Marketing Consultant vs Fractional CMO vs Marketing Agency– Which is right for your business?
December 16, 2024
But what's the best option?
When looking for a solution to your marketing challenges you come across a wide variety of potential options. You have marketing consultants, marketing agencies, fractional CMOs and outsourced marketing directors all competing for your attention.
We take a look at the differences and which option is right for your business.
What does a Marketing Consultant do & why hire one?
A marketing consultant's purpose is to provide expert guidance and support to help you achieve your business goals.
A marketing consultant might be a generalist, able to help with a wide range of marketing challenges across your business. Or they could be a specialist in one area of marketing and able to provide highly specific expertise to a particular problem.
They will often start by taking a top-level view of your marketing or unique marketing problem. Then provide actionable recommendations to deliver a solution.
Who is a marketing consultant right for
A marketing consultant is perfect for your business if you have a specific problem that you don’t feel you have the expertise to solve. Or when you simply don’t know where to start.
They will provide a solution for you, often in the form of a marketing strategy and plan. Many marketing consultants will also then help you bring your plan to life.
What does a Fractional Marketing Director do & why hire one?
A fractional marketing director is in its simplest terms a marketing director who you have access to for a ‘fraction’ of their time.
This could be one-day a week or a set number of hours per month.
They fulfil all the roles you would expect of traditional marketing director. But as you only pay for part of their time, they provide a cost-effective alternative for businesses that need high-level marketing leadership without committing to a permanent hire.
Unlike a marketing consultant, they will often be directly embedded in your business and as part of your marketing team.
Who is a fractional marketing director right for
A fractional marketing director is right for your business if you need marketing leadership, but with greater flexibility and at less cost than a full-time hire.
This would make a fractional marketing director particularly appropriate for a business that needs flexibility to its marketing resource.
Examples of this could be start-up businesses looking to grow, a business looking to reduce it’s marketing spend and marketing activities, or a seasonal business that only requires marketing resource at specific times of the year.
What does a Marketing agency do & why hire one?
A marketing agency will be able to deliver you outsourced marketing services.
Marketing agencies come in all shapes and sizes. The two common types of agencies you’ll come across are (i) highly focused specialist agencies and (ii) full-service marketing agencies.
Specialist agencies will be able to implement an individual marketing tactic for you, such as paid search, influencer marketing, branding or SEO.
A full-service agency on the other hand will take care of your entire marketing on your behalf.
Who is a marketing agency right for
A marketing agency is a good solution for a business that would like to outsource their marketing either partially or in its entirety. There can be many benefits to outsourcing your marketing.
Specialist agencies are great for parts of your marketing strategy that require a high degree of specialist skills you might not have in-house.
Meanwhile, full-service agencies are perfect if managing your marketing in-house is not a good use of your limited resources or outside of your area of expertise. In these cases, outsourcing your marketing will take away the hassle and leave you free to get on with the running of the rest of your business.
Is there really much of a difference?
If those are the definitions of the terms, how true are they to real life?
The answer is that there is an awful lot of grey areas where marketing consultants, agencies and fractional marketing directors overlap.
For example, a marketing consultancy will often not only help diagnose your marketing problems and make recommendations, but you will also be able to outsource your marketing to them to implement solutions. Therefore, blurring the lines between marketing consultant and marketing agency.
A fractional marketing director on the other hand will also often play the role of marketing consultant when first joining your business. They will take an overview of your business, identify areas of improvement and make recommendations.
The overlap in responsibility is further blurred by what is considered the trendy term. Perhaps unsurprisingly, marketers are keenly aware of staying on top of the latest trends (as well as what is ranking well on Google) and will choose a term that they feel reflect this.
As trends change, what once might have been a part-time marketing director is now a fractional marketing director.
The charts below show how the popularity of google searches for marketing consultant, fractional marketing director and marketing agency have changed over time.
Google Trends data: Search Interest for ‘Marketing Consultant’ change overtime. Data captured 12.2024. Numbers represent search interest relative to the highest point on the chart for worldwide searches. 100 represents point of highest search popularity.
Google Trends data: Search Interest for ‘Fractional CMO’ & ‘Fractional Marketing Director’ change overtime. Data captured 12.2024. Numbers represent search interest relative to the highest point on the chart for worldwide searches. 100 represents point of highest search popularity.
Google Trends data: Search Interest for ‘Marketing agency’ change overtime. Data captured 12.2024. Numbers represent search interest relative to the highest point on the chart for worldwide searches. 100 represents point of highest search popularity.
You can see here that the popularity of the term ‘marketing consultant’ has slightly declined in between 2004-2024, while the popularity of ‘marketing agency’ has grown over the same time period. ‘Fractional Marketing Director’ has increased rapidly in popularity since emerging in 2018.
Which option is right for your business?
This means thinking about if marketing agency, consultant or fractional marketer is right for your business is a great way to start your search for a marketing solution.
But don’t feel overcommitted to your initial decision.
Be open with who you talk too. Often the best option is not based on what one refers to themself as, but on the personal connection you build with them and the experience they bring to the table.
If you need support with your marketing the Richmond Marketing Consultancy (or should it be the Richmond Marketing Agency?) provide outsourced marketing services. Get in touch for a complimentary consultation - and we will start your journey to better marketing.
