Unilever has announced that Keith Weed, its chief marketing and communications officer, has been named as the most influential chief marketer globally, according to the latest Forbes 'World’s Most Influential CMOs' report.
Weed has been at the helm of Unilever’s marketing function since 2010, and has taken the top spot due to his 'broad visibility and engagement across multiple channels’.
He is vocal about key industry issues, calling on digital platforms to deliver on ‘value, view-ability and verification’, and promoting the need for sustainable brands.
Weed was also key in setting up the Unstereotype Alliance, which is a partnership with UN Women and industry leaders including WPP, Facebook and Google. The Alliance aims to banish stereotypical portrayals of gender in advertising and all brand-led content.
Consumer Centered
The Forbes report, developed in partnership with Sprinklr and LinkedIn, ranks the world’s most influential chief marketing officers, and takes a look at what brought them to that position. It also examines how today’s marketing environment is changing and what it takes to be the ‘CMO of tomorrow’.
Ragy Thomas, Sprinklr CEO and founder, said, “As marketing has shifted from being all about the brand to being all about the customer, the role of the CMO has completely changed".
“Leading CMOs must orchestrate more personalised, more holistic experiences for customers. They have to go from being the mouthpiece for the brand to being the eyes and ears.”
In the report, a CMO’s influence is defined as ‘the impact a chief marketer’s actions and words have on his or her internal organisation’s motivation and performance, corporate brand perception, broader marketing and advertising industry trends, and corporate financial performance, including stock price’.
© 2017 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Aidan O’Sullivan. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine.
