A new global study of more than 500 senior marketing leaders has revealed that chief marketing officers are facing mounting pressure to deliver growth, embrace AI and prove marketing’s value, while battling bureaucracy and short-term business expectations.
The CMO Outlook 2026 report, produced by Lippincott in partnership with Bloomberg Media, surveyed 541 CMOs and senior marketing decision-makers worldwide to understand the challenges shaping the profession. It found that today’s marketing leaders sit at the centre of technological disruption, commercial pressure and organisational complexity.
For financial services marketers, many of the findings will sound familiar.
Driving business growth emerged as the number one challenge facing CMOs, closely followed by balancing short-term performance targets with long-term brand building. Meanwhile, implementing new technology and AI ranked almost as highly as proving marketing’s impact on the bottom line, highlighting the growing importance of digital transformation across the sector.
The report suggests many marketing teams know they should be focusing on sustainable long-term growth, customer experience and brand development. However, day-to-day priorities often pull them in a different direction, with teams spending most of their time meeting short-term targets and demonstrating immediate marketing attribution.
One of the most striking findings is the growing tension between internal influence and external brand building. The study found that CMOs who enjoy greater influence within their organisations are often rewarded for prioritising performance metrics and business outcomes. However, this can come at the expense of longer-term brand investment and customer connection.
Researchers argue this creates a fundamental challenge for modern marketing leaders: winning trust from the boardroom while maintaining the strategic focus needed to build enduring customer trust and brand equity.
AI is another area where ambition appears to be outpacing readiness.
While marketers expect increased investment in AI adoption and implementation over the next year, many are simultaneously reducing spending on websites, customer experience, thought leadership and digital properties that help brands remain visible and trusted in AI-driven search environments.
The report warns that marketers risk focusing on AI tools themselves while neglecting the brand infrastructure and content ecosystems that influence how AI platforms interpret and recommend brands.
Despite concerns about economic uncertainty, confidence remains relatively high. Nearly two-thirds of marketing leaders expect budgets to increase over the next year, with investment likely to be concentrated on AI, demand generation, marketing analytics and media spend.
However, organisational barriers continue to hold many teams back. Nearly eight in ten respondents said bureaucracy regularly gets in the way of decision-making, while only 12% described their organisation’s technology enablement as excellent. More than four-fifths reported difficulty aligning senior stakeholders around a shared marketing vision.
Corporate leadership was identified as the biggest source of delays to major marketing decisions, ahead of finance, legal and compliance teams.
For financial services marketers operating in heavily regulated environments, the findings reinforce a familiar challenge: delivering measurable commercial outcomes while continuing to invest in brand trust, customer confidence and long-term reputation.
The report concludes that CMOs have an opportunity to strengthen their influence by articulating a clear long-term brand vision while demonstrating how marketing contributes to immediate business goals, helping organisations balance short-term performance pressures with sustainable future growth.