value.
  • Migration to digital channels and automated marketing platforms will multiply exponentially for both brand equity and performance marketing reasons and results.
  • Revenue science platforms will gain traction and lift as chief growth officers examine all areas of monetisation, retention, conversion, expansion, extension and yield / price optimisation.
  • Marketing investments and outcomes will be more productive, predictive, accountable and measurable with spend more surgical and certain to deliver ROI.

"This year's Marketing Vitality Index shows CMOs under pressure to grow revenue, meet rising customer expectations, create operational efficiencies, improve campaign performance, rein in costs and address challenges in MarTech," says Donovan Neale-May, Executive Director of the CMO Council. "The good news is that the expansive CMO remit showcases marketing's rising influence in the enterprise."

The CMO Council concludes that some of the notable MPIs curated for the Marketing Vitality Index include:

  • 57% of CMOs said MarTech investments in GenAI are likely to create the most value and ROI, followed by 49% in Customer Data Platform and Insights, according to CMO Intentions 2024. 
  • 80% of highly evolved marketers are satisfied with their intention-based marketing, compared to only 17% of lesser evolved marketers, according to Fire Up Your Revenue Generation Engine. 
  • 37% of CMOs said their campaign performance needs improvement, according to CMO Intentions 2024.
  • Over two-thirds of buyers involved in large and complex transactions valued over USD$1-million are Millennials and Gen Z buyers, according to Forrester.
  • 90% of CMOs are aggressively expanding their investments in digital commerce, according to Gartner. 

Individuals are encouraged to download the CMO Council's Marketing Vitality Index here. 

For more information, visit www.cmocouncil.org. You can also follow the CMO on LinkedIn or on X. 

*Image courtesy of contributor