When Should You Hire a Fractional CMO?

Strong marketing leadership is critical for businesses that are transforming and positioning themselves for the next phase of growth. But for many startups and small and mid-sized businesses, hiring a full-time Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) is costly and unnecessary. Those companies may want to consider working with a fractional CMO.

A fractional CMO is a senior marketing executive who provides part-time marketing leadership. They’re embedded with an executive leadership team and are accountable for setting the marketing direction and delivering results. 

(Read: What is a Fractional CMO – and Why Should Small and Mid-Size Businesses Hire One in 2024?)

As a fractional CMO who helps businesses grow and evolve through more strategic marketing, I often get asked the question, “when should I hire a fractional CMO?” The answer is that there’s no single right time. There are actually many moments in a company’s lifecycle when it could make sense to bring in a fractional strategic marketing leader for different reasons.

Here are four stages when hiring a fractional CMO makes the most sense.

1. Early Stage: Laying a Strategic Marketing Foundation

When a new business, pre-seed or seed stage startup is in its idea and validation stage, resources are often limited. Every investment must be carefully considered. It's also a time when establishing a strong brand identity and story, product positioning, and marketing foundation is crucial. But these businesses likely don’t need a full-time CMO and the cost can be prohibitive.

At this stage, fractional marketing leadership is valuable because it can give the company a solid foundation for growth, especially if the owner or founder doesn’t have a marketing background. That foundation includes building an understanding of the target audience, crafting positioning and the value proposition, and developing go-to-market strategies. There likely isn’t a marketing team or the resources to build one, so these fractional marketers also need to be able to execute the plan they created. Because the business and product can change rapidly at this point, a fractional CMO enables the company to flex, adapt, and bring in new skillsets.

2. Growth Stage: Building the Marketing Engine

In the growth stage, the business or startup has a working product or service and market traction. There are signs that the company could scale. Marketing needs to drive both new customer acquisition and retention of existing customers. But the marketing team is still small and likely more tactical and focused on execution rather than strategy. Focus, prioritization and using resources wisely remain mission critical. 

To get to the point of being able to scale and expand, it’s important at this stage to build the marketing growth engine and put systems and processes in place. The types of marketing the business is doing diversifies, and tactical execution is no longer enough. Marketing investments may include brand awareness, launching new marketing channels, testing and optimizing channels, building the initial martech stack, and setting up ways to coordinate with sales and product. Without a clear, strategic marketing direction, growth companies risk their marketing investments being uncoordinated, ad hoc and ineffective.

But marketing leaders who have experience across disciplines tend to be more senior with higher salary requirements, plus benefits. That can be a lot for a company to take on at this stage. Working with a fractional CMO will give them access to senior marketing expertise that positions them for long-term success. 

These fractional CMOs will set the strategic marketing direction, including defining marketing goals, building a comprehensive marketing plan that aligns with the growth objectives, managing marketing ROI, and overseeing the team’s execution of the plan. They will also set up scalable marketing processes and frameworks, and begin to build out an internal marketing team.

3. Expansion Stage: Scaling and Exploring New Markets & Products

With growth comes new challenges and complexities. As companies begin to scale – whether they’re entering new markets or expanding the product line – tailored marketing approaches for different customer bases and geographies become important. They need more sophisticated marketing strategies to be effective.

A fractional CMO can guide the company through these growing pains, ensuring that marketing strategies evolve with the company. They lead the shift towards more structured marketing campaigns and more advanced segmentation. They can help identify the best strategies for entering new markets or segments. They’re data-driven decision makers and instill an experimentation culture to optimize and expand marketing channels. 

Beyond the marketing strategy, as the company grows, so does the need for a more substantial marketing team with specialized roles and functions. A fractional CMO can play a vital role in building and mentoring this team, laying the groundwork for a strong internal marketing department.

4. Mature Stage: Reinvention and Staying Competitive

As small and mid-sized businesses mature, they often face new challenges, including increased competition and market saturation. Reinvention and innovation become crucial to staying relevant.

A fractional CMO can provide fresh insights and new perspectives on the market, helping mature companies stay relevant and competitive. They can assist in rebranding efforts or in redefining the company’s value proposition.

It’s also likely that mature companies are sitting on substantial customer and market data. It can be overwhelming to make sense of that data and turn it into an actionable plan. A fractional CMO can help gather insights from this data to make informed decisions, fine-tune marketing strategies, and identify new opportunities for growth.

