In today’s rapidly evolving and highly competitive B2B landscape, having the right marketing strategy and execution is critical for success. However, many B2B companies, especially smaller ones or startups, cannot justify hiring a full-time Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) or lack the budget to build a large in-house marketing team. This is where a B2B fractional CMO can provide tremendous value.

A B2B fractional CMO is an experienced marketing leader who works on a part-time, project, or retainer basis to provide strategic guidance and execute impactful marketing programs. They offer the experience and capabilities of a top-notch CMO without the high fixed costs. Fractional CMOs have become increasingly popular as an efficient way for ambitious B2B organizations to level up their marketing.

In this article, we’ll explore the key benefits of hiring a fractional marketing chief, their typical responsibilities, and how to find the right fit for your company.

Here are some of the biggest perks of bringing on a fractional marketing executive for your business:

An experienced B2B fractional CMO has a birds-eye view of marketing across industries. They can objectively assess your current marketing efforts and chart a comprehensive go-to-market strategy aligned with your business goals. This high-level perspective is invaluable for setting a practical course for your marketing and sales success.

B2B Fractional CMOs have often led marketing for companies across your industry and others. They’ve spearheaded initiatives like launching new products, entering new markets and geographies, driving awareness campaigns, and implementing modern marketing technology stacks. They leverage specialized expertise and leading marketing best practices for accelerated growth.

Full-time CMOs earn well into six figures in annual salary. Fractional CMOs allow you to pay only for the marketing leadership and expertise required — perhaps a few days a month or per quarter. You get executive-level guidance and program execution in a highly flexible, cost-efficient model tailored to your budget and evolving needs.

An outside fractional marketing leader provides an impartial perspective, helping you honestly evaluate what’s working and not working. They spot gaps in your messaging, positioning, and sales funnel. And they bring a wealth of new ideas from other industries and verticals you can apply for better results.

Rather than slowly building marketing experience and capabilities in-house, a fractional CMO hits the ground running on day one. They combine intimate knowledge of your industry, proven marketing leadership experience, and strategic and execution support. This drives faster traction of your branding, messaging, lead generation, and sales enablement.

Now that we’ve covered the benefits, what are the typical responsibilities and scope of work of a fractional B2B CMO? Here are some of their most common and impactful roles:

One of the most valuable aspects of leveraging a fractional marketing chief is their capacity to design comprehensive marketing strategies tied directly to your short and long-term business goals. This includes assessing your brand positioning, buyer personas, addressable market, competitive landscape, and growth opportunities to chart a high-level plan to drive sales and customer acquisition.

Fractional CMOs are experts at mapping out and executing go-to-market strategies for new products and services. This entails outlining detailed programs across multiple marketing channels to generate awareness, consideration, trials, and ongoing loyalty to your offerings. They sync these plans with your sales process and revenue targets.

An experienced fractional marketing leader will methodically craft differentiated and compelling messaging that spotlights your brand promise and value proposition. They’ll assess your current content and collateral and develop consistent messaging and positioning throughout the customer journey. This builds credibility and preference for your brand.

Fractional marketing chiefs don’t just provide strategic advice – they roll up their sleeves to manage tangible marketing campaigns that deliver results. This often includes planning and overseeing content marketing, product launches, promotions, and paid advertising programs across channels like pay-per-click, social, and display ads.

What good is marketing if it doesn’t drive sales? Fractional CMOs create tight alignment between marketing and sales, bridging the insights and interest marketing generates to your sales process and reps. This can include crafting targeted buyer personas and messages, content to support sales conversations, and analytics on conversions by the campaign.

Experienced fractional marketing leaders are fluent in business analytics and reporting to quantify marketing impact and ROAS. They’ll regularly analyze your marketing metrics and funnel conversion rates, run A/B tests, highlight insights, and present reports that showcase the revenue influence of marketing and areas to improve.

If the goal is to build an in-house marketing team eventually, an outside CMO can provide invaluable guidance on structuring that team for success. They identify critical roles needed and set responsibilities across strategy, creative, content production, analytics, and more. They also define processes for an efficient marketing workflow between teams.

What marketing technology stack a company needs is a complex question. Fractional CMOs have assembled martech for organizations large and small. They can survey your current marketing technology landscape and recommend cost-efficient solutions to enhance CRM, email marketing, landing pages, reporting, and more capabilities.

Hiring an executive-level B2B fractional Chief Marketing Officer to catalyze your growth is a significant investment. Here are the best practices for choosing one that’s the right strategic fit:

Not all marketing leaders translate seamlessly between B2B and B2C. Seek out a fractional CMO with an extensive background in B2B companies similar to yours. Look for experience specific to your industry that indicates they’ll quickly grasp your business model and market landscape.

While fractional by nature, a temporary executive should still mesh with your workplace culture for maximum collaboration and fit. Assess candidates for appropriate communication styles, values instilled by company leadership, and ability to adapt to your organizational style.

Marketing technology, analytics, and operations have grown highly advanced. Ensure your B2B fractional CMO has hands-on experience with modern martech like CRM platforms, email, landing pages, and the data to track it all. If they can strategize and execute, it’s a significant plus.

A consistent track record in past positions is the best indicator of future success. Carefully validate that potential fractional marketing chiefs have tangibly driven growth and ROAS at organizations comparable to yours. Require specific examples of programs deployed and metrics lifted.

The best fractional CMOs customize their strategic approach based on your organization’s unique needs, challenges, strengths, and capabilities. They won’t force-fit the exact blueprint on you as previous clients but relatively objectively assess your situation and opportunities. Avoid those pushing a rigid, cookie-cutter methodology.

While not full-time, a fractional CMO must be consistently accessible and responsive to company leadership and team members to keep initiatives moving forward effectively each week. Ensure defined expectations of their availability and reliable working hours.

There are many places to find and recruit a B2B fractional CMO. One of the best places is CMOx, a network of leading fractional CMOs. You can also find B2B fractional CMOs by going to LinkedIn and searching for “B2B Fractional CMO”. For more information on how to find and hire a fractional CMO, check out our article, “Where to Find a Fractional CMO“.

Hiring an elite-caliber B2B fractional Chief Marketing Officer allows ambitious B2B companies to execute sophisticated marketing strategies and programming without the enormous price tag of a full-time executive. Fractional CMOs provide complete flexibility to scale their involvement up or down as your needs evolve.

Be diligent in assessing candidate experience, competencies, work style, and likelihood to drive tangible outcomes tailored to your organization. When you find the right fit, a fractional marketing leader can fast-track your growth in today’s highly competitive business landscape better than almost any other investment.

If your company needs a B2B SaaS fractional CMO, consider working with Peter Geisheker. Peter has been providing Fractional CMO services for over 20 years and has expertise in growth tactics and conversion optimization. View Peter’s Fractional CMO case studies.