Everyone’s heard of Chartered Accountants because there are hundreds of thousands of them across the UK.
357,200 registered members of the eight main professional accounting bodies in the UK at the end of 2022 to be precise, according to the Consultative Committee of Accountancy Bodies report of January 2024.
Chartered Marketers in the UK however number only 2,557 compared to the 2.4 million people on LinkedIn UK who call themselves marketers. In fact there are only 18,000 UK based members of the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM), the leading professional body.
Now that’s not to say that the other 2,377,443 marketers are rubbish – far from it. Many of my best friends are brilliant and instinctive marketers who learned on the job, much like I did before pushing myself down the CIM qualifications route some 20 years after my first marketing gig.
I’ve also met some amazingly technically gifted people who specialise in super niche areas of marketing such as search engine optimization. These areas are essential for seamless digital experiences and data-driven insights. However, having such a deep understanding of a niche area isn’t going to help you get the bigger picture and develop an understanding of business requirements and growth.
Business growth is not about followers, likes and shares. Business growth is about increasing revenue, whether through volume or value of sales against operating costs. And marketers have to be all over the numbers, the insight and analysis as well as the creativity, brand and product positioning and channels.
Once we have attained our Chartered Marketer status, we have to maintain it every year by submitting Continuing Professional Development (CPD) either through activity credits and attendance for affiliates and associates, or by reflective statements on activity undertaken for fellows and members. Read more about how to become a Chartered Marketer.
Professional Marketing Competences – Chartered Institute of Marketing
Every year for the last seven years since I gained my chartered status, I seek out CPD activities and sources of insight to make sure I keep up with all the latest developments. And digital technology has transformed the ways and channels that we as marketers engage with our audience. But that doesn’t mean that we should forget about the guiding principles and parameters of professional marketing – the 7Ps. More of that later…
The infographic above illustrates the different areas of competence that every Chartered Marketer is assessed against from core – insights, customer and strategy to the eight technical areas and the 10 behaviours that are the mark of a CIM marketing professional.
Not every Chartered Marketer will be an expert in every one of these areas – but as professional senior leaders we need to be aware of their impact and value in creating coherent and credible strategies, while carefully considering every parameter. What I mean by that is that you can’t create a robust and rounded strategy regardless of the product or service, without kicking the tyres on each of these key areas.
Global Professional Marketing Framework – Chartered Institute of Marketing
Recently the CIM introduced a new skills and behaviours-based framework Global Professional Marketing Framework designed to set the industry standard.
The infographic below is a snapshot that illustrates the pillars of excellence that drive marketing impact, the goal of every marketing team across the globe every professional marketer should strive for – direction, capability, professionalism and impact. Every course, assessment and piece of content that the CIM develops, including chartered status, are designed to develop the capabilities of the next generation of marketers through this focused framework.
For more detailed explanations of the eight essential marketing capabilities highlighted below, please go to the CIM’s website Global Professional Marketing Framework.
The services and expertise which I offer are broadly aligned to a mixture of the core competencies, technical expertise and essential business skills that should be a hygiene factor for any commercial professional in a senior leadership position – leadership, strategy, customer focus, commercialisation and insight and analysis.
In conclusion, a Chartered Marketer is a member of the CIM, who has committed to continual professional devleopment and actively seeks out activities that focus on areas of our knowledge that need refreshed or strengthened.
There were only 2,557 of us in the UK at the end of April. And there are only 587 Fellows who are also CIM Chartered Marketers in the UK. Of those, only 316 FCIM Chartered Marketers (like me) also hold a level 7 Professional Postgraduate CIM qualification in the UK. Those qualifications and letters after my name mean a huge amount to me – my professional licence to operate, combined with decades of experience combine to give my clients the power of professional marketing.
