It has now been 6 months since I began the Fractional CMO journey, and having interacted with dozens of founders/CEOs and an occasional CMO/COO (and in some cases worked with them), I have now seen a broad set of use cases for the Fractional CMO.
A commitment of 15-20 hours a month for a 3-6 months timeframe
The founder needs help on the following:
1. Identifying marketing priorities and building a marketing org around it – people, processes, partners etc
2. Mentoring and grooming a promising VP to become a CMO
Sometimes, a founder and/or CMO would like
3. A second opinion on their current approach
4. Help on a specific domain/challenge – brand, content, growth and so on
Strategic
A commitment of 30-40 hours a month and usually requires about 6 months
1. A founder has a mid/senior level leadership but needs help in aligning different marketing teams towards common business objectives (OKRs anyone?)
2. A founder thinks their mid/senior level leadership team could do with some strategic help on GTM/positioning.
Strategic + Team Management
A commitment of 50-60 hours a month and requires 6 months to a year
1. A founder needs help in managing day to day ops of the marketing team to free up bandwidth and so that the team has someone with domain expertise to go to for help
2. A founder needs to hire mid and senior leadership while doing the above
For these projects, I typically recommend my 6 month CMO™ program, especially if the founder has a structured approach to work.