We recently conducted a series of CMO roundtables featuring a total of 19 healthtech and life sciences tech heads of marketing with revenue and pipeline responsibility to find out if, and how, marketing is being seen by their CEOs and boards. The results are fascinating. Check them out here:
Marketing is finally being treated like a business function
Most CMOs are still fighting the same fight
There’s a quiet but important shift happening in healthtech marketing. The old conversation, proving marketing’s value, is still there. But it’s evolving into something sharper: can marketing actually drive growth in a way the CEO and board respect?
That’s the core theme from the CMO Report. At Sirona, we recently sat down with 19 healthtech and life sciences CMOs to understand how they’re navigating that shift, and one thing is clear. The bar is higher now. Marketing is no longer a support function. It’s expected to show up like a revenue engine.
1. The MQL era is dying (good riddance)
There’s broad agreement that traditional MQL-driven thinking is breaking down. It’s too easy to game, too disconnected from revenue, and too divorced from how healthcare buying actually works.
Instead, teams are moving toward MQAs and account-based thinking. Fewer leads, more context. Less volume, more signal.
The implication is obvious: if you’re still reporting on lead counts, you’re already losing credibility.
2. CMOs are learning to speak finance, not marketing
The strongest leaders aren’t defending marketing anymore. They’ve changed how they talk: pipeline, payback periods, and capital allocation. They align marketing metrics with how the CFO already thinks about the business.
This is less about dashboards and more about translation. Marketing only gets taken seriously when it uses the same language as the rest of the exec team.
3. Brand is back, but with teeth
Brand isn’t a “nice to have” anymore. It’s a functional growth lever, especially as AI reshapes how buyers discover vendors. If search is shifting toward AI-driven answers, then brand becomes the filter for who even shows up. That changes the ROI equation entirely.
The CMOs in the report aren’t debating brand vs demand. They’re integrating them, and have commitment for set brand budgets.
4. The job is bigger than marketing
One of the more interesting threads: growth problems are rarely just marketing problems.
CMOs are getting pulled into product, sales, ops, even customer experience. Not because they want to, but because the system doesn’t work otherwise.
In healthcare and in life sciences especially, fragmented processes and long buying cycles mean marketing can’t succeed in isolation. The role is expanding whether companies are ready for it or not.
What this means
Most teams are still early in this transition. They’re being asked to drive growth like a revenue function, but they’re still operating with legacy metrics, legacy expectations, and legacy org structures.
The takeaway is pretty simple. If you want marketing to matter, you have to run it like a business function. That means fewer vanity metrics, tighter alignment with revenue, and a willingness to step outside the traditional marketing lane.
I'm Abdul, the healthcare and life sciences marketer, and CEO / Co-Founder of Sirona Marketing. We focus on GTM and marketing support for healthtech and life sciences companies. If you need help with your marketing, let us know. If we can't help you, we know people who can.
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