Growing from an early-stage startup to a thriving corporation means your marketing needs have evolved. Whether you're a marketing firm starting fresh or an established marketing company looking to expand, finding the right marketing talent is crucial. You now have bigger goals—brand awareness, lead generation, international expansion—and you feel it's time to build a full-scale marketing department. A digital marketing agency can help, but your monthly advertising budget might not have caught up yet.
This begs the question, how do you find enterprise-level marketing talent with startup-sized resources?
Well, this guide walks you through exactly that: how to find diverse, fractional expertise and hire a corporate marketing team to meet your demands without overextending your budget or headcount.
What do corporate marketing teams do?
Corporate marketing teams handle brand strategy and market growth for large companies. They operate within specialized departments to manage marketing projects across multiple brands, products and regions.
R.J Gazarek, Director of Product Marketing at SolarWinds specifically describes corporate marketing as "An umbrella term for all non-product marketing functions such as Demand Generation, Content Marketing, Public Relations, Communications, and Campaign Planning."
Essentially, corporate marketing teams prioritize global brand marketing initiatives while non-corporate marketing focuses on campaigns for single products.
The primary responsibilities of your corporate marketing teams include:
- Brand management: A corporate marketing team focuses on developing brand strategies that align with your business objectives. The brand marketers within your team have the skills to create and manage all aspects of your brand identity and messaging across all channels. When brand management is done properly, you'll notice an influx of downstream revenue from satisfied customers.
- Market research and analysis: A corporate marketing team analyzes target audiences, emerging trends and competitors to ensure your strategies hit the mark. Working with a marketing consultant can help track consumer behavior, identify opportunities and provide insights to strengthen your position in the market.
- Digital channel strategy: They develop seamless digital marketing strategies from social media marketing and search engine optimization to paid advertising and email marketing. Your social media manager and digital marketing specialists ensure marketing effectiveness across all channels.
- Experiential marketing: Industry events, conferences, and trade shows offer opportunities to engage with customers, partners, and investors. Corporate marketing teams use these virtual and in-person corporate events to build strategic relationships, showcase new products, and enhance brand visibility.
What are the most essential roles in a corporate marketing team?
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While figuring out how to make a marketing hire for a small corporate team, you'll realize that you can't pick everyone and might have to let some highly qualified marketing talent walk away simply because your monthly advertising budget can't accommodate them. This is a classic challenge in growth-stage companies.
That said, it's still important to know the most essential marketing professionals that make up a well-structured corporate marketing team:
Marketing Manager
The Marketing Manager oversees the overall management of the marketing department to ensure that all marketing efforts are aligned with your business objectives. They are responsible for defining marketing KPIs, setting budgets, and building a powerful marketing team. While hiring a full-time marketing manager can be costly, this position is critical to the success of your corporate marketing team. As a cost-effective alternative, consider opting for a fractional CMO to fulfill these responsibilities.
Content Marketer
The Content Marketer oversees creating and publishing valuable content to attract, convert, and retain your customers at different stages of the marketing funnel. They handle research and writing, optimize web content for search, and manage editorial calendars for different channels such as your blog, email and social media.
Social Media Manager:
A Social Media Manager drives brand visibility, engagement, and growth across selected social platforms. In addition to being experts in copywriting and influencer marketing, they manage your brand’s social calendar, execute creative campaigns, engage with your audience online, and analyze performance metrics to ensure every strategy is leading towards the desired results.
Digital Marketing Specialist
This specialist has a deep understanding of various online marketing channels (SEO, Pay-per-click advertising, email marketing, and social media advertising) and can audit your current strategy to identify opportunities for improving performance. They are experts in programmatic marketing and their primary objective is to keep your brand top of mind by increasing online presence, awareness, and customer engagement.
Graphic Designer
This is a highly creative role that is responsible for ensuring brand consistency across print and digital media. Sometimes referred to as brand designers, they serve as the visual communicators of your brand identity. They design marketing collateral for multi-channel campaigns, websites, and social media content. They are also able to combine aesthetics with functionality to ensure designs resonate with the target audience while staying true to your brand’s essence.
