Fractional CMO | GTM Visionary

Business-first mindset fractional CMO with experience harmonizing business strategies and marketing tactics across 8 industries.

Christian Hollums

Chief Customer Officer | CMO | Uncensored CMO Podcast host | Speaker | Columnist

An experienced commercial leader with lots of senior level sales & marketing experience running both well established and challenger brands. 

More recently I switched from client side to agency side and I am currently working as Chief Customer Office for System1 the world-leading provider of advertising and innovation testing. I combine this role with being host of the Uncensored CMO podcast which has gone on to be one of the most popular marketing podcasts in the world.

Previous experience includes a short stint as CMO for Brewdog, Marketing Director at Suntory leading some of the UK's most iconic brands, on the Board of Purity Soft Drinks, a Private Equity backed Soft Drink business and working for Britvic Soft Drinks running a 'Seed Brand Unit' in conjunction with Pepsi.

Specialities Include: Podcasting, Feeling Seen - how diverse advertising unites us, effective advertising, successful innovation, winning pitches, challenger brands, business development, brand management, customer activation, field marketing, International marketing, brand turnarounds & creative problem solving.

Jon Evans

15 MUST READ BOOKS

I love reading business books for inspiration and decided to shortlist the 15 books that have had the biggest impact on my career and why

Here they are in no particular order 

1. It's Not How Good You Are, It's How Good You Want to be - Paul Arden

The best book to help get you in the right mindset and also the one with the best sub-title I have ever read "The world's best-selling book by Paul Arden"

2. Great by Choice - Jim Collins

"fire bullets then load the cannon" is the summary of why some businesses thrive despite uncertainty, choas and luck and others don't

3. The Founders Mentality - Chris Zook & James Allen

Why founder led businesses beat management led ones due to acting like an owner, being insurgent and a frontline focus

4. Eating the Big Fish - Adam Morgan

How challenger brands can take on the establishment and win. The essential guide book for all challengers.

5. Black Box Thinking - Matthew Syed

Why most people never learn from failure and how it is a source of competitive advantage for high performing businesses

6. The Tipping Point - Malcolm Gladwell

The little things that can make a big difference and why finding your tipping point is so important

7. The Innovators Dilemma - Claydon Christensen

Why large companies can't innovate and the difference between incremental innovation and disruptive innovation

8. Alchemy - Rory Sutherland

The surprising power of ideas that don't make sense and why irrational thinking is sometimes the best way to solve a problem

9. The Choice Factory - Richard Shotton

The 25 behavioural biases that influence why we buy and how to use them to your advantage

10. Thinking Fast and Slow - Daniel Kahneman

The science behind how we make decisions and the different roles of System1 and System2 ways of thinking

11. How Brands Grow - Byron Sharp

The scientific laws that explain how brands grow that every marketer needs to understand

12. Building Distinctive Brand Assets - Jenni Romaniuk

The importance of building and protecting your distinctive brand assets and how to measure them

13. How Not to Plan - Les Binet and sarah carter

66 ways to screw it up, a brilliant summary of what really matters when managing a brand

14. Look Out - Orlando Wood

How advertising really capture attention and the most comprehensive manual for how to create advertising that really works

15. The Long & The Short of it - Les Binet & Peter Field

How to balance both long and short term approach and why getting that balance right has such a big impact

I have interview many of the above authors on Uncensored CMO so do look them up!

What books have I missed?

Drop me your suggestions below in the comments👇

15 MUST READ BOOKS

2026 PREDICTION - JAGUAR WILL BE HOT

Nothing divided opinion more than the Jaguar re-launch just over a year ago but I am going to make a bold prediction and say 2026 is when the brand will be back in a big way

Here are 5 reasons I believe this is the year of the Jaguar

🔥 RE-POSITIONING AS A COPY OF NOTHING

Jaguar has spent the past couple of decades making cars that other brands do just as well if not better. With the Type-00 they have made a clear statement of intention they will be defining the genre not copying it.

🔥 THE DRIVE IS SENSATIONAL

When the iconic E-Type launch not only was it a thing of beauty but it also had incredible performance and the Type-00 must do the same. Jaguar got a number of experienced auto journalists to drive the car and the reports suggest it more than lived up to expectation

🔥 DON'T BE FOOLED BY THE TEASER

The teaser images were designed to shock by showing the car in contrasting locations, extreme angles and very bold colour choices. Now look at the car below in a normal setting and tell me it doesn't look incredible? 

