Chief Marketing Officer Executive Search

The CMO who owns brand & demand.

Partner-led marketing search for PE-backed, high-growth, and public companies. From placing NVIDIA’s first CMO to delivering a 100-day median close for marketing searches, we secure leaders who drive enterprise value.

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95% Referral Rate
85% Referral Rate
4.9 out of 5 rating
98% Placement Rate
The Role

Chief Marketing Officer
executive search

Every CMO search starts with the same unspoken question: is this a demand seat or a brand seat? Getting that wrong fills the slate with the wrong pool, because revenue-accountable CMOs and brand-led CMOs rarely overlap. The seat is also being rebuilt around AI tooling, and Gartner reports only 30% of CMOs have the infrastructure to scale it, which puts stack architecture inside the spec. We name the lean of the seat before outreach begins. Our marketing searches close in a median of 100 days, the fastest function we run.

Source:  Gartner 2026 CMO Spend Survey | ON Partners Widening Gap Report 2026

The Roles We Place

Demand seat or brand seat? Three CMO archetypes

Most CMO searches anchor on the wrong archetype. The candidate pool for revenue-accountable CMOs is structurally different from the brand-led pool. We name which one before week one.

Owns pipeline, demand, and brand against revenue targets. The most-requested CMO archetype in PE-backed and growth-stage companies in 2026.

  • Owns pipeline contribution and demand-gen attribution

  • Defends marketing spend in board-level financial review

  • Built or rebuilt the modern marketing tech stack

  • Partners closely with CRO and CFO

Leads brand, media, creative, and consumer insights. Hired into consumer goods, retail, and direct-to-consumer companies where brand equity drives the business.

  • Has built brand at scale across digital and traditional media

  • Comfortable with creative leadership and agency management

  • Strong consumer insights and category-development instincts

  • Holds CFO partnership without being absorbed by ROI conversations

Leads marketing in large or public B2B companies. Carries proxy-relevant communications work, analyst relations, and global brand discipline.

  • Has held marketing through a multi-quarter transformation

  • Comfortable with analyst relations and investor communications

  • Strong product marketing and category-leadership instincts

  • Partners closely with the CEO on positioning

Sample of our work
In their words

What clients say after the placement.

1 / 4
“

So responsive, quickly dialed in to what we needed, didn't push us to consider candidates who weren't a fit, very honestly evaluated talent, and helped us rank candidates.  Overall, I was very very pleased with our experience with the team.

QSR & Multi-Unit Consumer Brands
President
Adjacent Capabilities

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Other

Our clients

Companies trust ON Partners

Common Questions

What leaders may ask before a search

 B2B SaaS CMOs specialize in high-velocity demand generation, advanced marketing operations, and product marketing architecture. Consumer CMOs focus on macro brand equity, direct-to-consumer media mix optimization, and creative leadership—creating a functional divide where candidate pools rarely overlap during a search.