Most CMOs and marketing leaders don’t need to become finance experts. But they do need to plan like finance expects.
Because while marketers are often busy explaining campaign performance and top-of-funnel volume, finance leaders are thinking in terms of risks, ranges, options, and forecasts tied to measurable outcomes. When those two styles of planning don’t line up, trust erodes, and budgets often follow.
This article outlines the shift B2B marketing leaders need to make in order to plan the way finance already does. The good news? It’s not about losing your independence. As Chris Crawford, Head of FP&A at InfluxDB, put it:
“I don’t dictate because I’m not the domain expert. Now that being said, I absolutely will opine, knowing full well I’m not the expert there.”
“You hire the CMO and CRO and empower them to do their job. You don’t need finance coming in over the top saying, ‘No, I don’t believe you.’”
Finance doesn’t want to dictate your plan. But they do expect you to show your math.
The pressure trap: One number, one plan
Most CMOs are handed a pipeline or revenue target and asked to “hit the number.” Often, they return with a spreadsheet: one column of channels, one line of budget, one row of results. No ranges. No assumptions. No backup plan.
It creates a fragile situation where any variable can break the whole model. As Crawford noted:
“I don’t love [marketing’s forecast models]. It’s a string of logical assumptions, ‘if this, then this, then convert at this percent’ but if anything goes wrong, the whole bottom-line number doesn’t manifest.”
Sound familiar?
What your CFO actually wants
Most CFOs aren’t looking for a perfect model or a flawless forecast. They’re looking for credibility. Marketing can earn it by planning like finance does.
Here’s what they’re really hoping to see:
- Transparency of assumptions: Show how you got to your numbers and what needs to be true for them to work.
- Confidence ranges, not false precision: CFOs know not everything goes to plan. A credible plan accounts for uncertainty.
- Options and scenarios: Don’t just show “the plan.” Show alternatives and tradeoffs.
- Risk awareness: Highlight what might go wrong, what levers you have, and how you’ll adjust.
- Connection to business outcomes: Focus less on marketing KPIs and marketing credit; instead focus on revenue, efficiency, and lift.
And critically: they want you to verify your optimism.
“Trust, but verify. Metrics help narrate the story, but if there’s not a good return, then we need to start doing things differently.” —Chris Crawford
Why Marketing Plans Often Fall Short
Most marketing plans fall into a few common traps:
- They’re built as single-track forecasts. No alternatives, no contingency paths.
- They present fake ROI; meaning the ROI is typically based on rules for credit instead of actual impact.
- They don’t account for sales team dynamics, even when sales is essential to converting demand into revenue.
- They’re focused on activity, not outcomes. Things like MQLs or sourced pipeline that often don’t tell the whole story.
And maybe most importantly: they’re static. They don’t evolve with new data, and they’re hard to adjust mid-quarter when the environment shifts.
CFOs aren’t looking for marketing to become finance. But they are looking for signals that marketing understands how to make decisions under uncertainty.
CFO-style planning: 5 principles to adopt
You don’t need to adopt finance’s tools or lingo. But you do need to adopt these principles:
- Show ranges, not just targets. Your $20M pipeline target is based on assumptions. Present a base case, a stretch case, and a downside.
- Frame budgets as options. Don’t pitch a single plan. Show tiers or tradeoffs. “At $3M, we expect X. At $4M, we expect Y.”
- Quantify the plan’s risks. If it hinges on a key event, like a sales team expansion, call it out. Plan B should live in the model.
- Model outcomes, not just inputs. Don’t say, “We’ll spend $500K on events.” Say, “$500K on events is forecasted to yield $4M pipeline if sales follow-up capacity holds.”
- Collaborate early with finance. Want to make your budget go further? Work together.
“Marketers shouldn’t have to care about accounting rules—but they kind of do. There are ways to get creative—again, not Enron creative—but creative with contract structure, timing of deposits, and liability recognition to make your budget go further.” —Chris Crawford
A new planning style builds trust
Crawford put it bluntly:
“Your leads are appreciated, but we need convertible pipeline.”
That’s the bar.
If your plan maps budget to real pipeline, links to sales capacity, and includes modeled risks and fallback paths, you’re operating like finance expects.
It doesn’t guarantee approval but it builds trust.
And in a budget-tight environment, trust is your fastest path to a yes.
How Align BI supports this shift
Align BI makes it easy to build this kind of model. Our B2B Marketing Mix Modeling platform:
- Quantifies likely pipeline and revenue from each channel, with diminishing returns baked in
- Allows you to simulate scenarios, shift budgets, and show full-funnel forecasts
- Helps marketing, finance, and sales build joint plans that model the real business, not just vanity metrics
If you’re ready to replace guesswork with a model your CFO would actually trust, let’s talk.
Final thought
Planning like finance doesn’t mean giving up control. It means building shared understanding, faster decisions, and credible investment cases.
And maybe, just maybe, making your next QBR less painful for everyone.