The Rise of the Fractional CMO
Executive level marketing on-demand.
The Rise of the Fractional CMO
Not every company needs a Chief Marketing Officer. Scratch that. Not every company needs a full-time CMO. The world of work has changed. Business models have changed. You can get your car service on-demand, you can get your favourite curry on-demand, you can pick and choose what to watch and when to watch it, so why not have access to an executive level marketing leader on-demand?
I’ve written about the CMO acronym before. Each of the letters has a meaning which tends to be lost in many of the CMO Job Descriptions that I read. Let’s revisit.
C is for Chief.
There is no marketing role above the CMO.
C is for Command. Not the instruction to a computer meaning, but the proficiency and mastery definition of the word. This is a board level, leadership position that ‘commands’ respect from the marketing team.
C is for Cognition. The CMO has acquired knowledge and understanding through thought and more importantly experience. Cognition is developed through awareness, perception, reasoning, and judgment, not watching a 5 minute YouTube ‘training’ video.
M is for Marketing.
That’s Marketing with a capital M. Full-Stack Marketing at a strategic level.
M is for Mentoring. The CMO is responsible for building a team to execute the strategy. The CMO is a coach, a leader who helps to guide and train and make people better.
M is for Memory. The advantage of hiring an experienced CMO is to avoid potential mistakes that have been made in the past and thus accelerate growth and reduce risk.
O is for Officer.
This part of the acronym is perhaps the most misunderstood. Without the O, the role is just a ‘Head of Marketing’ or ‘Marketing Lead’ or ‘Marketing Manager’. The O has legal ramifications and as such requires a person who understands the responsibility of holding the office.
O is for Obligation. The CMO has a duty or commitment to the stakeholders of the company, to the customers and to the brand itself.
O is for Oversight. Supervision, monitoring, and reporting are all important responsibilities for the CMO. Getting it wrong can be expensive.
F is for Fractional.
The role of Chief Marketing Officer, even for large companies, is probably not a full-time gig in the old sense of 9-5, 40 hours a week. You need a CMO, but you don’t need one 24/7.
New engagement models exist that allow companies to have all the benefits of a CMO at a fraction of the cost. The arrangement could be a fixed retainer for a few days a week or a few days a month. You could use a model from the programming world and buy buckets of hours or days that can be used in an ad-hoc way, flexing up and down as required.