Quick Summary: A marketing-minded CEO is the difference between random acts of marketing and a predictable revenue engine. This article shares 10 signs you’re working for a leader who values marketing, from putting marketing in the room where strategic decisions are made to acting as a brand evangelist. It also explores how leadership commitment impacts brand strength, lead generation, and ROI at RIAs, fintechs, and other financial services firms.

I’ve said this my entire career: marketing isn’t just a nice to have. In the right hands, it’s the growth engine of a business.

But I also know from personal experience that not every CEO believes that. Many treat marketing like a cost center or a support function instead of a powerful growth driver.

Over the years, I’ve realized there are several clear indicators of a CEO who believes in and values marketing. If your CEO checks most of these boxes, you’re in good hands:

1. They Put Marketing in the Room Where Decisions Are Made

If you’re a marketing leader and you’re not invited to meetings where business strategy, product direction, and budget decisions get made, your CEO probably doesn’t see marketing as having strategic business value. A marketing-minded CEO makes sure you have a seat at the table.

2. They Invest in Brand Like It’s a Revenue Driver

CEOs who understand the power of a strong brand don’t diminish it as “fluffy” or surface-level work. They understand that strong positioning, consistent messaging, and recognizable visual identity fuel trust, pipeline, and pricing power.

3. They Care About Outcomes, Not Activities and Vanity Metrics

A CEO who values marketing doesn’t care how many emails you sent or what the open rate was. They want to know if your activities moved the needle. They expect reporting tied to revenue, and they understand the difference between vanity metrics and business impact.

4. They Fund Marketing Before It’s Comfortable

They’re willing to invest in marketing ahead of growth by building the right team, tools, and campaigns now so the pipeline is full six months from now. CEOs who start prioritizing marketing resources only after sales slow down likely see it as a short-term fix rather than a long-term strategy.

5. They Hold Marketing to the Same Standards as Sales

They believe marketing should be accountable to revenue results, but they also understand and provide the resources, data, and authority necessary to deliver on that accountability.

6. They Value Consistency Over Campaign-of-the-Month Syndrome

CEOs who understand marketing recognize that real impact comes from steady execution, not shiny-object hopping. They give tactics time to work and invest in what they know will move the needle instead of chasing the latest trend or channel.

7. They Understand CAC and LTV

They can talk about customer acquisition cost and lifetime value without glazing over. More importantly, they understand the significance behind those metrics and use them to justify marketing spend, not cut it.

8. They Celebrate Marketing Wins Publicly

They give marketing credit when marketing sourced deals close, when brand awareness spikes, and when the firm earns media attention.

9. They Back Marketing in Cross-Functional Conflicts

When sales, product, or finance push back on marketing decisions, a good CEO steps in to protect the long-term strategy, even if it’s unpopular in the short term.

10. They Act as Brand Evangelists

They’ll get on stage at events, make guest appearances on podcasts, post regularly on LinkedIn, and use their position and platform to tell the company’s story. They understand the importance of building real connections with their target audience, and they don’t expect marketing to work without them.

I think it was Dave Gerhardt who said Life is too short to work for a CEO who doesn’t get marketing, and he’s right. When your CEO understands and values the role of marketing, you have the potential to build an incredibly powerful marketing engine at your firm, one that drives not only business success but personal growth and satisfaction. The opposite, though, is also true. If your CEO doesn’t check most of these boxes, you could be looking at a long and frustrating uphill battle. You get to decide if it’s worth it.

For 20 years, Intention.ly CEO and Co-founder Kelly Waltrich has been championing the role of marketing in the financial services industry. As former Chief Marketing Officer at eMoney Advisor and Orion Advisor Solutions, she built powerhouse marketing teams from the ground up, developing the engines that would fuel the highest periods of growth for both firms.

Waltrich designed the strategy behind several successful rebrands, acquisitions, and product launches, including spearheading the development of two advisor marketing products, while creating unmatched overall brand visibility and helping to turn company executives into industry thought leaders. Through forward-thinking demand generation, PR, and product marketing, she created a consistent inbound pipeline for both firms, driving CAC down and SOV up. Her exceptional leadership and innovative approach earned her recognition as CMO of the Year by WealthManagement.com.

Today, Intention.ly represents the culmination of every lesson Waltrich has learned in her tenure as a marketing disruptor. Under her leadership, the growth engine design agency has experienced remarkable growth of its own, serving 100+ fintech and financial services firms while establishing itself at the forefront of AI-powered marketing innovation. Waltrich conceptualized and brought to market Intention.ly’s groundbreaking Advisor Brand Builder initiative, a generative AI solution that revolutionizes how financial firms approach brand development and marketing strategy.

As an advisor to several high-growth tech firms, Waltrich continues to shape the industry’s marketing evolution. She’s also a frequently requested contributor to major trade publications and host of the “Don’t Do That” podcast, which has struck a resonant chord across the fintech, financial services, and tech leadership communities by delivering unique “what not to do” lessons from real-world leaders.

Intention.ly is born from Waltrich’s passion and persistent belief that when it’s done right, marketing is the accelerant firms need to transform their growth trajectory. Through cutting-edge AI innovation and proven strategic expertise, she continues to disrupt an industry ready for transformation.

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