Marketing Analyst
This data-driven professional analyzes marketing data across all channels to identify trends, understand consumer behavior, and assess the effectiveness of strategies. Their insights enable more informed decision-making and makes this role indispensable. If a full-time hire isn’t feasible, consider a fractional marketing consultant as a cost-effective alternative.
Skills to look for when building a corporate marketing team
A successful corporate marketing team is made up of individuals with a diverse range of skills.
As you build your marketing team from scratch, these are the most important skills to look out for:
- Strategic Thinking: This empowers your team to analyze the market, recognize potential opportunities, and implement the best marketing strategies to capitalize on them. It also deepens their understanding of what consumers need and enables them anticipate shifts in the market.
- Creativity and Innovation: Creativity and innovation are essential for helping your business stand out in a crowded marketplace. For maximum impact, hire creatives and let them share fresh ideas. Be careful not to set overly rigid rules that diminishes their contribution as doing so risks confining you to the same uninspired strategies of the past.
- Communication and collaboration: In corporate marketing, success depends on the ability to effectively communicate complex strategies. Look for professionals who can articulate ideas clearly to diverse audiences - from C-suite executives to creative teams - while maintaining consistent brand voice across global business units. They should be team players who collaborate seamlessly with colleagues, clients, and stakeholders while also excelling at managing relationships across departments, agencies, and international teams.
- Technical proficiency: Corporate marketers should be proficient in enterprise-level marketing tech stacks. Choose candidates who have experience with enterprise CMS, marketing automation tools, and analytics platforms. They should understand how to leverage and integrate these tools at scale.
- Advanced project management: Corporate marketing campaigns have a lot of moving parts and it's easy for things to become overwhelming. Look for marketers who can navigate intricate approval processes, enterprise-level budgets, and deliver results particularly during high-stakes moments like product launches.
- Adaptability and agility: The fast-paced marketing landscape demands flexibility and a willingness to evolve. Ideal candidates stay informed about the latest trends and technologies, embrace change, and continuously seek growth through learning and innovation.
How to hire for a successful corporate marketing team: A step-by-step guide
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Follow these best practices to build a corporate marketing team that truly align with your objectives and can drive growth across multiple markets:
1. Define your marketing needs and goals
Before you begin hiring, clearly outline what your corporate marketing team must accomplish. Whether your focus is on building brand equity or entering a new market, break these objectives into specific roles and responsibilities. This will help you identify the skills and expertise needed to achieve your goals effectively.
2. Outline the team structure
Based on your goals and available resources, clearly outline the structure for your marketing team. Decide whether you need to hire in-house specialists or a hybrid model that combines your internal team with fractional experts. Consider factors like your company’s stage, growth objectives, and budget to ensure the team structure aligns with your overall strategy.
3. Create detailed job descriptions
Develop clear and thorough job descriptions that specify the responsibilities, qualifications, and experience required for each role. Highlight technical skills, familiarity with marketing tools, and essential soft skills, while also including an overview of your company culture. This not only helps attract candidates who align with your values but also sets clear expectations from the outset, improving the quality of applicants.
4. Offer competitive compensation packages
Research industry salary benchmarks for each role and ensure your compensation package is competitive. Beyond base salary, structure a complete package that includes performance-based incentives, professional development opportunities, or flexible work options. These make your offer more appealing and help you attract top-tier talent.
5. Assess candidates using a clear evaluation process
Combine thorough resume screening with multi-stakeholder interviews and practical assessments that mirror real corporate marketing challenges. This helps evaluate candidates for technical capabilities, problem-solving skills, alignment with company culture, and ensures they can excel in a corporate environment.
6. Invest in onboarding and training
The hiring process doesn’t end once you’ve selected your new team members. Effective onboarding is crucial to ensure they integrate smoothly into your workplace and are set up for success from day one.
Ensure that your onboarding plan includes:
- A vision and mission statement of your company, and all its core values.
- A brief description of the team and their responsibilities.
- Training on important tools, software, and company processes.
- A mentor or buddy system to show them the ropes.
- Regular check-ins to determine how well they're settling in and answer any questions they may have.
