As marketing budgets come under increased scrutiny, the relationship between the CFO and CMO takes on greater importance. However, just 22% of marketers strongly feel they have enough data to justify value to their CFOs, according to new research from Perion and Advertiser Perceptions.
“We're entering a pivotal year for marketing. There's a lot of talk about the complexity of marketing,” said Erin McCallion, global CMO, Perion. “The expectations from the C-suite just keep rising. We really wanted to understand where the tension points are and what's helping the CMOs and CFO stay better aligned.”
“Bridging The Divide: Solving Fragmentation Between Marketing and Finance” includes data from 167 U.S. and Canada-based marketers collected via a survey fielded between Aug. 28 and Sept. 10, 2025. Respondents were senior-level decision makers with at least $1 million of annual advertising spending. The majority were based in the U.S. and 46% were at the vice president level and above. Half of respondents made decisions with input from staff or management, 36% were sole decision makers and 14% made decisions as part of a committee or group.
Cost-benefit analysis
While both job positions focus on growth, how that growth is accomplished varies, according to the report. CMOs tend to focus on driving revenue through strategic spending while CFOs tend to focus on profitability and cost control. This relationship has become more complex as consumer behavior changes. A fragmented media landscape has made campaign performance more difficult to track, further muddling the meaning of success.
Of respondents, just 21% agree that they are completely aligned with their CFO around marketing budgets and metrics. However, for the CFO, metrics matter. Sixty-two percent of marketers said their CFO sees marketing as a “revenue driver with measurable proof.” The same percentage said they need better tools to show how marketing contributes to the bottom line.
“The CFO does play a significant role in deciding where the investments go across the organization, and so having that shared language and the shared understanding of what investments are driving business outcomes are very important,” said McCallion. “If the CMO cannot bridge that gap, it makes their remit that much more challenging.”
The current state of ad tech has made it difficult for marketing to prove value to finance, according to the report. While respondents indicated they track some performance across ad tech and martech platforms, 70% said there is still a gap while 7% said they were unable to track holistic performance across platforms.
Organizing the data
The disconnect has significantly impacted the ability of marketing departments to prove their value. The majority of respondents without a unified system in place, 71%, said that disconnection between ad tech and martech systems has at least somewhat limited their ability to prove marketing's value. Twenty-one percent said the disconnect has significantly impacted their ability to prove marketing's value while just 8% said there were no issues.
Ninety-seven percent of marketers operating on a singular system are aligned when it comes to understanding outcomes and ad spend, compared to just 63% of those without. A similar trend is seen with marketing budgets and metrics, with 97% of those with a single funnel saying they are aligned with their CFO in this area, compared to 66% with data spread across multiple platforms.
“The CMO-CFO relationship has evolved, but many marketers are still flying blind,” said Lauren Fisher, general manager of business intelligence at Advertiser Perceptions in press materials. “In the absence of clear, unified data, even the most sophisticated teams struggle to prove marketing’s financial impact.”
