The New Corporate Digital Leadership – Chief Internet Officers

By Evan Kramer
VP/GM GoHoming.com
Leading Chief Internet Officer

December 3, 2009 Copyright © ChiefInternetOffers.com by Evan Kramer

Introduction
Corporations have taken a big leap forward over the past decade by adding or advancing
digital properties to its portfolio of assets in order to better leverage or extend its brand.
Most of this has been under the extended responsibility to the CTO or CMO or both.
Fortune 500 Companies have created and monetized web sites and digital products.
During this time, you have noticed the emergence of start-up competitors that have
leaped past big companies while the bigger companies just sit and watch. For example,
how did Amazon.com beat Barnes and Noble to the punch and why couldn’t Barnes and
Noble react more quickly given their resources? In addition, companies like EBay and
Craigslist have dominated major media assets such as local newspaper companies. Why
should there even be a market for online real estate, automotive or job web sites that
don’t come from the companies who own the product themselves? Travel companies?

Problem Statement
The problem is that the “big company” has not been positioned to manage a digital
business. As Jack Welch had put it, the strategy or the “ah ha” idea is really only just
20%, but it is the execution that wins out. I firmly believe that the “big company” has not
been positioned properly for the execution – regardless of its digital strategy.

Previous Options
Previously, options were to hire a more experienced CMO, invest in consultants and
interactive agencies, or perhaps an acquisition.

CiO Solution
Chief Internet Officer

Benefit 1- Organization Management

A CiO should be able to provide the insight as to how to best
structure an organization to support an e-business. A CiO
should have run and/or built a start-up and have been
involved in a Corporate start-up. Having such frame of
reference will allow the CiO to know what they need the
organization structure to look like in order to succeed and
what they need to do to make the appropriate changes. For
example, it is important to re-evaluate ‘functional’ or ‘matrix’
designs and support more business unit-like designs. In
addition, it is important to evaluate how product, marketing
and technology are structured as well as the process within
each. In today’s world of Agile development and stronger
performing technologies and methods, the organization

December 3, 2009 Copyright © ChiefInternetOffers.com by Evan Kramer

 should not be driven by RUP approaches, business analysis
and such.

Benefit 2 – Strength of Distribution

The CiO can clearly advantage a larger company by
leveraging its assets to acquire distribution. There seems to
be a middle ground today between a CMO and CTO where
the CMO is skilled at “marketing” and the CTO is skilled at
“technology development”. Distribution blends both skills
and is often overlooked. Large companies spend too much
money on advertising and media agencies when they could
merely be deploying more web pages and creating partner
relationships to leverage strength of distribution.

Benefit 3 – Architecture – Information and Technology

Perhaps the most overlooked of all is information and
technology architecture. Where the CiO position most
benefits an organization is the ability to assist with IA and
Technology and meet project demands (this benefit blends a
bit with “speed to market”). On the IA side, many companies
utilize large sets of data to conduct their business both
internal and external. The ability to account for IA is a skill
that needs to be accommodated for in Marketing plans that is
often overlooked. With respect to Technology architecture, it
is often overlooked how much larger companies are not
properly set up to conduct an e-business – even today. As
CMO’s prepare to launch new initiatives on top of older
technology architectures, they could be building a house of
cards that may not be supportable long term or that may be
causing hardship to support internally or to push to
production. A CiO should have the insight on how to best
match resources and strategy with technology architecture.

Benefit 4 – Speed to Market

Speed to market is the final benefit. Not to give away any
secrets in the this one as it truly is a ‘secret sauce’ for many
others in my field but the ‘process’ deployed internally to
produce product and marketing initiatives is essential.
Today, there are dozens of variations of Agile methodologies
from which to select that will improve a business’ speed to
market.

December 3, 2009 Copyright © ChiefInternetOffers.com by Evan Kramer

 Implementation
Need to target a candidate for the CiO position. Prior to the
filling the role, the Company must take the internal political
will necessary for the CiO to execute. As such the following
needs to occur:
1. Generate the appropriate the political corporate will
for the CiO to succeed
a. Allow the CiO to re-arrange the organizational
structure as necessary to support the Internet
b. Allow the CiO to separate consumer digital
initiatives with separate infrastructure policies
c. Allow the CiO to manage digital initiatives to
a business plan rather than a budget
2. Source a candidate with the appropriate skill sets
a. Remember, nobody can have 20 years of
Internet experience. Do the math. It wasn’t
until the mid-90’s that Internet/Digital
businesses took shape. Even then, few people
entered the category. Ten years of experience
is senior.
b. The candidate needs to be both well-rounded
and have managed a P&L. By well-rounded,
they need to be strongest at online sales and
marketing but also have managed product
development, web development and have a
strong understanding of finance and
operations.
c. The candidate should have been in BOTH a
corporate start up leadership role and pure
start leadership role.

Summary
The CiO is the next C-level digital leadership position. With
this position, large companies, or even mid-size companies
looking to grow their digital business, can truly leverage its e-
business more effectively.

December 3, 2009 Copyright © ChiefInternetOffers.com by Evan Kramer

December 3, 2009 Copyright © ChiefInternetOffers.com by Evan Kramer