As a small footnote this isn't even the actual car which is a 4-door GT so won't look exactly like this

🔥 WE ARE ALL TALKING ABOUT IT

Jaguar pulled off the hardest part which is getting us all talking about the brand again. They achieved this with hardly any media spend too. 

Last year the most successful episode of Uncensored CMO ever was a conversation between Rory Sutherland and Scott Galloway about the rebrand which charted at No.31 on Spotify globally across all categories

🔥 JLR KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING

Everyone seems to forget that the company that owns Jaguar is also the one behind the success of Range Rover and Land Rover. They know how to make a very good car. I wouldn't bet against them.

So that's why I predict good things for Jaguar in 2026

By the way last year one of my highlights was meeting the MD of Jaguar Rawdon Glover who generously shared the thinking behind this. It was a truly fascinating conversation which you can find here

apple
https://lnkd.in/ew4i5MXb

Spotify
https://lnkd.in/etSQq9wj

YouTube
https://lnkd.in/eTQy8Afb

Ken McConomy Tom Child 토마스 차일드

SHOW ME THE DATA

Imagine Jerry Maguire in that famous scene is yelling down the phone at you telling you to ... Show. Me. The. Data.

This was one top tip from Mark Ritson on the latest episode of Uncensored CMO which is sponsored by Worldwide Partners, Inc.

We all know that everyone else thinks they are a marketer

So what do you do about it?

Quite simply you show them the data to back up your story

No-one is going to argue with what your customer thinks because they are the person that really matters to the business

Don't like your new Ad? 
Show them the data.

Not sure about the new logo? 
Show them the data

Questioning your media selection? 
Show them the data

You get the idea

In this episode we are discussing the findings of a fascinating report called Confessions of a CMO that reveals what CMO's are really thinking

You can download the report here

Confessions of a CMO
https://lnkd.in/eP2G26W8

To hear Mark and I discuss the insights from the episode go here

apple
https://lnkd.in/dA7qRHkV

Spotify
https://lnkd.in/eFjnz68Z

YouTube
https://lnkd.in/eQewBnei

Huge thanks to Worldwide Partners & Monigle for creating such a brilliant report

Worldwide Partners is a global network of independent advertising agencies with more than 90 agencies in 50 countries

Kerry Collinge

FOCUS ON WHAT YOUR COMPETITORS DO BADLY

Why are we so focussed on copying what our competitors do?

Instead try the concept of 'reverse benchmarking' that Rory Sutherland uses to describe the approach of identifying what your competitor is weak at and doubling down on that

It was inspired by Will Guidara the owner of the World's No.1 Restaurant, Eleven Maddison Park, who was obsessed with trying to emulate his competitors until one day he had a surprising revelation

He and his partner were dining at a competitor restaurant and had what he describes as a flawless experience until they served the coffee at the end. It wasn't bad but equally it wasn't exceptional either.

This sparked an idea

What if the coffee experience could be as good as the wine experience

What if the range of beer could match the range of wines

It led him to excel at the very things his competitors weren't good at

In fact his entirely philosophy in 'Unreasonable Hospitality' was based on winning through the quality of experience not the quality of food

So maybe stop obsessing on what your competitor does well

And start obsessing on what they don't 

Would love to know in the comments examples of brands that have done that 

For more little gems like this check out the latest episode of Uncensored CMO here

apple
https://lnkd.in/eGWShVgs

Spotify
https://lnkd.in/eirJADQ5

YouTube
https://lnkd.in/eMJAHb7A

And if you would like to know 'the one thing' I take from each episode then sign up to my newsletter here

The One Thing
https://lnkd.in/etvJGuqr

Anna Cairns Kerry Collinge

I CANT BELIEVE THIS IS HAPPENING!

My new years resolution was to do more things that scared me

I have always wanted to have an Uncensored CMO live event, the kind of conference I would want to attend myself

So I set myself a 3 year goal to sell out the coolest venue in London - the OUTERNET - with a capacity of over 400 and prior home to the Sex Pistols the inspiration behind the podcast soundtrack and artwork

But that's not scary enough so I thought SOD IT

Let's do it in 3 months time

The best CMO's on the planet, the most inspiring founders and the smartest thinkers who can provide the biggest boost to your career in one day

Fortunately I have a partner in crime for this.

The incredible Camilla Eden-Davies from Little Dot Studios approached me last year and said they would love to put on an event with me and so we started chatting about 100, maybe 150 people .... and somehow that's now 400 👀 

So ladies and gentlemen ....

