Not too long ago, when growth slowed down, companies did not resort to CROs, who were just another executive title in a company. Things have changed drastically since those times. In 2025, the smartest of companies don’t double down on tactics, but turn to the right person: the Chief Revenue Officer.
So, let’s take a look at the top CROs today that are making a huge difference and making it look like second nature.
What is a CRO?
To put it simply, a Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) is the person in a company who’s responsible for making sure that the company’s revenue grows across all the customer-facing departments, not just the sales side. Most companies have separate teams for sales, marketing (such as SEO services), and customer success, and the CRO acts as the individual who unifies them behind a clear strategy focused primarily on scaling revenue.
Instead of each department within its little bubble, the CRO makes sure these teams aren’t working in silos and are completely aligned behind one goal. Think of it like this, you’ve got:
- Sales trying to close deals
- Marketing trying to bring in leads
- Customer support trying to keep customers happy
The CRO’s job becomes to look at all of this and turn it into repeatable and scalable revenue. They look at the full customer journey, from the first ad someone sees to the moment they renew or refer others, and find ways to make it smoother, faster, and more profitable.
Why the CRO Role is Mission-Critical
When we say the CRO role is mission critical, it means it’s one of the most important roles in the company because without it, growth slows, teams lose direction, and money flows out and only leaves the table.
That’s where the CRO’s job begins. They bring order into this chaos and build systems that are actionable, repeatable, and profitable. They align marketing, sales, and customer success so every part of the business is working toward the same target.
Without that, things break down fast. The CRO makes sure the company isn’t just moving, but moving in the right direction, with a clear plan to grow revenue on purpose, not by luck.
What Makes a Great CRO?
In the C-suite battlefield, the CRO is a new competition, and there are plenty of them competing with one another. However, defining which is better than the other can be a difficult task. However, here are some factors that undeniably make them worthy of being considered:
- Be a Data-Driven Doer: As important as gut instincts are, many extremely important decisions must be made using real and hard data. The best CRO is obsessed with data. They need to get all the information possible from customer relationship management (CRM) software, including tracking lead quality and conversion rates.
- Able to Handle Difficult Situations with Poise: There are always difficult situations to tackle. However, in these situations, top CROs should thrive as that’s almost their home ground. A top-performing CRO thrives under pressure, turns responsibility into results. Along the way, they enjoy the perks of the job.
- Big Picture Thinker: They should see beyond the quarterly targets and look at the long haul.
- Cross-Team Connector and Passionate: A major aspect of a CRO’s job is to help other members of the team grow. They must bring the teams together, sit in on marketing huddles, shadow sales calls, and check in with customer success. When everyone’s speaking the same language, deals close faster and churn drops.
- Relentlessly Curious: Market shifts? New competitors? New tech? They’re on it. A stellar CRO is always testing new pricing models, tools, or channels, never saying, “This is how we’ve always done it.”
Put these qualities together, and you’ve got someone who can bring real growth.
Top CROs Driving Growth This Year
1. NUOPTIMA
One of the biggest troubles is simply getting access to the best CROs out there. NUOPTIMA, being a renowned marketing agency, provides fast-growing companies with best-in-class CRO support from in-house executives.
These individuals have already built and scaled high-performing sales, marketing, and success teams across dozens of industries and have a track record of success to show for it. Each CRO we connect with your company is done so through a strategic vetting process, making sure they align properly with your goals and integrate smoothly into your team.
Alexej Pikovsky, our founder, built NUOPTIMA after years of working inside startups, scale-ups, and investor-backed businesses that needed senior revenue leadership. This practicality still shapes how we work today.
Instead of spending 3 to 6 months searching for a CRO who “might” work out, our clients often plug in a battle-tested expert in as little as 7 to 10 days, someone who’s ready to start delivering strategic results from week one. Contact us to know more about how we can do the same for you.
2. Erica Anderson
Notion was a small team that built a note-taking tool. Erica Anderson was able to lead the charge and turn that into a platform that Fortune 500s have since adopted. She aligned product, marketing, and sales around a common messaging framework, doubling enterprise bookings in under 12 months.
3. Kevin Knieriem
Kevin was brought on as CRO in 2019, and he was able to transform Clari from a promising sales analytics startup into a scale-up and spread its platform across the enterprise markets. He formerly led revenue at DataScience.com (acquired by Oracle), overseeing demand gen, field marketing, and customer success through rapid growth phases.
4. Stephanie Valenti
Intelligent Inbound marketing agency SmartBug, on Feb. 3, 2022, onboarded Stephanie Valenti as their CRO. Thanks to Valenti’s efforts, the company grew fast, lowered its costs by 15%, earned a spot on the Inc. 5000 list, and was named one of the best places to work in Dallas-Fort Worth.
Behind that success was her work in strengthening the leadership team, setting up key systems, and reshaping the company’s structure to handle future growth.
5. Pete Crosby
Pete has guided dozens of startups from $10 million to $100 million ARR. He is an experienced GTM strategist, a 4× SaaS CRO, and the CEO and Co-founder of Revelesco. As the founder of Pavilion’s London chapter, he now coaches SaaS CEOs and CROs globally on revenue strategy and scaling.
