The CMO Survey: Inspiring TABS

Key Characteristics

• Longitudinal Design: Conducted biannually since 2008, creating a rich time-series dataset that tracks marketing trends and evolution over more than 15 years.
• Leadership Focus: Targets C-suite marketing executives (CMOs, VPs of Marketing) who make strategic decisions affecting their organizations.
• Open Access: All findings are freely available to the public, democratizing access to critical business intelligence.
• Academic Rigor: Backed by leading business schools and peer-reviewed research methodologies, ensuring credibility and reliability.
• Industry Impact: Has become the go-to benchmark for marketing spending, strategy, and performance across sectors and industries.

Research Topics

The CMO Survey addresses a comprehensive range of topics relevant to marketing leadership:

• Marketing spending and budget allocation
• Digital marketing adoption and social media usage
• Marketing analytics and performance measurement
• Economic outlook and business confidence
• Customer experience and engagement strategies
• Innovation and technology adoption in marketing

1. Longitudinal Methodology

Just as The CMO Survey tracks marketing trends over time, TABS is designed as a repeatable survey intended to build a comprehensive dataset on technology adoption barriers across multiple collection cycles. This long-term perspective allows us to:

• Identify emerging trends and shifting barriers
• Track the evolution of organizational readiness
• Measure the impact of technological innovation on adoption patterns
• Provide cross-cycle comparisons for benchmarking

2. Leadership-Centric Approach

The CMO Survey demonstrates the value of gathering insights directly from decision-makers. TABS follows this model by targeting the full C-suite (CEO, CFO, CIO, CISO, COO, CMO, CTO, CSO, CHRO, CRO) who shape their organizations' technology strategies. This focus ensures that our data reflects:

• Strategic perspectives rather than operational details
• Organizational priorities and resource allocation decisions
• Executive-level barriers and constraints
• Decision-making frameworks used by technology leaders

3. Open Access and Democratization

One of The CMO Survey's most impactful features is its commitment to making all findings freely available. This open-access model has democratized marketing intelligence, benefiting small businesses, academics, and consultants who might not otherwise afford premium research. TABS embraces this same philosophy:

• All survey results will be published openly on our website
• Raw data (anonymized) will be made available for academic research
• No paywalls or subscription fees will restrict access to insights
• Community contributions and interpretations will be encouraged

4. Academic Foundation

The CMO Survey is developed and maintained by a consortium of top business schools, lending it credibility and ensuring methodological rigor. Similarly, TABS is grounded in established academic frameworks:

• Survey design informed by Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), Technology-Organization-Environment (TOE) framework, and Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT)
• Questions validated through pilot testing and expert review
• Data analysis following peer-reviewed statistical methodologies
• Findings intended for publication in academic journals

5. Industry Benchmarking

The CMO Survey has become the definitive benchmark for marketing performance and spending. TABS aspires to achieve similar status in the technology adoption space, providing:

• Cross-industry comparisons of adoption barriers
• Sector-specific insights (e.g., healthcare, finance, manufacturing)
• Organization size and maturity benchmarks
• Geographic and cultural adoption pattern differences

Technology-Specific Focus

Unlike the broad marketing landscape covered by The CMO Survey, TABS zeroes in on technology adoption barriers, organizational readiness, and capability maturity. This specialized focus allows us to provide deeper insights into:

• Specific barriers (cost, complexity, security concerns, cultural resistance)
• Technology lifecycle stages (evaluation, pilot, deployment, optimization)
• Infrastructure and technical debt challenges
• Digital transformation maturity models

Broader Leadership Perspective

While The CMO Survey focuses on marketing executives, TABS includes the full C-suite (CEO, CFO, CIO, CISO, COO, CMO, CTO, CSO, CHRO, CRO) to capture how barriers are perceived differently across the leadership of organizations vs single leader types.

Rapid Technology Evolution

This section examines how the fast pace of technology change creates adoption barriers. Respondents rate the extent to which factors such as emerging-tool complexity, shifting vendor landscapes, and compressed evaluation timelines have posed challenges within their organizations over the past 12 months.