Welcome to THE CALLING

One day of inspiration for all future CMO's

Nevermind the weekly boll**ks status meeting, this is your CALLING

More details and ticket information here

https://lnkd.in/eqqnFrJ2

KEEP 21st APRIL FREE

Leave me a comment below if you want me to DM you the details 

Huge thanks to Kerry Collinge who is full on "make sh*t happen" mode for this and the incredible ninja's at Little Dot Studios

London's Calling.

Are you coming?

STAYING IN THE GAME

This quote from Rory Sutherland is one of the most true things about life and business 

In our chat on Uncensored CMO I was joking about the fact my entire career has been spent in roles lasting no more than 3 years but in my current role I am over 6 years and all the success has come in years 4,5 & 6

Back in the day working at Britvic I was pitching for investment in a new organisation to run what I described as ‘seed brands’ and so I did an analysis of how long it takes to really achieve critical mass with a new brand 

My presentation closed with this conclusion -

“On average it takes 7 years to have an overnight success” 

That’s the reality of success.

It takes time and a great deal of persistence until you ‘get lucky’ and everything comes together 

Which is rather neat because the sponsor of the weekly quote is Jimmy's Iced Coffee who are living proof of this precise point 

If you are reflecting over the weekend about why you haven’t yet achieved what you dreamed of then take a moment to remember this 

Russell Goldman Nick Waring 

#Partner
#LETSGO 
#JimmysIcedCoffee

EVERYONE THINKS THEY ARE A MARKETER

But somehow no-one thinks they are the CFO, not even the CFO

That's what Mark Ritson was saying on the latest Uncensored CMO which is sponsored by Worldwide Partners, Inc.

There was a lovely quote in the Confessions of a CMO report that we produced together

"Marketing is the lightening rod for every irrational decision a company makes"

This is perhaps one of the unique challenges of marketing that everyone else thinks they can do your job better than you

Everyone has an opinion on the logo, the packaging, the latest advert, what you put on TikTok last night

If it's a success then they are a genius and if it fails then obviously it was your fault

In this episode we discuss the many different 'M's in the CMO job title such as Mutiny, Meaning, Momentum, Mood and others. They are all the various roles the CMO has to play to effectively navigate the organisation

These were inspired by the many confessions we got from highly experienced CMO's at the top of their game

To read the report go here

Confessions of a CMO
https://lnkd.in/eP2G26W8

And to listen to this episode go here

apple
https://lnkd.in/dA7qRHkV

Spotify
https://lnkd.in/ec4TtU3R

YouTube
https://lnkd.in/eDiNdTdj

This was so much fun and I hope you enjoy Mark and I discussing The Confessions of a CMO

Huge thanks to Worldwide Partners and Monigle for pulling this research together and shining a light on the unique challenges of being a CMO

Worldwide Partners is a global network of independent agencies comprised of more than 95 agencies in 50 countries

Kerry Collinge

LESSONS AFTER 2.5MILLION DOWNLOADS

Uncensored CMO passed a nice milestone of 2.5million downloads last week and rather than me sharing what I have learnt over that times I had a much better idea and asked my team

I love what they came up with as it covers so many different facets of success

Have a read through and tell me what you think?

🎙️ CONSTRAINTS LEAD TO CREATIVITY

"constraints lead to creativity. We show up anywhere in the world with all our gear in a suitcase and have to turn a random location into a studio"

James M. (Producer)

🎙️ CHOOSE WHERE YOUR ENERGY COMES FROM

"Greatness and happiness comes from choosing where and with whom to spend your energy. Accentuate the positive. Eliminate the negative."

Kerry Collinge (Managing Director)

🎙️ MAKING IT LOOK EASY TAKES HARD WORK

"It takes a lot of hard work to make it appear this easy. Constant communication across the team is what makes it work"

Jarrah Collyer (Executive Assistant)

🎙️ CUT OUT ALL THE FLUFF

"Set a simple list of the few things that matter most. Create systems to make the actions repeatable & scalable, and focus on making them best-in-class"

Sam Price (Social Media Manager)

🎙️ SAYING YES

"Saying yes opens far more doors than saying "I have never done that before". Say yes and then learn fast. It's an ethos the entire team lives by."

