Not only can they give. A fractional CMO can work with your team to improve their skills and help take efficient and effective organizational communications to the next level. Especially in this scenario, it's important to hire a fractional CMO that adapts to your team and the culture of your company. It's critical that you have clear communication with your team about why you're hiring a fractional CMO and how this will benefit their success.
As they say: “What has brought you here will not get you where you want to be. Your company needs to develop new skills and introduce new approaches. The best firms understand the relationship between risk and reward. Prudent decision makers act courageously because they KNOW and UNDERSTAND risks and manage them intelligently.
Most importantly, prudent decision makers don't punish failure or waste learning opportunities for fear of “failing.”. It's OK to fail in healthy companies. In fact, failure indicates that people are looking for answers, trying new approaches and looking for new ways to create value for the company. These could be new revenue opportunities, productivity increases, or cost reductions.
It can be big or small, as long as it strengthens the company in terms of its core values and the value delivered. Healthy companies develop prudent processes that anticipate downside risk and establish decision points and evaluation milestones to invest in a measured manner, redirect or cancel based on LEARNING. This way, you can use the experience of a fractional CMO as you search for the perfect replacement. A fractional CMO can offer immense value to organizations, since hiring a full-time marketing director would not be feasible, either practically or financially.
Talk to your executive team about the company's objectives, the sticking points with the marketing team, and what you want your fractional CMO to achieve. On the other hand, a creative fractional CMO must ask the right questions to help frame forward-thinking discussions. This debate is fruitful beyond the fractional CMO and provides clarity for decision-making in the often complex and matrixed world of professional services. When your needs and objectives are clearly identified, a fractional CMO can be a great resource to help you make a big impact on your marketing and communication program with less investment.
A fractional CMO can be an effective mediator when sales and marketing (and sometimes engineering, production, or IT departments) don't work well in the same isolated environment. Many companies that hire a fractional CMO have talented and ambitious young marketers who aren't ready for a CMO position, but could be. In fact, a good fractional CMO should need a seat at the table; it's the only way to maximize the effectiveness of their work. A fractional CMO is a high-level marketing executive hired part-time or as a contractor, saving organizations the cost of a full-time hire.
If you're stuck between working with freelancers or agencies and hiring a full-time CMO, a fractional CMO may be an option worth considering. A fractional CMO is a marketing specialist who works with companies for a fixed period of time in a given month, often just a few hours. Each of these concerns is valid, but may reflect a deeper trust issuer or a lack of preparation for a fractional CMO. When hiring full time isn't an option, a fractional CMO can ease the workload of the person responsible for sales and marketing, allowing them to focus solely on sales, knowing that they have a team member dedicated to marketing support.
Taking these important steps will ensure that your decision to hire a fractional CMO was truly wise...
