Building a marketing team is as much about understanding the complementary skills you’re looking for, as balancing what other parts of the business may think marketing ‘does’.
A Director of Marketing manages expectations from all around the business. Bring us more money. Spend less money. Make our brand sing. It’s going to cost what? Launch this new product. Don’t spend any more. Deal with the customer. Can you find more savings? Launch a new campaign next week. Why would you need dedicated budget for that? And the list goes on.
For your team to work effectively and prove its worth to the business, whoever is ultimately responsible for the company’s marketing efforts must match business objectives with marketing skills.
This can come in many forms. A fully integrated internal team with specific roles for each staff member and equally specific key performance indicators. A cross-trained internal marketing team that consists of those who just roll up their sleeves and do whatever needs to be done. There’s even the option to have a few internal staff with either dedicated or general marketing roles and outsourcing other functions to an agency.
Full disclosure, that’s where pepperit can come in. But with 15 years of marketing management experience, I can honestly say there’s no one right answer. Within the same company, I’ve managed a fully internal team and then as natural attrition unfolds, sought additional help externally.
Building a marketing team – what’s best for me?
You could google this question all day and come up with lots of different answers. Would it help if we outline some of the top-level pros and cons of both scenarios?
Manage all roles internally
Pros
Cons
- Full control of who is managing your brand and messaging
- Easy access to all assets, strategies and reports when you need them
- Allows internal growth into new and expanded roles
- Finding specialised skills can be time-consuming and stressful
- You may be limited by your team’s creativity and knowledge of the brand
- You need the time to do it all, including all that recruitment (tactical V strategic)
Outsource some or all marketing activity
Pros
Cons
- Rely on marketing professionals who are on top of latest trends and their game
- New ideas generated from those slightly removed from business politics
- Professional reporting and other admin done to let you get on with other things
- Understanding of your business politics may be limited
- An extra level of approval may take more time to get communications to market
- Can be expensive – but doesn’t have to be!
That last one about expense is a bit misleading. Without a full understanding of what agency costs should be, some companies end up paying way too much for the value they receive. However, when working with a professional marketing agency like pepperit (90+ years’ experience!) you will end up saving money spent on recruitment, salaries and entitlements. You’ll have more to put into campaigns, branding and messaging. The reason we got into marketing in the first place, right?
What/who should I look for?
For building a marketing team internally, we’ve picked some of our favourite complementary roles for you to consider. In other articles, we describe how they will fit into your structure. They’re also roles our pepperit team have held so they come with lots of experience.
Marketing Manager – across all key disciplines of marketing. Often the head of the department and responsible for other team members.
Sales and Marketing Manager – similar to the Marketing Manager, with a remit of the sales function as well. Nicely combines the two sections that are often considered ‘silos’.
Social Media Manager – responsible for the brand’s community on social media. Plans, creates, posts and manages engagement.
Digital Marketing Coordinator – covering all disciplines of digital marketing from email marketing and social media, to website content and content marketing.
Marketing Coordinator – a great entry level position for one who is looking to gain experience across the full marketing function – on and offline.
Marketing Internships Sydney – internships are a great way to feel out the marketing profession to understand what other training is required or what functions most suit.
Marketing Consultant – someone who is knowledgeable about your business and is on hand to provide advice and strategic direction.
Whatever path you choose to take to build your marketing team, even if it takes a radical turn down the track, the pepperit team would love to chat. About your team’s structure, about how we can be an extension of your team, or about how great coffee tastes. It’s all in a day’s work for us!
Get in touch, your way today.