Doing More with Less: Cybersecurity Marketing Insights for 2025
Digital marketingWhat is Digital Marketing? Digital marketing—or online marketing—is a catch-all term for promoting brands using the Internet and other forms of digital communication. Digital marketers use various marketing channels, such... is undergoing a seismic shift. As new tools, trends, and technologies emerge at unprecedented speeds, marketing leaders are grappling with how to stay ahead. What’s more, budgets are falling, expectations are rising, and the market is more competitive than ever.
But don’t stress: we’re on hand to help you make sense of the cybersecurity marketing landscape and ensure success in the coming year and beyond. In this blog, we’ll explore some of the key takeaways from Censuswide’s recent Voice of the CMO report and how they can inform cybersecurity marketing efforts for 2025.
New Tech, New Opportunities, New Risks
We couldn’t discuss the future of cybersecurity marketing without discussing AI. It’s one of the world’s most important emerging technologies and will continue to have an enormous impact on the cybersecurity marketing landscape.
The Voice of the CMO report clearly shows that marketing leaders are keen to take advantage of AIWhat is AI? Artificial Intelligence (AI) refers to the simulation of human intelligence processes by computers in an aim to mimic or exceed human cognitive abilities across a range of domains.... technologies: 62% of CMOs use them with open arms, while 32% use them with caution. And for good reason – these tools can offer remarkable productivity, creativity, and time-saving benefits. For example, Grammarly uses AI to efficiently check for spelling or grammar mistakes, while Midjourney creates high-quality, copyright-free images.
That said, AI is an inherently risky technology. There’s a reason 97% of CMOs said they have one or more concerns about AI. Perhaps most notably, AI tools present a data security risk: if an employee inputs sensitive company data to a generative AIWhat is Generative AI Generative AI is a subset of artificial intelligence that focuses on creating new content. Unlike traditional AI, which typically analyzes or classifies existing data, generative AI... tool, that data could be exposed. Moreover, many (37%) CMOs are concerned about AI’s potential to produce unoriginal content.
It’s important that CMOs don’t view AI as an inherently “good” or “bad” technology. No technology is inherently good or bad, but how we use it can be: this is especially true for AI. Inputting sensitive data into ChatGPT, for example, is a bad idea, but it doesn’t mean AI is a bad technology.
Similarly, if you use a generative AI tool to write an article from scratch – by asking it to “write an article giving advice for cybersecurity CMOs,” for example – you are unlikely to get good results. However, inputting a pre-written blog post and asking the AI to create a list of potential promotional social media posts (and editing them afterward) can create high-quality content in a fraction of the time it would take to draft posts manually.
The key takeaway here is that AI can be a powerful tool for cybersecurity marketers, but only if used responsibly. If you’re looking for guidance on how you should, and should not use AI for your marketing efforts, check out Bora’s AI Policy.
Smaller Budgets, Bigger Expectations
39% of CMOs say they are having to manage more activity with smaller budgets. This statistic comes as little surprise – amidst a global economy still reeling from the pandemic, several geopolitical concerns, and budgets are down across almost all industries. While it’s frustrating, marketers must figure out a way to do more with less in 2025. Here are a few ways you can do that.
“39% of CMOs say they are having to manage more activity with smaller budgets”
Censuswide – the voice of the CMO.
Leverage Existing Resources
Cybersecurity companies have streams of valuable data at their disposal. Threat research teams are an often-overlooked source of marketing materials: if your organization has information on, for example, where email threats originate, what sectors they target, and what techniques they use, why not share that data with the industry as part of a threat research report?
Sharing threat intelligence is a cost-effective way to expand your audience and demonstrate the value of your products. You don’t need to spend resources on research because you already have the data at hand, so what you should be doing is creating a campaign leveraging that unique data and sharing it with the industry.
Rethink Industry Events
There’s a tendency in the cybersecurity marketing space to follow the status quo, especially when it comes to industry events. Attending these events comes with a massive cost: purchasing a booth, putting employees up in hotels, and paying out expenses can see even mid-sized organizations spend upwards of $500,000 without seeing much return on investment (ROI).
Part of the problem is that marketers have traditionally used badge scans as a key performance indicator (KPI) at these events, and they rarely translate to meaningful conversations or connections in the modern marketing landscape.
To do more with less in 2025, organizations should consider hosting or participating in smaller, vertical-specific, round-table-style events. These events cost significantly less than trade shows and encourage one-to-one conversations with the people marketers want to reach. Ultimately, the risk associated with this kind of engagement is much lower, while the potential ROI is much higher.
Customer-centric Marketing is King
Building strong customer relationships is one of the most important things you can do in 2025. 29% of CMOs cite improving customer experiences as their top challenge, and the only way they can achieve this is by understanding their wants and needs.
CMOs can (and do) gain this understanding through various tools and methods. The most common include qualitative market research (55%) and quantitative market research (51%). While these methods are undoubtedly effective and, in many cases, necessary, they are typically quite costly, which can present a real challenge in the face of falling budgets.
It may seem obvious, but the best way to understand your customers is by simply engaging with them. Put genuine effort into getting to know your clients as people, not just customers. Developing meaningful relationships with key contacts will ensure your interactions with them aren’t merely transactional. It will enable them to express their wants and needs clearly.
What’s more, your customers can be a marketing asset in themselves. Potential customers trust other customers more than service providers, and when you develop meaningful relationships with your customers, you can leverage them to testify, and speak highly of your cybersecurity services. For example, you could craft a case study that demonstrates how you helped a client meet a certain goal. You can then take testimonials from the case study and re-purpose them on your website’s homepage, boosting your brand’s credibility and appeal.
Similarly, encouraging satisfied customers to post product reviews on sites like LinkedIn or Gartner Peer Insights can significantly improve your brand’s reach and boost credibility. This process focuses on building and nurturing relationships with customers to turn them into spokespeople for your brand. Again, this is a cost-effective way to demonstrate your commitment to a customer-centric approach to business.
Looking Ahead
Winning in cybersecurity marketing in 2025 starts with putting people first. Success comes from building authentic relationships with key stakeholders—whether they are customers, prospects, department teams, or industry leaders. By prioritizing engagement and connection, marketers can deliver enormous value at all levels.
At Bora, we’re dedicated to helping cybersecurity marketing teams plan and execute marketing campaigns that address organizations’ unique needs. With flexible usage plans, decades of combined cybersecurity marketing experience, and some of the world’s largest cybersecurity companies as clients, no agency is better placed to supercharge your marketing efforts in 2025.
Want to find out more? Schedule a discovery call today.
