There is a difficult stage between founder-led marketing and a mature team. Marketing has become too important to keep doing between product meetings, but there is not yet a working function for a senior hire to inherit. At that point, founders usually consider four options. They are not interchangeable.
Hire a full-time head of marketing
This is the cleanest answer when the company already knows who it sells to, how it wins and which channels can carry growth. A good head can take a motion that works and make it larger, more disciplined and less dependent on the founder.
It is a risky answer when those things are still unresolved. The search can take months. The new hire then spends the first quarter learning the business, hiring a team and working out what should have been true before the role existed. If the hire is wrong, the company loses money, time and often the remaining confidence in marketing.
Hire an agency
An agency is useful when the brief is clear. If you know the audience, the proposition, the channel and the result you expect, a specialist team can give you capacity quickly.
The trouble starts when the missing thing is the brief itself. Agencies are built to deliver a defined service. Asking one to solve positioning, choose the growth model, wire the CRM, create the reporting and own the commercial result usually produces a set of disconnected outputs. Each may be competent. Together, they still do not form a function.
Hire a fractional CMO
A strong fractional CMO gives a company senior judgment without a full-time salary. That can work well when a capable team already exists and needs direction, prioritisation and a more experienced voice in the room.
It works less well when there is nothing underneath the advice. A few days a month can set the direction, but it rarely covers the daily work of building the channels, systems, content rhythm and data model. The founder ends up with a plan and the same execution gap they had before.
Have the function built inside the company
The fourth option is to bring in senior operators to do the build itself. They work inside the team, settle the positioning, put the first channels into market, connect the CRM and reporting, establish the operating rhythm and prove what can work.
Once the function runs, the company can hire a permanent head into something real. Or the operators can stay, usually in a lighter form, to keep running it. The aim is not permanent outsourcing. It is to remove the costliest uncertainty before the permanent hire is made.
How to choose
The decision is easier when you ask what is actually missing, rather than which label sounds most senior.
- Hire a permanent head when a working motion needs leadership and scale.
- Hire an agency when the brief is clear and you need specialist capacity.
- Hire a fractional CMO when a capable team needs experienced direction.
- Have the function built when positioning, execution and infrastructure all need to be created together.
Questions founders ask
Should I hire a head of marketing or a fractional CMO?+
Hire a full-time head when there is a working motion and enough scope for a senior leader every day. A fractional CMO fits better when a capable team already exists but needs senior direction for part of the month.
When is it too early to hire a full-time marketing lead?+
It is usually too early when positioning is unresolved, no channel has shown repeatable demand and the new hire would need to build every system before they can lead anything.
What is different about having the function built?+
The work covers the connected build: positioning, brand, demand, CRM, data, operating rhythm and hand-over. The output is a working function rather than advice or one channel.