As new marketing tools and technology like AI emerge, a fractional CMO can lead the charge in digital transformation and marketing modernization, ensuring that the company stays ahead of technological trends and uses tools effectively.

Hiring a fractional CMO can be a strategic move for companies at various stages of growth. Whether laying the foundation in the start-up phase, scaling and exploring new markets in the expansion phase, or reinventing and staying competitive in the maturity phase, a fractional CMO offers the expertise, flexibility, and cost-effectiveness that businesses need to navigate these critical periods. By understanding when to bring in this valuable resource, companies can make strategic decisions that position them for long-term success.

If you’re ready to explore how a fractional CMO can help your business achieve your growth goals, let’s talk.

What is a Fractional CMO – and Why Should Small and Mid-Size Businesses Hire One in 2024?

I’ve been having some long overdue catch ups with old friends and co-workers recently, and they’ve almost all said, “I’d never heard of a fractional CMO until you became one.” 

It made me laugh because, to be honest, I’m not sure I had either. There’s nothing like becoming something you didn’t even know existed. 

But in all seriousness – in the current economic and business environment, hiring a fractional Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) makes a ton of sense for many startups, small businesses, and middle market companies. 

Consumer behavior is changing, marketing channels are fragmented, and the marketing technology landscape is evolving rapidly. It’s overwhelming for already busy business leaders, and confusing for non-marketers. CMOs help businesses navigate through those changes so that marketing is a growth lever. 

But what if you don’t need a full-time CMO? Enter: a fractional CMO.

What is a Fractional CMO?

A fractional CMO is a senior marketing executive who’s retained to provide part-time marketing leadership. Unlike consultants or advisors, fractional CMOs are embedded with an executive leadership team, and they’re accountable for setting the marketing direction and delivering results. Because of that, fractional CMOs have longer-term engagements and work on monthly retainers, rather than on an hourly or project basis. 

What does a Fractional CMO do?

Fractional CMOs work collaboratively as part of your team. Where a consultant functions as an outsider, working with only a few team members and handing off a strategy for implementation, fractional CMOs have end-to-end accountability. 

Their responsibilities include:

• Defining the marketing strategy, objectives and key results

• Building and managing the brand

• Translating the strategy into action and driving results

• Continually analyzing market trends, consumer behavior and marketing performance to adapt strategies 

• Building, leading and growing the marketing team

• Building the “marketing engine,” including processes, infrastructure, tools and technology

• Leading storytelling around marketing results for investors and advisors

• Optimizing marketing spend

What are the Benefits of Hiring a Fractional CMO?

If you’ve realized your marketing could be more strategic, but you’re not ready to commit to a full-time CMO, a fractional CMO offers a number of benefits.

Fractional CMOs are:

• Cost-Effective: Hiring a fractional CMO as a contractor gives you access to executive marketing expertise, as needed, without having to pay an executive level salary and employee benefits.

• Flexible: As businesses grow and scale, the type of marketing leader they need can change. Fractional CMOs offer flexibility, allowing you to bring the right skill sets into your business at the right time. 

• Accountable: Fractional CMOs have skin in the game because they’re accountable for marketing results. You’re more likely to get strategies that are realistic for your business to implement, and you’ll have an expert adapting your strategy to continuously drive performance. 

• Objective: While fractional CMOs operate as part of your team, they’re still external. They need to be aware of internal politics, but they don’t get caught up in them. They can provide unbiased opinions and fresh perspectives, often seeing challenges and opportunities that internal teams might miss. Because fractional CMOs work with various businesses, they have diverse insights, which can lead to new and innovative approaches.

Why is 2024 the Year to Hire a Fractional CMO?

2024 is the year to put structure and strategy around marketing, if the conversations I had with middle market CEOs throughout January are any indication. 

In 2023, I heard a lot of “we should probably have a strategy, but we just want to get going, so we’re going to do some stuff and see what works.”

Months or a year of marketing tactics > marketing strategy have led to some common challenges that are holding marketing back:

• Business and marketing goals are only loosely connected: Their business goals include things like growing existing customer relationships or expanding in certain industries or acquiring higher value customers. But their marketing goal is only an acquisition volume number. Marketing has more of a role to play in different types of business growth than some might think. Without the right marketing goals, it’s highly unlikely the marketing activities are the right ones to drive all the business growth they’re looking for.

• No executive team capacity to manage marketing: If the marketing team is small and tactical, then leading and managing them is likely a side of desk job for an already time-stretched executive. 

