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- Do I need an agency or CMO?
Do I need an agency or CMO?
Plus: how to tell if they're any good
Read time: 4 min, 12 secs
Hey there - it's Brian š
This week a friend from Canada flew in to Boston, so we met for drinks.
Heās the CEO of a consulting firm and Iām a fractional CMO.
So naturally he challenged me:
āWhen does it make sense to use a CMO vs an Agency?ā
Wellā¦
In today's issue, weāre not holding back.
Youāll hear:
ā¢ The type of marketing you need at each stage of your business
ā¢ Is a CMO any good? How to tell
ā¢ Agencies I recommend for SEO, ads, LinkedIn etc
Letās make your business an outlier: š
A Canadian challenged me: CMO or Agency?
Caffeine gets me jittery and makes me far too focused for a social conversation. So I rarely have it.
But I broke my rule for Jeff!
We met in Bostonās North End and the espresso martinis are too good to ignore.
Jeff Tetz is the CEO of a consulting firm in Canada (called Results). He also hosts the Unleashed podcast where he interviews business giants (including Adam Grant).
Anyway, Jeff asks me the most common question about my fractional CMO business:
When does it make sense to hire a CMO vs an agency?
Iām biasedā¦ BUT Jeff is a close friend so I gave him the honest answer.
And Iāll share the same answer with you.
When does a business actually need a CMO? What does a CMO do that an agency doesnāt? What skills does a CMO need?
Letās get into it:
![](https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/3cc1d56a-ee49-4543-b92c-47d070787ad8/image.png)
xMe (left) breaking my caffeine rule for Jeff
Does your business need a CMO? Or should you use an agency?
So it depends on how big your business is.
3 stages:
1) $0 - $3M: Prioritize testing and staying flexible
2) $3M - $50M: Prioritize building systems to scale
3) $50M+: Prioritize running the systems & making investments
Since you have different priorities, youāll have different marketing needs.
Hereās when you need a CMO vs an agency depending on your stage:
Stage 1: āThe mad scientistā ($0 - $3M in revenue) - Use Agencies
When youāre starting out, your only mission in life is to find your positioning. Nothing else matters.
At this point you need to tinker in the lab. Test out:
ā¢ Whoās the perfect customer type?
ā¢ Whatās their pain?
ā¢ How do you solve that pain (better than anyone)?
ā¢ What words get them to buy?
Test. Test. Test.
![](https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/d5e41ba6-b17a-477a-9141-dfb83318d9bf/image.png)
Startups testing
You need to be flexible, quick, and test constantly to find that magic combination.
At this stage, we do not know what systems we need yet. Optimize for learning what customers want.
Focus on testing individual marketing channels (ads, SEO, Socials etc.)
Donāt hire someone in-house (unless theyāre a co-founder). Stay flexible.
Tinker with marketing channels yourself or hire an agency.
š§š»āāļø Brianās nerdy side rant:
Youāll work with agencies no matter how big your business gets.
As you move to the next stages your CMOs will run the show (and use agencies to reach their goal).
Stage 2: āBuild the systemsā ($3M - $50M in revenue) - Use Fractional CMO
At this stage, youāve tinkered with a few marketing channels. Youāre more confident with your business model.
Youāre looking to tie your marketing together to scale your business.
You want more customers. But more customers = more complexity.
To scale you need systems:
ā¢ People to bring specific expertise to each channel
ā¢ Processes to align work across channels
ā¢ Tech to handles more customers
Systems keep the wings from falling off as your business takes off.
At this point, you can afford to bring a few people in-house to focus on running the systems you build.
To build these systems, you need your own marketing department.
But you arenāt a marketing expert.
So youāll want to bring on a CMO to be responsible for building the people, processes, and tech systems for your marketing department.
At this stage, you canāt afford full-time top talent (roughly $350k: $250k salary + equity/revenue share).
A fractional CMO gets you access to the top talent without spending top budget.
A good Fractional CMO will take you from $3M to $50M.
That moves you to the next stage.
Stage 3: āRun the systemsā ($50M+ in revenue) - Use Full time CMO
At this stage, you can afford a full-time CMO.
The Fractional CMOās systems will have scaled you up to $50M and itās time to transition to full-time.
The full-time CMOās focus shifts to thinking of bigger investments with longer time horizons.
This CMO will now run the systems that the fractional CMO created, and operate the full marketing department.
How can I tell if a CMO is good? Or if my agency is good?
A CMO will sit over your whole marketing department. So youāre looking for a generalist.
CMOs build systems that tie everything together:
Strategy (Go-to-market & growth)
Channels (SEO, Ads, socials)
Landing page conversions
Email marketing
Management
Analytics
Funnels
Etc.
It comes down to skills for: strategy, management, & marketing channels.
On the other hand:
For an agency, you need a specialist. Someone whoās really good at one specific marketing channel (at much better at their expertise than the CMO is).
Example expertise:
ā¢ Email marketing
ā¢ Facebook ads
ā¢ LinkedIn
ā¢ SEO
See how much more specific that is?
The agency needs to be on top of all platform specific changes. Facebook changes their algorithm? They know how to stay on top.
š§š»āāļø Brianās nerdy side rant:
Iām going to heavily emphasize āstrategyā as a core CMO skill here that 99% of people think they have (but donāt).
Strategic thinking is mandatory for a CMO, but nice-to-have for an agency.
How to tell a strategic thinker:
ā¢ Rarely surprised: they simulate possibilities in their head
ā¢ Understand 2nd and 3rd tier impacts of their decisions
ā¢ Think in systems (interactions, not actions)
ā¢ See signals when others see noise
ā¢ Use nuanced decision-making
So what should I do?
![](https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/a5248b2d-88a3-4aeb-a075-250289abfd87/image.png)
Agency vs. Fractional CMO vs. Full-CMO
If youāre starting out, use an agency to test out specific channels.
In fact, Iāll even share some agencies I trust at the end.
Then, once your business is big enough that you need systems to scaleā¦.
Bring on your Fractional CMO to build your marketing systems.
See you next Thursday š
Brian
P.S.
If you want your own Fractional CMO, grab time with me (for free).
Iāll check out your SEO, ads, socials, & website. Then, Iāll give you a list of small changes you can make to get big results (paying customers).
If weāre not a fit, Iāll introduce you to someone who is.
š§š»āš» My friends who run agencies:
LinkedIn brand building - Lara Acosta
Content - Teddy Mitrosilis
SEO - Barrett OāNeill and The Boring Marketer
Ads - Samuel Thompson
Newsletter Growth - Shane Martin
Note: I wish these were affiliate links. But theyāre not. I donāt trust a lot of agencies, but Iāve known these people for a while and I like them.
Tell them I sent you their way and theyāll treat you well.
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