Building a marketing team looks different for every organization. Whether organizations outsource their marketing efforts or focus on building their marketing team in-house, it ultimately comes down to what marketing strategy is right for your organization. Today, most businesses still focus on building their marketing teams in-house. Some benefits of building an in-house marketing team include better communication and increased transparency. But some downsides to building in-house include high hiring costs, potential hiring biases, and oftentimes a lengthy onboarding period (which can cost your business both time and money). However, the best approach to building a marketing team will vary based on each business and its unique organizational goals.
Identifying Your Needs
Before actually beginning to build your marketing team, your business must evaluate its marketing strategy and needs. In terms of marketing strategy, some things to consider would be how you segment your market, your market positioning, your business’s value propositions, and how you plan on implementing your strategy. A good place to start analyzing the execution of your marketing strategy would be by identifying recurring marketing activities which are relevant to your organizational goals and needs. Some examples could include conducting SEO audits, writing social media posts, and email marketing campaigns. An effective way to identify these activities for your business would be to conduct an audit of your business’s marketing activities. Some things to look for include what your business is already doing well, what drives conversions in your organization, and what your competitors are doing. Understanding these 3 components will help you identify your organization’s marketing competencies and the best way to structure your marketing team.
Team Structure
Before you think about structuring your team, there are two things you need to identify first: the skills required to achieve success in your organization and how your organization is projecting to grow in the future. With these two factors in mind, you can now develop a sustainable team structure that considers your business goals that will remain relevant in the future.
Each marketing team will have many roles designed based on business goals, processes, and structures. Here is an example of how your marketing team could be structured.
- Team Leader (CMO, VP of Marketing etc.)
- Data Analyst
- Content Manager
- SEO Manager
- PR Manager
- Social Media Manager
Keep in mind that each role doesn’t necessarily correspond to a single individual, multiple individuals can occupy some roles. There is also no one-size-fits-all approach to designing a marketing team. It ultimately depends on your organization’s individual needs and goals. However, the organizational structure provided above can be a good starting point. Additionally, finding qualified candidates for each role who will provide the right fit and skillset for your organization, while meeting your budget is not an easy task. Finding your perfect marketing team often requires a large time commitment and many company resources.
What You Should Be Looking For?
When hiring candidates for these specific roles, experts suggest focusing on the candidate’s character and work ethic rather than their marketing proficiencies. This ensures that the candidate selected will mesh well with your organization, collaborate well with others and can deliver the results you desire consistently. It is also crucial that you hire individuals that you trust. Hiring trustworthy individuals will help make you feel comfortable about important, high-level getting done properly and effectively.
When building your marketing team, experts recommend that you look out for these three character traits: intelligence, responsible, and hardworking. Additional other character traits to look for are creativity, curiosity, and self-discipline. Hiring individuals with these characteristics will set your organization up for long-term success and foster a strong, reliable marketing team. Some other general hiring tips include:
- Recruiting from within your network
- Using the same interview questions for every candidate
- Staying patient throughout the entire process
The last point is crucial. Oftentimes hiring a candidate is a long process that often takes many months. Though it may take longer, you should focus on hiring someone who truly fits the role and the organization rather than simply hiring someone who fills the position. Depending on the level of hiring that is being done, it can also become very expensive. For example, if you are hiring at the executive level, it is likely that you will utilize a recruiting agency in order to gain access to the best applicant pool. However, due to the quality of candidates these recruiting organizations offer, they often charge fees or commissions based on whether you hire a candidate through them.
Building the Best Team For Your Organization
Building a good team is like building a good foundation for your organization. However, keep in mind that building an in-house marketing team from scratch is a very time-consuming, tedious, and expensive process. By building a team that meets your organization’s requirements and goals, you can ensure that your business finds sustainable marketing success for years.
