Marketing leaders are navigating an increasingly complex landscape. While their organizational influence is expanding, amid deeper digital and AI adoption, they face greater pressure to demonstrate ROI.

Marketing leaders also reported a decline in optimism about the U.S. economy, with inflation concerns continuing to affect marketing spending.

These are among the findings of the 34th edition of The CMO Survey, directed by Professor Christine Moorman of Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business and co-sponsored by Deloitte and the American Marketing Association.

The survey was conducted from January 21 to February 12, 2025. It polled 281 marketing leaders, all at for-profit U.S. companies, 99% of whom at VP-level or higher.

AI powers marketing operations

The use of artificial intelligence and machine learning continues to transform marketing operations, now powering 17.2% of all efforts — a 100% increase since 2022. Marketing leaders projected a 157% growth in the use of AI to optimize and automate marketing over the next three years, reaching 44.2% of all marketing activities. 

Generative AI adoption has surged 116% since last year, and organizations reported progress in safety, bias minimization, and hardware investments. 

CMOs indicated that companies are using AI more effectively, leading to tangible business results such as increased sales productivity (8.6% from 5.1% in spring 2024), enhanced customer satisfaction (8.5% from 6.1%), and lower marketing overhead costs (10.8% reduction, compared with 7.0%).

Marketing’s impact and performance pressures increase

The rise of digital technologies and AI has significantly enhanced marketing’s standing within organizations. Over the past five years, marketing leaders report a considerable expansion of their role, rating it at 3.2 on a scale from -7 (significantly narrowed) to +7 (significantly broadened). This expanded role has also translated into increased influence, rated at 2.9 on the same scale. This is consistent with marketing leading digital activities in 92% of companies. 

“Marketers are the logical lead to navigate the digital tools now at the heart of many companies’ strategies,” Moorman said. “As AI and marketing technologies are leveraged, marketers will have even greater opportunity to assume this strategic role in companies.” 

Survey results indicate this role must be supported by a focus on innovation, growth, and profitability — priorities that both marketing and other company leaders agree are most important. There is a gap, however, with marketing leading revenue growth and innovation in only 32% and 26% of companies, respectively. 

“This gap indicates that marketers’ seat at the table must still be earned,” Moorman said. Another challenge is that marketers’ elevated profile within companies has also brought increased expectations, the survey found. Marketing leaders cite "demonstrating the impact of marketing on financial results" as their top challenge, with "securing collaboration across departments for new marketing investments" rapidly emerging as a major concern (a 24% increase over two years).

This heightened pressure stems from various key stakeholders:

• 63% report increased pressure from Chief Financial Officers (CFOs), up from 52%.
• 61% face greater scrutiny from Chief Executive Officers (CEOs), up from 51%.
• 50% experience more pressure from Board members, up from 33%.

Collaboration across departments continues to improve, particularly with finance and human resources in brand-building initiatives. Nearly 70% of marketing leaders anticipate their senior marketing titles will remain unchanged in the next five years, with Chief Growth Officer and Chief Customer Officer considered the most likely alternatives.

Marketing jobs remain robust

Organizations increased marketing headcount by 5.4% in 2025 and CMOs anticipate a similar growth for next year. 

Marketing leaders identify hiring top talent (41.2%) as their biggest people-related challenge, followed by “identifying best candidates,” “retention,” and “training.” Key hiring obstacles include low compensation (22.7%), difficulty finding expertise (16.7%) and talent scarcity (16.7%). 

The composition of marketing teams continues to evolve, with full-time employees now representing 77.9% of expected hires — down from 82.5% in 2019. This shift reflects increasing reliance on:

• Full-time contractors (7.8%, up from 5.4% in 2019)
• Part-time contractors (9.9%, up from 9.0%)
• Part-time employees (4.4%, up from 3.1%)

“We expected to see more contractors and part-time employees in this economy, but the shift was marginal,” Moorman noted. “This is another sign that companies are looking for marketers to contribute over the long run.” 

Notably, online-only companies (where 100% of sales come from the internet) plan to hire fewer full-time employees (66.7%) and more full-time (7.8%) and part-time (25.6%) subcontractors. This contrasts with companies with no internet sales who plan to hire 78.1% full-time employees, 6.1% part-time, and 10.1% subcontractors.

Economic headwinds impact performance and budgets

Marketing leaders expressed a decline in economic optimism, the survey found. Nearly half of the respondents said they are “less optimistic” about the U.S. economy compared with the previous quarter. Persistent inflationary pressures continue to constrain marketing activities, with 43.5% of leaders reporting decreased spending. 

Key performance indicators reflect the impact of these challenges:

• Corporate sales growth fell to 8.3%, continuing a two-year decline from 14.1% in 2022.
• Profit growth showed a modest increase to 7.8% (from 7.4% in 2024), but remains below the 2022 peak of 10.7%.
• Customer retention and brand value metrics hit two-year lows.
• Customer acquisition showed slight improvement as the only positive bright spot.

In this constrained environment, marketing budgets grew just 3.3% over the past 12 months (down from 5.8% in Fall 2024), with digital marketing spending up 7.3% (down from 11.1%). Despite slower growth rates, marketing budgets now represent 9.4% of revenues and 11.4% of overall company budgets — increases from 7.7% and 10.1% in 2024, respectively. 

This paradox suggests an even bigger slowdown in overall company revenues and budgets. 

Looking ahead to 2026, leaders anticipate stronger marketing budget growth, with an 8.9% in overall spending and an 11.9% increase in digital marketing budgets.

Social media spending projections consistently unrealized

Social media investments, as a portion of marketing budgets, have decreased to 11.3% (from 12.1% in Fall 2024). Despite this decline, marketing leaders predict increases to 13.3% within 12 months and 18.4% within five years. 

Professor Moorman said that these optimistic projections have consistently failed to materialize over the last decade. In Spring 2024, leaders projected social media spending to reach 12.2% of marketing budgets within a year — but it only reached 11.3%. Likewise, in Spring 2023, leaders anticipated 20.3% social media spending within a year and the actual was only 11%. 

“Social is a very alluring tool for marketers trying to reach a large audience in a cost-effective way,” Moorman said. “This may be tempting them into thinking its payoffs will somehow magically increase over time. Based on these survey results, I recommend that they double down on new growth strategies that have longer-term and more strategic possibilities.”

Which companies are setting marketing standards

The 2025 CMO Survey award asked fellow marketers to select one company that is considered setting the standard for excellence across all industries. It also asked to award a set of companies viewed as setting the standard in their respective industries. 

Apple Inc. was the overall winner for the 17th straight year, while industry winners included Amazon, Nike, the Procter & Gamble Company, Salesforce, and Airbnb.

For detailed findings and additional insights, visit https://cmosurvey.org/. Qualified marketers can also sign up there to participate in the 2026 survey.