Genevieve Norris (Global Comms Manager System1)

🎙️ GREATNESS IS IN THE AGENCY OF OTHERS

"Be very clear about what you are world-class at and then for everything else hire experts who will do what you could never imagine doing yourself"

Me (Host & Founder)

As an aside over the past year we delivered 1.25million downloads so around half of all downloads from 6 years happened in the past year - that shows the extraordinary power of compounding!!

Next stop 5 million.

Thanks to the team and also the enormous support of System1 and in particular the founder John Kearon and our CEO James Gregory 🙏

Lessons from 2.5 million downloads

GET FINANCE TO SELL YOUR MARKETING PLAN

My favourite presentation at Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity wasn't about the work. That would be obvious. It was about how one CMO convinced her organisation to do the work in the first place.

The CMO of SAS the absolutely wonderful Jennifer Chase was giving a talk about how she sold in a brand campaign to a tech business that hadn't done one in around 25 years

Now that's a tough brief

What she did next was a stroke of genius.

She got the CFO to sell the plan to the company. In fact she plays a video of that CFO talking about the evidence for how marketing works and why her new campaign was such a good investment for the company

Just imagine the power of your CFO telling the company why they should spend money on your campaign

I have always said it is much better to let other people tell you story and it doesn't get better than the CFO

In this episode of Uncensored CMO Jenn talks about the journey SaS went on from full on performance machine to leading with Brand and how she did it

As Jenn says the most under-rated skill of the CMO is stakeholder management

As marketers we are good at selling to the customer but often not so good at selling to our stakeholders

To hear more wisdom from Jenn check out the episode here

apple
https://lnkd.in/eSC7HkHv

Spotify
https://lnkd.in/eNNBF5g3

YouTube
https://lnkd.in/ewA5NuhQ

BE THE VOICE OF THE CUSTOMER

One of my favourite Mark Ritson sayings is that our primary job as marketers is to represent the customer where decisions get made 

It sounds so simple to do but it really isn’t

When you are a start up everything you do is in service of the customer and decisions happen instantly as you are in charge 

But as businesses grow the distance between decision makers and the customer gets larger 

What then happens is we start to treat the internal organisation as ‘the customer’ and make decisions based on what might get approved vs what the customer actually needs

The best marketer understand this and find ways to make sure the customer is informing everything they do 

In the Founders Mentality, a brilliant book about why Founder led businesses beat management led ones, it’s this ‘frontline focus’ that is one of the core reasons they do so well

Have a listen to the latest Uncensored CMO episode where we talk about this 

Apple
https://lnkd.in/ea5YevMx

Spotify
https://lnkd.in/e-avpbn8

YouTube
https://lnkd.in/eMAgWRwF

As a customer of Jimmy's Iced Coffee I can tell you they really know how to ensure the customer is always at the heart of everything 

#JimmysIcedCoffee
#LETSGO
#Partner

No alternative text description for this image

I eat ice cream

I drink Jimmy's Iced Coffee

Now at the same time

Great little bit of innovation from my favourite iced coffee brand

Top work Nick Waring

CONVINCE PEOPLE IT WAS THEIR IDEA

In the latest episode of Uncensored CMO which is sponsored by Worldwide Partners, Inc. I catch up with the one and only Mark Ritson 

We sit down to discuss what CMO's would confess to when they are not on camera based on a fascinating study called 'Confessions of a CMO' from Worldwide Partners

One of the big theme's in the report is the many hats the CMO has to wear and how little it has to do with actual marketing 

As Mark says "there is a lot more C than M in CMO"

There are so many truth bombs throughout this episode and one that I know many will relate to is making other people believe the idea was theirs

So much of what makes a CMO succeed is down to the art of persuasion

How do you convince an organisation to get behind a plan or idea.

How do you manage the many egos involved in decision making

How do you align apparently conflicting goals

Getting other people to believe an idea is theirs so they own it is one of the skills needed to get it through

It's why I think the real 4 P's of a CMO are actually

PEOPLE
PLANNING
POLITICS
PERSUASION

This episode is packed with revealing and amusing insights into what CMO's really think.

You can listen here

apple
https://lnkd.in/dA7qRHkV

Spotify
https://lnkd.in/e7s9WTMz

YouTube
https://lnkd.in/es-bnDMD

I would thoroughly recommend reading the Confession of a CMO report you can download it all here

Confessions of a CMO
https://lnkd.in/eP2G26W8

Kerry Collinge

EVERYONE HAS AN OPINION ABOUT MARKETING

But does anyone have the facts?

