The Role of a Fractional CRO in Building a Holistic Revenue Strategy

The traditional executive board structure is no longer enough for a modern business. Rather than having silos built between marketing, sales, customer success, and finance, those four teams need to work together to ensure every facet of the customer experience is seamless and excellent. That can't happen if the marketing team reports to the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) and the path stops there, just like reaching out to repeat customers with nuanced marketing copy can't happen when upsells pass the desk of the VP of Sales and slide into the "done" pile. When you have a Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) at the top of the revenue departments and functions structure, all the pieces start to fit together much more holistically.

In fact, the fundamental role of a Chief Revenue Officer is about making sure 'holistic' is the name of the game for your organization. Take a closer look at what a CRO is, how they can pave the way to holistic revenue growth, and how to make it happen for your own company.

Let's Review What a CRO Is

The Chief Revenue Officer role is a position on an organization's executive team. They report directly to the CEO, and the CMO and VP of Sales report directly to the CRO. In some organizations, the CFO may report to or collaborate with the CRO more than in traditional C-suite structures.

Their key priority is creating revenue growth that is reliable, predictable, and (whenever possible) scalable.

They do this by:

• Implementing and refining workflows across the client experience

• Ensuring all of the cogs — or teams — in the revenue engine are properly aligned to collaborate and succeed

• Creating cost-effective methods of getting recurring business and client retention

• Continually improving on The Customer's Journey

What Role Can a Fractional CRO Play in Building Your Holistic Revenue Strategy?

A good CRO can't be over-valued. Because of the unique structure of the role, a CRO can bring a fresh perspective to every element of the client and revenue sides of your business.

After all, their job isn't to ensure departmental success or compliance; their job is to ensure your organization's revenue grows by ensuring The Customer's Journey is strong. 

The only role at the same or higher elevation is the CEO, who can often be preoccupied with focusing on investors or the product. While they focus almost entirely on these vital responsibilities, everything else can fade to the background. This leads to founders and CEOs feeling like they're stuck in the weeds and can't make holistic improvements to the problems crossing their desks. 

CROs, especially if they have a strong team of an experienced marketer who can guide the inbound engine, a Head of Sales who can organize, train, and focus a sales team as it grows, and Customer Success Directors who want to proactively rather than reactively provide support. But even CROs (and CMOs or VPs of Sales who take on the additional responsibilities of a CRO) can lose focus on the holistic view of revenue needs.

That's where a Fractional CRO comes in. A fractional — or consultative — CRO can offer your organization these four benefits.

1. Emotion-Free Analysis

The first step a CRO has to take is to analyze an organization's strengths and weaknesses. Then that responsibility continues throughout the rest of their time in that position. A strong analysis sets the foundation for identifying risks that sink your organization and opportunities that can rocket you to the top of your market space. 

Because this analysis is so vital, it has to be emotion-free. A Fractional CRO doesn't have emotional baggage to consider, biases for work friends in the organization, and other roadblocks that can interfere with the analysis. Instead, they can focus on uncovering problems and identifying the right move to take next. CEOs, CMOs, and other executive team members can also rely on a Fractional CRO as a sort of 'third party' involved in making uncomfortable changes while still fostering growth and healthy work culture.

2. Holistic Sounding Board

At the same time, a CRO will start building relationships with key stakeholders throughout the revenue departments; these relationships will be based on skill, utility, and results. By fostering work-focused relationships with key personnel in marketing, sales, customer success, and  RevOps roles, they can quickly gain insight into how the organization performs and operates. Just like a Fractional CRO can be the visible impetus for unpopular changes, they can be the audience for unpopular opinions and insights that employees don't want to say to the people signing their paychecks or making decisions about bonuses. 

3. Breadth of Experience

'CRO' is still a relatively new role, but our experts at the House of Revenue® are far from inexperienced. Our Fractional CROs and consultants come from a wide range of backgrounds with years of professional experience as CMOs, VPs of Sales, top-performing marketers, and everything in-between. Good CROs need to have dynamic experiences and work histories, so they don't overly favor sales versus marketing or understand the inner workings of one department while being completely unfamiliar with another.

We'll help you find a CRO that matches your organization's needs, whether you're focused on ramping up your revenue or you need to lay the groundwork for organizational success.

4. Galvanization

Your organization has to be excited. Good workflows and strong strategy won't be enough if your teams don't buy into your organization and plans. A CRO improves communication and the dynamic between revenue teams by breaking down silos, increasing camaraderie, and giving everyone the resources they need to be productive and take action.

As a result of these four elements that only a strong Fractional CRO can provide, your organization will see better ideation, communication, strategy deployment, and team and individual development.

Build Your Revenue Strategy with the Right Fractional CRO from House of Revenue

If you're wondering if a Fractional CRO is the right next step for your organization, ask us! If we decide that it is the right next step for your business, we'll help you forge a solid internal structure without siloed departments, create individualized strategies to increase your revenue, and actually help you build an overall better business by working directly alongside you.  Contact us today to see if we're your perfect partner to get started.