Alice de Courcy is the former CMO of Cognism. She joined when the company was just below £3M in revenue and left as it was approaching £100M ARR nearly seven years later. Over that time, she built a marketing organization of 28 people operating across European markets and the US. She has since written two books on the CMO role and now works as a fractional CMO.
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She joined Cognism as Head of Marketing, not CMO. She earned the title, year after year, by treating each year as if she needed to re-interview for the role. That’s the mindset this entire conversation is built around.
Here’s what I took away.
1) There’s an epidemic of CMOs who won’t execute. CEOs are scared to hire marketing leaders because they expect a positioning document, not a growth engine. Alice’s view is direct: when marketers ask to be “more strategic,” they’re often asking to stop doing the work. Execution never stops, regardless of seniority.
2) Gated content is a math problem. It took 25 demo requests versus 100 gated content leads to close a single deal. The ACV on content leads was also half the size of demo leads. When she modeled that and showed it to the C-suite, the conversation shifted immediately.
3) Builders and managers are not the same hire. Bringing in a senior marketer from Salesforce sounds like a shortcut. But someone who spent 10 years delivering a playbook they didn’t build has never built one. Alice’s position: she wouldn’t make that hire for a build phase. The only exception is someone who has already done a build phase somewhere in between.
4) Internal marketing is the actual job. Always having the numbers. Communicating wins proactively before being asked. Repeating until it lands. That’s what built trust with the CEO and the board, not the strategy deck.
5) The content engine has four layers. Authority content, owning the industry narrative. Product-linked content, connecting topics to the offer. Social proof validation from outside voices. And distribution. Without distribution, the other three don’t exist.
Where to find Alice: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alice-de-courcy-5205516a/
The diary of a first-time CMO: https://amzn.eu/d/0h0vDLCC
The diary of a first-time CMO: Volume 2 : https://amzn.eu/d/04Dn3lUa
Enjoy,
— Jordan
