One big reason CMOs last an average of only 21 months may be that few view customers as especially important. In a new study by Forrester Research and Heidrick & Struggles CMOs rated customer-oriented competences far down their priority lists.

When asked about which five competencies are most important to personal success:

• Less than 40% included being the voice of the customer.
• Just over 20% included listening to/interacting with customers.
• Less than 10% included personal knowledge of customers.

Yet 60% of these same marketing execs said that acquiring new customers was their top marketing objective. And more than 70% said visioning and strategic thinking were top competencies for personal success. How do you accomplish either without really understanding customers?

Also interesting: Web 2.0 trends like customer communities and social computing have the most potential to help marketers efficiently and effectively understand customers and prospects, yet marketers rated these as the least important tools for their marketing organization’s future success. A glimmer of hope — they expressed more interest in learning about these approaches than in most of the tools rated highly-important, like customer trends and Web analytics.

Remember James Carville’s famous line back in the first Bill Clinton presidential campaign, “It’s the economy, stupid.” Adapted to marketing: “It’s the customers, stupid.”