Breaking Free from Hype Cycles – How CMOs Can Leverage Content to Drive Growth

The rapid evolution of the CMO role is not without consequences. According to Marketing Week, the average tenure for CMOs has fallen to its lowest level in a decade. This is surprising because it comes at a time when marketers are supposed to be more important than ever before. 

EY and Oxford University predicted Chief Marketing Officers will be the most crucial role for enabling organisational transformation. Similarly, Gartner’s 2024 CEO Survey highlighted “digital” and “growth” as top priorities, which are perfectly aligned for a CMO’s expertise. 

So, what is driving this misalignment?

Ellen Steinlauf,  a former Managing Director at Deutsche Bank, believes “the CMO role is simply too demanding”. Across organisations, marketers are relentlessly questioned, “why weren't we on TikTok sooner? What's the AI strategy? Have you seen reviews on that new website? Why aren’t we exhibiting at this trade-show like our competitor?”. The pressure can be relentless.

In Steinlauf’s view, CMOs today face expectations that are impossible to meet consistently, and they are being unfairly scapegoated for failing to meet these unrealistic standards. A report from Boathouse Thinking reveals that only 34% of CEOs have “great confidence” in their CMO. 

This lack of confidence is a direct result of marketers being set-up to fail with expectations that they chase every new trend.

But there is a very clear path to getting unstuck – content remains the best way to focus your marketing efforts and drive growth. As builders of a next-gen CMS software, we’ve seen firsthand how creating powerful digital experiences at breakneck speeds can transform marketing strategies from stuck to thriving.

Ahead, we’ll take a look at how marketers, and especially CMOs, arrived at these roadblocks and explore the ways market leaders have leveraged effective content management to break free from the endless loop.

Hype Cycles are Creating Organisational Paralysis

To understand this dynamic, we can consider Gartner’s theory of “hype cycles.” 

This is where marketers face an initial “peak of inflated expectations” from new innovations such as generative AI. 

However this will be followed almost inevitably by a “trough of disillusionment” the stage where interest in the new innovation significantly declines after the initial excitement. Here, inflated expectations wear off, as early experiments and implementations fail to deliver on promised results. The diagram below demonstrates what this looks like.

For CMOs, these hype cycles can lead to repeated failures. 

The pace of digital innovation is relentless, and chasing every new trend only results in fragmented, inconsistent efforts that distract from the core mission. 

To thrive, marketers need to break free from these hype cycles and focus on what truly drives sustained growth.

The Key Guiding Principles for Future Success: Focus and Content

First… Stay Focused

Success requires discipline. Writing in The Disciplined Pursuit of Less, Greg McKeown emphasises the need for clarity of purpose and extreme focus. This is echoed by Meta Founder Mark Zuckerberg who claims to start every day by asking, "am I doing the most important thing I could be doing?". 

For marketers, this means resisting the pressure to respond to every hype cycle and instead prioritise on what will generate lasting impact.

Content Is Still King

The foundation of effective marketing remains unchanged since Bill Gates’ 1996 essay, “Content is King.” 

Deloitte’s Redefining the Modern CMO study emphasises that being both a brand storyteller and growth driver are essential for CMO success. 

Content lies at the intersection of these priorities, serving as the bedrock for all marketing capabilities. 

Without a robust content strategy, investments in the latest 'hype cycle' —whether it be analytics, personalization tools, or AI— will fail to generate meaningful business outcomes or positive ROI. 

These innovations cannot unlock growth opportunities unless they are built upon a solid foundation of consistent, high-quality content.

How to Build an Operating Model for Content-Led Growth in 4 Steps

1. Focus on people, process and technology

To drive growth, CMOs need an operating model with digital at its core. Capgemini have created a framework for “the new Marketing Operating Model” that has core pillars of people, process and technology. 

These should be designed to gather insights and deliver the right content to the right consumer at the right time via their preferred channel. Meanwhile, teams should be structured to facilitate collaboration and co-production of content.

2. Adopt a best of breed technology approach

Those who want to lead in their industries must adopt a best-of-breed technology approach. 

This involves selecting the most innovative software tools to gain a competitive edge. 

Leading teams such as NISMO – the high performance division of Nissan –  have turned to the Storyblok CMS to leverage its  headless CMS produt to create content faster. Their decision is validated by new Gartner research that found these innovative “best-of-breed” tools are utilised more than their legacy counterparts.

3. Prioritise a headless CMS within your MarTech stack

The foundation of all marketing digital transformations is the content management system (CMS). 

This is where content teams will spend most of their time so it is crucial that it is easy to use and easily distributes content across every touchpoint. 

A headless CMS is a particular type of content management system that is detached from the frontend and is built from the ground up as a content repository. 

This means you and your team have an exceptional amount of freedom to execute content operations efficiently. Developers their technology of choice without worrying about how it’ll impact the frontend. Meanwhile, content editors can reuse their content across any number of devices as it’s not baked into one specific channel.

The MACH Alliance published a list of key content management principles built with members from over 100 companies including PayPal, JP Morgan, and Publicis. They recommend using a headless CMS that is capable of supporting omnichannel content delivery such as Alexa and VR. 

4. Establish effective governance and metrics for success

Once your technology is in place, establishing effective governance is essential. It ensures that the right people and processes are in place to execute effectively. Forrester recommends the following KPIs:

• Customer Engagement: metrics like unique visitors, time spent on the site, conversions and revenue.
• Content Velocity: the speed at which new and edited content is published.
• Digital Performance: website load times and SEO scores. 
• Employee Time Spent on Innovation: a reduction in developer time spent on technical debt, allowing more focus on creative, growth-oriented tasks.

These KPIs help ensure that your content strategy remains focused, agile, and aligned with business goals.

Increase Revenue by 370% Like Sydney FC

You don’t need to be pulled into hype cycles manufactured by others to elevate your marketing efforts. Instead, create your own hype using content.

How Sydney FC Transformed Fan Engagement Using Headless CMS

A powerful example of how marketers can create their own hype cycle is Sydney FC. They are the most successful football club in Australia, winning 31 trophies in 17 years. 

When faced with the challenge of building excitement for a new stadium, their team delivered a 228% increase in match-day attendance and a 370% increase in revenue. They did this by taking their fans online with a new digital strategy.

Leveraging Best-of-Breed Technology

Sydney FC adopted a best-of-breed approach, selecting Storyblok as their CMS. This decision enabled their marketing team to independently build and manage content with minimal training. This liberated them to fully populate a new website in just two weeks before the winter holidays. 

As a result, they were able to “reconnect with fans who were lost along the way” and “build their hype and desire to buy season tickets”. 

A Future-Proofed Content Approach

Sydney FC’s approach is not only effective but it is also future-proofed. The team say their biggest win has come from selecting a CMS with a flexible content structure. 

Their marketing team now has the autonomy to publish content without involving developers. This has enabled them to start building new functionality for members as a phase two that will deliver future revenue gains.

Seize the Opportunity to Achieve Content-Led Growth

CMOs remain under as tight of scrutiny as ever. But breaking free from the hype cycles to hyper focus your strategy is achievable.

Instead, prioritizing the creation of amazing content experiences at speed and scale will be essential to keeping your team focused and drive the growth you envision.

By implementing a content development and management strategy, focusing on the right metrics, and leaning on innovative technologies like headless CMS to efficiently manage content, you’ll be able to officially say goodbye to those hype cycles for good.

Achieving success with your content management is within your grasp. Reach out to our team today to learn more about how the Storyblok headless CMS platform can help your team drive the business growth you deserve.