Services / Scale-up
Services · Scale-ups
Fractional CMO for scale-ups
Senior marketing leadership for Series A to C startups that already have a team. When output is high but pipeline is flat, the problem is usually direction, not effort. I reset the strategy around what the numbers say, point the team and budget at it, and coach your marketers into the leaders you need.
The problem
Plenty of marketing, not enough pipeline
Scale-ups rarely lack marketing activity. There’s a team, an agency or two, a content calendar and a paid budget. What’s missing is conviction about where growth actually comes from, so effort spreads thin across channels nobody is prepared to kill, and the board sees cost without a believable line to revenue.
Underneath sits a harder question nobody has had time to answer: has the ICP moved? Is the positioning still true? Are the channels that got you to Series A the ones that get you to C? At Uncapped the honest answer was no. After a planned US banking proposition was paused, I reset the ICP and GTM around lending, and revenue doubled in nine months.
Then there’s the team itself: good people, often promoted fast, pointed at output instead of outcomes, with no senior marketer to learn from. That’s not a hiring problem. It’s a direction and coaching problem.
Strategy, economics and talent drift apart as you scale. The job is pointing all three at the same revenue line again.
The work
Strategy, economics and team, pointed the same way
Four workstreams, adapted to where you are. I work alongside your team, not around them.
Growth audit
Where revenue and pipeline actually come from, by segment, channel and cost: what each pound produces, which motions have degraded, and what the board should be told. Evidence first, opinions second.
Strategy reset
ICP, positioning and channel mix rebuilt around the economics. Channels that can’t scale get killed; the ones that can get proper budgets and targets. At Contis, a new B2B demand engine tripled inbound leads and sourced 88% of new B2B clients.
Talent pointed at revenue
Team structure matched to the motion, gaps hired well, and your existing marketers coached, managers included. At Bullhorn I hired and managed 20+ people across marketing, inbound SDRs and interns while we delivered 164% of the marketing-originated revenue target.
Measurement the board believes
Attribution and reporting that separates marketing-sourced revenue from noise, so budget conversations stop being opinion contests. At Uncapped, marketing-sourced revenue rose from c.50% to c.80% of recognised company revenue.
Working with your team
Leadership without the replacement risk
This is not rip-and-replace. Your head of marketing keeps their job and gains a senior operator to set direction with, sanity-check plans against 20 years of pattern recognition, and coach them through the step-up. If you run agencies, they get sharper briefs and honest performance reviews.
I typically work two to four days a month at this stage: enough for strategy, hiring support and coaching, without the £150k-plus cost of a full-time CMO. £800 a day, 30-day rolling, no equity. When your team runs without me, that’s the engagement working.
Julian is a very strong marketeer and leader. We worked together in Contis. While there he built the most effective Marketing team I have worked with in my career.
FAQ
Questions scaling founders ask
We already have a marketing team. Where does a fractional CMO fit?
Above the team, part time: setting direction, making the kill-or-scale calls, and coaching your marketers while they keep executing. It’s the senior judgement layer most scale-up teams are missing, without adding another executive to payroll.
Will this undermine our head of marketing?
The opposite, done properly. The mandate is explicit from day one: I set direction with them, not over them, and part of the job is coaching them into the leader you’ll eventually promote. At Penfold I mentored an internal team member into the Head of Marketing role.
How fast should we expect results?
The audit and strategy reset land in the first four to six weeks. Pipeline moves on your sales-cycle timescale, so expect leading indicators such as qualified pipeline, CAC and channel economics to move within a quarter. At Uncapped, revenue doubled within nine months of the GTM reset.
What does it cost compared with a full-time CMO?
£800 per day on a 30-day rolling contract. At two to four days a month that’s roughly £19k to £38k a year, against £150k or more plus equity and a six-month ramp for a full-time hire. Bounded pieces like a positioning reset or channel audit are scoped by the day at the same rate.
Can you direct our agencies?
Yes. Agencies do their best work with sharp briefs, honest measurement and a senior marketer holding them to outcomes. Expect fewer, better-briefed agencies and clearer reporting.
What if we actually need a full-time CMO?
Then I’ll say so and help you hire them: spec, interviews, onboarding. A fractional engagement is a poor substitute for a full-time leader once the scope genuinely fills a week. The point is honest sequencing, not maximising my days.
Is the team pointed at the right things?
Book a 30-minute call. Bring your numbers; I’ll bring 20 years of pattern recognition. If a full-time hire is the right answer, I’ll tell you.