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By John Glenday, Reporter

February 22, 2018 | 2 min read

The latest CMO Survey of top marketers predicts that combined spend on the likes of digital marketing, martech platforms and marketing analytics will increase by 6.5% over the next year.

Backed by Deloitte and the American Marketing Association the findings compare favourably with an anticipated 3.9% rise for marketing research and intelligence, a 3.3% uplift for marketing consulting and a 2.5% boost for marketing training.

Drilling down further into the precise nature of this spend the CMO Survey found that 56% of companies will build these capabilities in-house by either recruiting staff with the requisite skills or training existing employees. By contrast, just 3.5% will recruit other firms to acquire these skills for them

The remaining 40% will deploy a partnering strategy to come by the required knowledge with 14% partnering with agencies and a further 14% partnering with consultancies. 12% would elect to partner with other companies.

Commenting on the findings professor Christine Moorman wrote: “These results came as a bit of a surprise to me. Instead, I expected most companies to use some type of partnering to learn. At the same time, I think companies are wise to adopt this approach. Building marketing capabilities is not easy and it is take investments and time.

"However, if companies can succeed in doing so, they are more likely to have a sustainable source of competitive advantage in house they can leverage over time. These capabilities can also spawn new capabilities and opportunities for growth over time.”

The findings are broadly in line with a 2016 report, which identified a 6.9% increase in marketing spend.

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