Today I am launching the first annual Uncensored CMO marketing survey and I really want your help

This is mainly aimed at CMO's and senior marketers who lead their functions but all opinions are welcome

There will be some expected questions like 

👉 What % of turnover is spent on marketing 

👉 What's the split of long vs short

👉 Which media are you investing more or less in

But there will be some unexpected (uncensored) questions too

👉 What are you secretly afraid to admit?

👉 What would you say if you couldn't get fired?

👉 What is the worst thing about your job?

It should only take 10 mins to complete and you can find the link here

Uncensored CMO Survey Link Here
https://lnkd.in/eYsXbj_Y?

This is in partnership with TikTok for Business Europe and we will be sharing all the finding and separating the fact from the fiction and hopeful adding in a few Uncensored opinions too 

The plan is that this becomes an annual tradition and that we can start to trend what is happening in marketing 

A huge THANK YOU to everyone who takes part in this 🙏 

Kerry Collinge Kate MacKenzie Callum Mayfield Smith

WHY AI NEEDS TOILET ROLL 

This week on Uncensored CMO I catch up with the wonderful Jennifer Chase to talk about how SAS went from performance marketing to brand 

In our conversation she made a comment about how we need to move from winning hearts and minds to winning hearts, minds and machines 

AI is dictating so much of what we see that marketers have to consider how to market to machines 

But what if we do that by being more human? 

Your brand is the sum of what people say about you, who is saying it and where they are saying it 

The machines are essentially being trained to learn from this 

Which brings me nicely on to toilet roll ….

I interviewed the founder of Jimmy's Iced Coffee this week the inspirational Jim Cregan 

He told me a very funny story about a complaint he got from someone who got “the runs” on a train after drinking a Jimmys 

Rather than issue a corporate response he sent the person a free case of Jimmys which included a toilet roll and a handwritten note suggesting he try this at home first 

Seeing the funny side the person posted the entire thing on social media and Jim had won himself a brand advocate 

So I just wonder whether the answer to winning the machines is to be even more human 

To listen to my chat with Jenn about how she led SAS from performance to brand check out the links below

Apple

https://lnkd.in/evb5j2vB

Spotify

https://lnkd.in/ec9pfeuy

YouTube

https://lnkd.in/eR627Kqf

Russell Goldman Nick Waring 

#LETSGO
#JimmysIcedCoffee
#Partnership

KNOW YOUR E.L.F.ING NUMBERS

In Episode 2 of UNCENSORED RENEGADES Kory and I tackle the tricky topic of knowing your numbers - or knowing your elf**g number if you work for Kory Marchisotto

I haven't laughed so much as when Kory suggested you don't walk into a Board room spouting "bibedy bobedy booSh*t"

Marketers often have a credibility problem when it comes to numbers

However I would argue that no other department has the potential to create long term shareholder value as much as Marketing. But none of that value is created unless we can easily articulate the impact of what we do

It may not be why you chose a career in marketing but getting good at numbers and financial literacy is probably the faster career booster you can give yourself

Listen to Kory and I discuss why knowing you number matters so much

Would love also love to know what hot topics you want us to talk about in future episodes so leave us a comment below 👇 

Apple
https://lnkd.in/egmdvqj3

Spotify
https://lnkd.in/exQBrUMv

Also please do subscribe to the RENEGADES feed!

I will be dropping some episodes on the normal Uncensored CMO one but you can only get all RENEGADES episodes on the dedicated feed

BOUNCING BACK FROM FAILURE

A few years ago I interviewed the England Rugby Coach Eddie Jones when he was on a record breaking run of 15 consecutive wins 

I asked him for his top piece of advice for dealing with elite athletes in such a competitive environment 

His answer surprised me

“Be tough in victory”

“And gentle in defeat”

He explained that when the team suffered a defeat they knew exactly what had gone wrong and instead of heaping criticism on them he reminded them way they were great 

However after a victory when confidence was high he said the players were much more receptive to being told how they could improve 

As you look ahead to this week how are you feeling?

Perhaps if you are feeling fearful and have had some setbacks it’s time to cut yourself some slack and remind yourself of why you are great 

If you are feeling victorious then perhaps ask yourself what you could learn from whilst things are going well that will prepare you for when times are harder 

Kory Marchisotto and I discuss why we need to learn from failure in the first episode of UNCENSORED RENEGADES which you can find here 

Apple
 https://lnkd.in/exk6P6bB

Spotify 
https://lnkd.in/ereFfUjk

Would love to hear your stories of bouncing back from failure 

Uncensored CMO

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