• Marketing approaches and execution are inconsistent: If it’s a side of desk job, then it’s probably not surprising that the actual marketing is inconsistent. It gets bursts of attention and energy, when leadership has time. Then “shiny object syndrome” sets in. Something new and innovative catches their attention and suddenly the team is running in a different direction. Consistency is key to marketing success, and they haven’t stuck with anything long enough to see if it works.

• Once-strong strategic marketing foundations are outdated: Strategy isn’t set-it-and-forget-it. The competitive and marketing landscapes are constantly changing. Customer needs evolve. Without marketing strategy leadership, there’s a good chance the strategy is on a dusty Google Drive shelf from two years ago where it’s not helping anyone make smarter marketing decisions.

• Unclear what tactics are working: Reporting, analyzing and iterating are an afterthought. It’s hard enough just to get marketing out the door.

After a year of messy and confusing marketing, middle market founders and CEOs are craving structure, strategy and the confidence they’re getting the most out of their marketing investment. They’re feeling the marketing leadership void.

One solution? A fractional CMO. Add an executive marketer to your leadership team without the full-time cost and commitment. As the marketing and economic landscapes continue to shift, the strategic vision, flexibility and adaptability offered by a fractional CMO will only become more valuable. 

If you’re ready to explore how a fractional CMO can help make marketing a strategic growth lever, not a drag, let’s talk.

7 Marketing Moves to Make in a Downturn

Picture this: your marketing is firing on all cylinders. You’re testing, you’re growing. You made the case for more budget and got it (go you!). 🚀 🚀 But then - record scratch -  the economy looks shaky and suddenly you’re in cost-cutting mode.

Now you’re faced with some tough decisions. What marketing strategies can you use in a downturn to keep growing?

Good news: uncertainty doesn’t mean your marketing needs to stop.

Personally, I love the challenge of a downturn.

Maybe it’s because I started my career during the Great Recession, right before the bottom dropped out of the market. Or maybe because I've seen so many "new normals" and "unprecedented times" since. Or maybe I'm just competitive.

Whatever the reason, I find the creativity and strategic savvy required to get through a downturn and come out ahead to be so energizing.

But I also know that uncertainty can be paralyzing, and a lot of marketers are facing uncertainty right now.

For when that stuck feeling hits, I’ve outlined seven crucial marketing moves that can help you not only weather the storm, but also position your brand for growth when the economy rebounds. By proactively embracing change and optimizing your marketing approach, you can emerge stronger and more resilient in the face of smaller marketing budgets and economic downturns.

1. Assess and Reassess Your Marketing Strategy

Your marketing strategy is your game plan for finding, reaching and engaging audiences that matter to your business, based on what you know about them and the value your products or services can offer. The best marketing strategies are dynamic and open to evolving as new information and data becomes available. When you’re facing uncertainty, it’s even more important to treat your marketing strategy as a starting point that’s based on what you knew at the time. 

You know meaningfully more than you did before? It’s time to reassess. 

One way to evaluate your strategy is to write down a list of assumptions, questions and missing data that you had when you initially set it. Revisit the list and take note of where you have more information now or where the business and economic context have shifted, and see if it changes your approach.

You’ll want to reassess your marketing strategy quarterly. This gives your previous strategic decisions time to play out. Strategy pivots should be thoughtful responses not knee-jerk reactions. Overhauling your strategy too often is as much of a mistake as setting it and then never changing it again. 

2. Invest in Understanding Your Consumers

If you have a marketing strategy, you already have a core understanding of your target audience. The problem is your consumer insights and personas were likely constructed in a better economy. You have to anticipate that consumer behaviors – spending, saving, etc. – will change in a downturn. You may not have the clearest view of your consumers’ psychographics, meaning their attitudes, values, beliefs and goals that inform their behaviors. Not to mention that humans are “predictably irrational,” as behavioral economist Dan Ariely has written, and it’s helpful to know what form that irrationality takes in your target.

Investing in understanding your consumers at both macro and micro levels will enable you to make better marketing decisions. This can look like:

• Government economic and consumer data (e.g., Federal Reserve, Bureau of Labor Statistics, etc.)

• Proprietary consumer data (e.g., Net Promoter Scores, spending, etc.)

• Pulse surveys

• Custom consumer research

Ultimately, you want some process and mechanism by which you and your team are getting a regular cadence of new insights. The cadence that makes sense will depend on the degree of uncertainty you’re facing and how rapidly the context and thus, consumer behavior, is changing. 