7. Leverage flexible hiring options
If your budget is limited or your needs vary over time, consider filling certain roles with fractional or contract professionals. Fractional CMOs, freelance marketers, or consultants can bring high-level specialized expertise to your team without the long-term financial commitment to full-time hires. Consider platforms like MarketerHire that pre-vet marketers and allow you to scale your marketing team as your needs evolve.
By following this guide, you should be able to craft a corporate marketing team that checks all the boxes you need for your company.
How to scale a small corporate marketing team for international market expansion
So, you've put in the work and now you're seeing results. Sales numbers are exceeding targets, your team is consistently outperforming KPIs, and now you're looking to expand into new markets.
Here's a guide to help you scale your marketing team and successfully penetrate new markets:
- Evaluate your team's current capabilities: Assess your team’s marketing expertise, experience, and familiarity with the local language and cultural nuances of the new market. This is also a good time to identify potential candidates for roles like a regional manager to ensure localization efforts are well-executed.
- Conduct market research: Analyze the markets you’re considering for expansion to identify the best opportunities. Assess cultural differences in the target market and evaluate the competitive landscape to inform your strategy.
- Develop a clear international strategy: After selecting your target markets, craft a clear and actionable marketing strategy for your expansion. Define SMART goals to guide your efforts and develop localized plans with tailored messaging, content, and distribution channels for each market.
- Build a strong international team: The success of your expansion hinges on having the right team in place. Consider hiring local talent for their deep understanding of the market, which can provide insights your current team may lack. Train existing team members to navigate the unique challenges of international marketing. Additionally, explore freelancers or agencies to scale operations efficiently without significantly increasing your headcount.
- Leverage technology to optimize your operations: With countless marketing tools available, focus on those that truly enhance efficiency during your expansion. Invest in marketing automation to handle repetitive tasks, project management software to monitor progress, and analytics tools to track and measure performance effectively.
- Track your performance: Finally, closely monitor your progress during this demanding period. While some performance drop-off may be expected, keep a close eye on key metrics like website traffic, social media engagement, and conversion rates to minimize any decline. Leverage data analytics to uncover market trends, optimize campaigns, and make informed, data-driven decisions.
How much does it cost to hire a marketing team?
The cost of hiring a marketing team can vary significantly from one business to another. It all depends on the size of your business, the scope of your marketing efforts, and your location. You can take it from three angles.
Hiring an In-House Team
Your first option is to hire an in-house marketing team. This can be a significant investment. The annual cost of salaries, benefits, and overhead expenses for a small team of three can easily exceed $181,000. This approach would be a better fit for enterprises, However, it gives you greater control over their activities and long-term consistency.
Outsourcing to a Marketing Agency
Outsourcing your marketing needs to an external agency can be a more cost-effective option, especially for small businesses using the fractional marketing service model. The cost can range from $900 to $20,000 per month, depending on the agency's size, experience, and the specific services required. While this approach offers flexibility and expertise, it will lack the same level of control and long-term commitment as an in-house team.
Build your corporate marketing team with MarketerHire
Building an agile, effective marketing team doesn’t have to mean hiring an entire department. Working with MarketerHire lets you access experts for specific projects or growth stages without committing to expensive and potentially redundant long-term contracts.
Here's how it works:
- Share your goals: Schedule a 20-minute consultation with a dedicated growth manager who'll learn more about your specific needs
- Meet your match: We utilize MarketerMatch (AI x human expertise) to analyze our network of 2,500+ marketers and connect you with the perfect expert. This could be a fractional CMO, a growth marketer, or a specialist for short-term campaigns
- Start getting results: Onboard your selected specialist within 48 hours
What makes MarketerHire stand out:
- Access to elite talent: Only the top 1% of applicants make it into our network
- Proven track record: Over 30,000 successful matches, including with brands like Netflix, HelloFresh, and HP
- Flexible engagement: Simple monthly contracts and a no-risk two-week trial with every hire
- Consistent support: Post-match marketing operations guidance to help structure your team effectively
- Diverse expertise: From fractional CMOs to channel specialists, find exactly the skill sets you need
Ready to build a lean, high-performing corporate marketing team that drives real results? Get started with MarketerHire today.
Hiring Guides To Check Out
If you’re looking to hire experts yourself, learn how to do so using our many guides: