76% of UK Business Leaders Think Marketers Overstate Their Revenue Impact, Propolis Finds
TL;DR: A Propolis study of 150 UK CEOs and B2B leaders finds 76% believe marketers overstate their revenue impact, and 88% say marketing needs to speak the 'language of business' — a stark measure of the boardroom credibility gap.
What the research found
B2B community Propolis surveyed 150 UK CEOs and business leaders and found a pointed credibility gap. Some 76% believe marketers overstate their impact on revenue, while 88% say marketing needs a stronger command of the 'language of business'.
It is not all bad news: 83% said they would back brand investment that was shown to have commercial credibility. In other words, leaders are not anti-marketing — they are anti-vagueness. CEO Richard O'Connor framed the findings as a call for marketers to connect their work to business outcomes.
Marketing Minute's read: the gap is a language problem, not a value problem
The instinctive marketer's reaction is defensiveness. The more useful reading is that the same leaders who doubt marketing's numbers will fund it when the case is framed commercially. The barrier is translation, not belief.
Marketing has spent years perfecting its own dialect — reach, engagement, brand equity — and comparatively little time learning finance's. Pipeline, margin, customer lifetime value and payback period are the words that move a boardroom. Fluency in them is now a core marketing skill, not a nice-to-have.
What CMOs should do about it
Start every board conversation with the commercial outcome and work back to the activity, not the other way round. Attribution will never be perfect, but a credible, conservatively-argued link to revenue beats an impressive-sounding metric no one on the finance side trusts.
The brands that win budget in the next cycle will be the ones whose marketers can sit in a finance meeting and hold their own. This study is a useful, uncomfortable mirror — and a reminder that effectiveness is as much about how you argue it as how you measure it.
Quick FAQ
What did the Propolis study find?
It found that 76% of surveyed UK business leaders believe marketers overstate their revenue impact, 88% want marketing to speak a stronger 'language of business', and 83% would back brand investment shown to have commercial credibility.
Who was surveyed?
Propolis surveyed 150 UK CEOs and B2B business leaders. The research was published in September 2026, with Propolis CEO Richard O'Connor commenting on the findings.
What should marketers take from it?
The gap is about translation, not value: leaders will fund marketing when it is framed in commercial terms like pipeline, margin and payback. Fluency in finance's language is now a core marketing skill.
This isn't leaders rejecting marketing — 83% will fund it when the case is commercial. The gap is language. Marketers who can walk into a finance meeting and talk pipeline, margin and payback will win the budget; those who lead with reach and engagement won't. — Daniel Nikolla, Founder of Merx Marketing
The takeaway: the boardroom credibility gap is a translation problem — learn to argue marketing in the language of pipeline, margin and payback, and the budget follows.
Can your marketing team hold its own in a finance meeting — and if not, what's the one metric you'd start with?
If you would like to know more about this topic, please contact us on danieln@merxmarketing.co.uk
Sources: CFOtech UK, New Digital Age.
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Written by Daniel Nikolla, Founder of Merx Marketing Ltd and Marketing Minute
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