For example, during the first months of the Covid-19 pandemic, uncertainty was extremely high, the situation was changing daily and consumer behavior was highly unpredictable and changeable. I was leading the Covid-19 crisis response content marketing strategy at a large consumer financial institution, and we set up daily and weekly consumer insights gathering from a diverse set of sources. That gave us a higher degree of certainty that our strategy was relevant and responsive when the consumer need for information and resources was highest. Over time, as the context stabilized and we better understood consumer behavior, we moved to weekly and monthly insights.

3. Update Your Creative Assets

Hand-in-hand with staying on top of changing consumer behavior, you should audit your marketing campaign creative to make sure it’s still relevant and appropriately sensitive to the current environment.

For instance, if you’re marketing a cashback credit card and you learn that your target audience has been disproportionately affected by layoffs so they’re only spending on essentials, you may want to update your visuals and copy to highlight the cashback benefit on everyday spending rather than on discretionary items like entertainment.

4. Maintain Your Marketing Channel Mix, Even if You Exit Specific Channels

When marketing budgets shrink, there’s often a rush to cut upper funnel, awareness-driving, less attributable channels and tactics. If you can’t tie it directly to a sale, it doesn’t matter, right?

Resist the urge.

I’m not saying to stay in under-performing channels. Or to spread your budget so thin you can’t be effective. I am saying that channels work together, not in silos.

If you understand your consumer’s journey to purchase your product or service, you know that their decision hinges on multiple touchpoints and channels. If you want to see your funnel collapse, cut the channels that enable your last click channel to close the sale.

Instead:

• Think critically about your channel dynamics – separately and together

• Make sure you know and measure the role of each channel

• Experiment with different placements and tactics within a channel that let you cover more of the consumer journey

• Get out of underperforming channels and tactics

• Keep the core set of channels that span the consumer journey and work well together

5. 80/20 Your Marketing Budget to Allow for Innovation

Innovation and testing can be one of the first things to go when you’re in a budget crunch. While it can seem like this makes sense short-term, it puts you in a tough spot all around. In the short-term, testing and optimization can help you get the most out of the investments you’re making. Longer-term, trying new marketing moves now is the way to find small, early wins that can be expanded and scaled when the economy improves and budgets come back. Ramping up marketing innovation from scratch is like trying to run a 100 meter sprint from a standing start with no warm-up: built for a stumble and pulled hamstring. Ouch.

So how do you keep testing, optimizing and innovating when budgets are tight? Follow an 80/20 approach.

• Allocate 80% of your budget to your “knowns” - these are the channels, tactics, etc. that you have high certainty will drive results. These are tried and tested.

• The remaining 20% of your budget goes to testing and innovation. These are grounded bets that you’re making - i.e., you have data/insights-driven reason(s) to believe they’ll perform, but they’re untested.

• When something in your 20% works, you roll it into your 80%, cut underperformers and move onto your next test. 

• Lather, rinse, repeat.

It’s worth noting that there’s no magic to the 80/20. Feel free to pick allocations that work for you, and your risk tolerance. The idea is simply that a larger portion of your budget goes to conservative bets, and a smaller portion goes to speculative bets.

Why does this matter?

• You get more out of your marketing in the short-term.

• You can adjust faster when consumer behavior or your business context changes.

• You can find small, early wins to scale when the time is right.

6. Focus on Customer Marketing

Executives often think about customer marketing when marketing budgets tighten because of the allure of “free” channels like email, app and SMS. The reality is that if your customer marketing has been an afterthought, your growth has always been less sustainable than it could be. That typically becomes clear when the “grow at all costs” mentality is forced out the window, and teams are left scrambling for budget-friendlier, organic sources of growth.

Growth marketing doesn’t just mean acquisition marketing. Growth marketing is full lifecycle marketing — and sustainable growth comes from building sticky, deep customer relationships. If your retention and loyalty strategies haven’t been a focus, this is a better-late-than-never time to think about how to offer value and grow relationships with your customers.  

7. Be Ready to Seize Opportunities and Respond Quickly to Changes in the Landscape

Downturns don’t last forever, and you need to be ready to take advantage of the upturn when it comes. Companies that haven’t done the scenario planning and innovation prep work will lose out to competitors who have. This could mean being ready to re-enter paid channels before competitors and getting the first mover advantage. It could be investing in your marketing process and technology so you reduce your speed to market and improve your data feedback loops to drive performance lifts. 

Need help updating your marketing strategy to weather the downturn and emerge as a leader? Let’s talk.