The world of digital marketing is constantly changing, and it takes a savvy marketer to stay on top of industry changes, strategic successes, and constantly evolving social and search engine algorithms. Many small businesses struggle to keep up without a marketing department to track the latest trends of online sales, lead acquisition, advertisement and search engine optimization.
What Is a Fractional CMO?
A “Fractional CMO” is a for-hire Chief Marketing Officer that brings marketing management to small businesses so they don’t need to hire an in-house dedicated industry expert. You can find a Fractional CMO by working with an executive staffing agency, or you can team up with a marketing agency to find the right individual to work with your in-house team. Hiring fractional professionals is a common way for small businesses to keep costs low while continuing to grow and expand, and hiring a CMO is one of the most reliable ways to add value to your marketing budget. With an outside, on-demand CMO, you’ll have access to the latest in professional perspective and best practices so that you can meet your goals in a quicker and more cost-efficient way.
What Are the Roles and Responsibilities of a Fractional CMO?
A fractional CMO is an executive-level position that expands beyond the services offered by many creative agencies. Managing a marketing team at the highest level requires experience in many aspects of business. When you hire a fractional CMO, you’re getting someone with expertise in most aspects of marketing strategy, including:
Managing marketing budgets in an effective and efficient way. This is perhaps the most important responsibility of a fractional CMO, as the goal of improving your marketing strategy is to grow your bottom line.
Developing realistic short-term and long-term marketing goals based on industry trends, budget, and company-wide goals.
Consistent, high-quality reporting on analytics and campaign successes, with hard data to explain ROI for each dollar in the marketing budget. Your fractional CMO should be able to explain clearly the key performance indicators for your day-to-day marketing as well as larger campaigns.
Balancing communication between your in-house team and outside initiatives, including leading your vendors and organizations in company-wide campaigns that need to be clear and easy to understand
3 Signs You Should Consider a Fractional CMO
How do you know if you’re ready to bring in a fractional CMO to help boost your marketing strategy?
1. Your in-house marketing team could use some support.
If you have a team of savvy social media influencers, brilliant graphic designers, and creative copywriters, you’re well on your way to success. Many times, the missing link for an in-house marketing team is executive leadership. Rather than having to run campaigns yourself, hire an expert who can work with your team and their talents to create groundbreaking campaigns with remarkable results.
2. You’re about to launch a new product or service and want to hit the ground running.
Breaking into a new market can be a challenge, and having a fractional CMO to guide you can make the difference between success and failure. You may not want to commit to an ongoing relationship, but a project-based fractional CMO can give your product or service the boost it needs in order to stand out in a competitive and constantly shifting digital environment.
3. You could use an independent consultant to review your current marketing strategy and help make it more efficient and more effective.
You may find yourself with an incredible idea for a marketing campaign and spend hours carefully researching the best ways to show off on social media, optimize your web content, and rank higher on Google… only to find that it doesn’t quite go as planned. Hiring a fractional CMO can help you review your strategy in order to tackle your upcoming campaigns in the best way possible.
If you still aren’t sure, Check out this article from The Business Journals for additional ways to see if you should consider adding a fractional CMO to your team.
How to Choose the Right Fractional CMO for Your Business
You can find a fractional CMO on LinkedIn with just a few keystrokes. A Google search will bring up thousands of options, and it can be overwhelming! How can you tell if the fractional CMO you’re meeting is the right one for your business? You’ll want to vet them thoroughly to ensure a good match!
Ensure their style works for your team. The right fractional CMO will seamlessly integrate into your current marketing or sales team and adapt to ensure collaboration and cooperation. Be wary of a fractional CMO that does not work towards buy-in and cooperation between current efforts and their new ideas.
Learn about their industry experience. One of the benefits of hiring a fractional CMO through a marketing agency like Jennasis is their broad experience in a variety of industries. Being able to draw from techniques and campaigns that have worked in similar industries helps take the guesswork out of the process and can ensure success and flexibility to help you meet your goals.
Find out what else they offer, and how to best blend their services. If you’re in need of marketing strategy and planning, be sure your fractional CMO is able to grow with you. While you may just need a project-based consultation now, your needs may expand rapidly as your business grows. Being able to adjust your marketing plan with the help of a fractional CMO is easier if the CMO can reach out to a wide network of experts.
Jennasis & Associates Can Help with Our Fractional CMO Service
Jennasis has been in the fractional CMO game for years. We’re happy to lead projects with no in-house marketing support, or to work with your talented in-house teams. We have the experience needed to streamline your marketing strategy so your sales team can take advantage of our industry experts to achieve their goals. We’ll blend your sales and marketing strategies to drive and convert leads and help your business grow and succeed.
We start every fractional CMO client with a review conducted by our whole team. We’ll take a look at your annual goals compared to your performance year over year and create a plan with consideration to your current tasks and budget. We’ll help you understand what is working, why it is succeeding, and what we can do to redirect less successful initiatives. With Jennasis, you get vision and strategy in a collaborative environment that ensures the involvement of your in-house team.
Interested in learning more or moving forward with a fractional CMO for your business? Let’s talk about how a fractional CMO and marketing support team from Jennasis can help you meet and exceed your goals for the new year.
