Hey there Croners! Welcome back to 5 Tips for Wannabe CMOs, our marketing column where we get to know great marketers, their stories and some inspiring tips for the next generation of CMOs.
Aspiring to be a CMO is exciting, but it’s also a challenging journey, especially in fast-moving industries like B2B SaaS, where trends shift quickly and competition is fierce.
In the last episode at down with Loana Junge, CMO with over 10 years of experience, to hear her top tips for marketers dreaming big. Loana has spent her career building memorable brands, aligning teams, and turning marketing into a real growth engine.
I still remember once standing in front of a supermarket shelf filled with cream cheeses, different brands and different packaging, but in truth, most of them tasted almost identical.
I thought to myself, how do you stand out when the product itself isn’t that different?
I ended up choosing Philadelphia. Not because of the taste, but because of their branding. The TV ad about creaminess stuck with me, and the packaging just looked more appealing. That moment clicked for me. To get your products sold, you have to step into your customer’s shoes and understand what value they are actually buying and how you can make your product mean something to them.
That fascination pulled me toward Marketing. I was captivated by how it sits right at the intersection of psychology and product, so I chose it as my major and later pursued a Master’s program fully dedicated to Marketing. Fast-forward 15 years, and that curiosity has only deepened.
What keeps me excited today is how Marketing, especially in B2B, keeps evolving. It is complex, fast-paced, and forces you to continuously reinvent not just what you market, but how you market. There was a time when I used our marketing tech stack itself as a differentiator. We were faster, more personalized, and more relevant than our competitors, and that gave us an edge.
But that advantage will not last forever. With GenAI making automation and productivity gains accessible to everyone, the tech gap will close. So now we are going full circle, back to the core of why customers fall in love with a product. It is rarely about features. It is because the brand gives them something deeper: identity, belonging, or the sense of having a partner by their side that helps them achieve something they could not do alone.
Slack is a perfect example. It is not just a communication tool; it has turned workplace communication into something fun and instant. Slack made work feel lighter. Shopify did the same for e-commerce entrepreneurs. It became a trusted partner for retailers, proving that you do not need a big team to start or grow a business online. That emotional connection is where real brand magic lives.
When I first started out, I gave everything to my team, prioritizing their needs, optimizing processes, and trying to grow their skills.
It felt like the right thing to do, but I realized that even if that helps individuals grow, it does not necessarily move the company forward.
The biggest impact comes when you align with your peers and the board. Those are the people who will help your team succeed.
I have seen many leaders start with what they want. But when decisions do not serve the company first, it eventually hurts everyone, including the team.
Amazon is a great example of how to implement that. For them, customer obsession is company priority number one, and all employees will always put everything else second.
You will never be truly effective if you try to mimic someone else’s leadership style.
Authenticity is your biggest advantage and your biggest personal brand lever.
When you join a new company as CMO, 60 percent of your experience will serve you, but you will need to unlearn 40 percent and adapt to “what’s working already” and “what is not”.
Simply copy-pasting playbooks never works.
5. Redefine marketing success
Leads and MQLs are vanity metrics if they are not tied to revenue and retention.
The goal is not more leads, but the right leads from the right customers. Prioritize ICP acquisition and long-term LTV over volume.
That is how marketing becomes a growth engine instead of a cost center.
We are only as good as the team around us, and that means every function that helps us realize our goals. Marketing does not operate in isolation. It is connected to Sales, Customer Success, Product, Operations, Finance, and People teams.
Understanding what drives each of those teams saves you a lot of frustration when things need to move quickly. For example, Sales will always focus on quarterly goals, while Marketing often plays the longer game. That means my job is to make sure we support their short-term wins and keep an eye on sustainable growth.
Customer Success, on the other hand, is laser-focused on NPS and retention. The insights that come from those teams are gold for shaping messaging and campaigns that actually resonate.
And Product? They want to ship great things, but great features do not sell themselves. Marketing’s role is to translate those features into clear, human value that customers can instantly connect with.
When you understand each team’s motivations and pressures, alignment stops being a challenge and becomes part of how you naturally operate.
Most of the friction between Sales and Marketing comes from misaligned goals or expectations. It sounds simple, yet beats most other processes that I’ve seen: The easiest way to fix that is consistent, open communication.
One practice that has made a huge difference for me is a standing 30-minute weekly sync with the Sales leader on a Friday afternoon. It is not a status meeting; it is an informal space to talk honestly about both our challenges, what is working, and where we need to adjust when working together.
That simple rhythm of collaboration and trust paid off massively. In one year, we increased revenue by 180 percent. But beyond the numbers, the real win was that we stopped working in silos and started pulling in the same direction.
When Sales and Marketing see each other as partners instead of functions, everything, from pipeline to performance, gets better.