Why CMO Needs to Be Involved in Privacy Policy Creation
As a CMO, do you have much involvement in your company’s privacy policy? I’m sure, thanks to the GDPR and other laws that have passed recently, that your company has recently updated your privacy policy. But were you included in the discussion? Privacy policy—often left to the suits in legal—is about to become the most important issue a CMO can manage effectively. In fact, I’d argue it already has. Still, most CMOs are too sidetracked by AR, AI, blockchain and other new technologies to fully engage with it. Since marketers gather and use most of the data pulled by businesses today, however, it’s essential that they begin to take a leading role in crafting privacy policy—whether they like it or not.
Yes, CMOs already have a lot riding on their shoulders when it comes to managing the omnichannel experience in an ever-changing digital landscape. But thanks to increasingly complex legal hurdles surrounding privacy, from the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation to California’s Consumer Privacy Act, utilizing data in today’s expansive martech realm is becoming incredibly tricky. It makes sense that CMOs should be brushing up on their legalese.
To be fair, CMOs are finding themselves in a bit of a technology pickle. In a new report Futurum Research did in conjunction with SAS found that 67 percent of consumers are concerned with the way brands are using their data. 70 percent of consumers believe they should be able to see what data a company has captured on them. As such, marketing teams are tasked with the seemingly impossible job of personalizing their actions with consumers—without being too invasive about the personal information they gather.
Yes, dealing with privacy concerns can be a struggle, but it can also be a huge opportunity for positive growth in customer experience and engagement. The following are a few reasons CMOs need to start taking a leadership role in privacy policy development—and why the benefits may be bigger than they realize.
In fact, it’s integral to it. And when CMOs take a leading position on creating it for the company, they also have a huge opportunity to either rebuild or recalibrate the company’s brand for the better. Research shows that consumers want increased transparency from big business. 65 percent of people, in fact, wish that companies had a more transparent privacy policy. What’s more, they’re more willing to hand over their data when they know the companies they’re dealing with are being transparent. They want to shop with retailers who are upfront about how they’re obtaining data and why.