6. Ryan Longfield
Ryan became CRO of Gong in August 2018, bringing over 10 years of sales leadership from LinkedIn (notably in Talent Solutions). At Gong, he expanded the SDR floor while aligning marketing where needed in order to build a predictable revenue model to reinforce Gong’s growth.
He has also stated that he openly discussed with Gong’s CEO, Amit Bendov, that marketing wasn’t his strong suit and should roll under the CEO instead.
7. Adam Tesan
At Chargebee’s 2021 APAC User Conference, Adam Tesan emphasized “adaptive scalability,” showcasing Chargebee’s ability to pivot quickly during uncertainty. His leadership helped Chargebee move into APAC and EMEA. He said, “When I left, we were processing over $12 billion and doubled the customer base. Our vision was to monetize further that processing volume over the platform with payments and embedded finance.”
8. Andrea Kayal
Andrea blends brand building with pipeline creation and retention. At Teampay, she leads GTM, revenue ops, and partnerships, and is known for reducing friction between finance and sales. By optimizing spend-control workflows, she’s created actual internal resource alignment.
9. Shuo Wang
Shuo orchestrated Deel’s expansion from $1 million to $100 million ARR in 20 months, reaching $500 million ARR and 150+ countries by 2024. He scaled sales teams by using rev-ops early for quote design and forecasting, drove four strategic acquisitions, and cultivated the “Deel Speed” culture: founder-led sales, global-first mindset, and obsessive customer feedback. Experiment fast, execute faster.
10. Vince Murdica
Vince focused on enterprise account growth through building repeatable sales motions for complex B2B deals, secured deals with six of the top ten Fortune 500 cybersecurity teams, and united sales, partnerships, and marketing to drive expansion in regulated industries.
11. Mark Kosoglow
As the first CRO at Catalyst, Mark merged sales, success, and support teams into a “single growth engine.” He layered in intent data, revamped the SDR workflow, and partnered with the product to launch enterprise modules. They built the leading sales execution platform, grew revenue from zero to over $200 million in just seven years, and scaled the company to 1,500 employees along the way.
How These CROs Are Winning in 2025
There is no cookie-cutter, perfect recipe for CRO success out there. Every business is unique in its goals, resources, teams, and industry. However, there are a few factors that can be observed within CROs that are performing their best currently:
1. Prioritizing Revenue Over Vanity Metrics
The trap of vanity metrics is now stronger than ever before, since we’re sold the idea that these numbers actually make a difference. Metrics like page views, social media followers, webinar sign-ups, and email newsletter subscribes look great on paper, but unless they’re actually generating revenue, they don’t mean much. In fact, they hardly ever reflect a business’s actual performance.
Instead, these leaders focus on KPIs that tie directly to the bottom line, such as qualified pipeline, conversion rates, deal velocity, customer lifetime value, and retention. It’s no longer about who generated the lead but about whether that lead turned into revenue.
2. Using AI and RevOps to Increase Efficiency
Artificial Intelligence is no longer the big, scary word it used to be a couple of years back. It has now become yet another tool. The best CROs use all tools at their disposal to get the best possible results.
AI helps revenue teams move faster and make better decisions. Now, combined with Revenue Operations or RevOps, which unites sales, marketing, and customer data into one system, CROs can break silos and see smoother handoffs between departments.
3. Building Full-Funnel Teams
Growth doesn’t stop after a deal is closed. Expansion, renewal, and retention matter just as much, and today’s CROs understand that. So, instead of treating marketing, sales, and customer success as separate departments with different goals, the best CROs treat them as one unified team working together across every stage of the customer lifecycle.
All teams come together at every step of the sales funnel, from the first time a customer hears about you (top of funnel) to the moment they buy (bottom of funnel) and even after (post-sale support, renewals, upsells). This also creates a healthy environment.
Instead of handoffs and finger-pointing (“marketing gave bad leads” or “sales didn’t follow up”), these teams share goals, tools, and accountability. Everyone’s focused on one thing: revenue.
Closing Thoughts
Revenue growth can be difficult because it requires strategy, coordination, and strong leadership. The CROs on this list have proven to have all of those and more to help a business grow consistently in this volatile market.
FAQ
A CRO stands for Chief Revenue Officer, and they’re the executive who is responsible for overseeing all revenue-generating functions in a company. This typically involves sales, marketing, RevOps, and customer success, but could vary from one to another. Their goal, simply put, is to align and rally all teams behind a single goal of predictable, scalable revenue growth.
Yes and no. Every company can benefit from it, but you don’t always need one from the very get-go. However, fast-growing businesses often hit a point where leadership fragmentation slows growth. That’s where a CRO comes in, introduces structure, builds strategy, and a sense of direction.
Salaries vary widely. Full-time CROs at startups may charge $150K–$300K+ annually, often with equity. Fractional CROs, brought in part-time, can cost between $8K–$25K/month depending on scope and experience. However, again, the number does vary vastly.
