Why CISOs Should Make Friends With Their CMOs

It might not seem like CISOs and CMOs have much in common, but both executives stand to gain by becoming allies.

Every day cybersecurity factors, such as bad breach publicity and phishing impersonators, erode enterprise brands — thereby diminishing the effectiveness of a CMO's daily efforts. Brand value goes down, email marketing ROI gets trashed, and customer churn increases, all of which reflect poorly on the chief marketer. CMOs need help from CISOs to lock down risk factors. On the flip side, CISOs grapple with a number of challenges that CMOs could help them with, including insecure marketing technology and communication processes, breach response communication, and inadequate budget for preserving brand value.

While CISOs and CMOs might never become corporate besties, there's clearly a lot of room for some mutual back-scratching. Here are some proof points to show why a partnership between this pair of executives can benefit both parties, as well as their companies.