How can a scale-up business professionalise its marketing effectively?

I’ve recently been advising three separate scale-ups at a very similar stage of growth and found it all very interesting - but it can be tricky because it’s often the first time they’ve looked at marketing in a formal, professional way.

They want to get marketing processes going to take their business to the next level, but:

Aren’t ready to hire a whole marketing department
Don’t have much/any in-house marketing experience
Don’t have time to do it with their current staffing levels
Need to keep costs tightly controlled

However, there’s a point when you need to take the plunge into proper marketing despite all that, normally around 3-4 years in.

The three companies reference above are at that point and in a fantastic position to start their marketing work.
They all have:

A wealth of outstanding past work that they can show off to clients
Unique selling points and services that set them apart
Business leaders and teams who are all enthusiastic and committed to getting it right
A strong idea of where they want to be and how to get there

If you’ve got all that, you can do all sorts with the right marketing approach. In fact, you can do far more than you might think – but you’ve still got those restrictions mentioned previously.

If you don’t want to create a whole marketing department, the obvious step is to hire a freelancer to kickstart it all (which is why they all got in touch with me initially).

What are the downsides of using a freelancer like me?

There are potential issues with hiring someone like me though:

Costs can overrun with a freelancer if time isn’t managed properly
You don’t get someone available to you every day to talk marketing through with
Can be contractually tricky to add additional tasks if not in original scope
Will a freelancer also work with competitors?
Will a freelancer be able to learn the business quickly?
Will I have to spend a lot of time supporting a freelancer?

All valid worries and worth considering for any scale-ups looking to bring someone in to get their marketing work going.
In particular, the question of cost and time is a big one. My normal ways of working are:

Set number of days a week/month on retainer
Specific project with limited scope

Neither are quite right for a scale-up starting out with marketing. Both impose limits on what can be done in different ways and will incur additional costs if extra work is needed.

A different way of working with scale-ups like yours

Thinking this through, I have developed the following structure for scale-ups to give them an all-round marketing function (from strategy though execution and reporting) without them having to create a whole department:

Cost per month which includes strategy, content planning, writing, posting and reporting
Doesn’t set out specific days or projects
Instead lays out the minimum requirements over a month (i.e. number of blogs, social, press releases, case studies etc) and also includes time for additional ad hoc work

A sample proposal might look like:

Set up marketing structure (i.e. create email templates, case study structure, social guidelines)
Create monthly strategy for website articles, social, emails, press
Plan, research and write all above pieces each month
Section database and send out emails
Liaise with press and get releases published
Monthly reports on all the above

All for a package cost of £X,XXX a month.

What are the benefits of this approach?

Going for this middle ground between my two normal service types gives scale-ups the following benefits:

Cost control – An agreed cost per month makes budgeting easier. There’s never surprise extras, it’s an all-in-one package for the work agreed
No down time – I’m contactable all month (in work hours) rather than just at specific times, so to all intents and purposes you have a full-time team member
Flexibility – Can pursue new ideas or re-prioritise as needed without having to amend the contract or add more time at extra cost
Accountability – You know what you should be getting each month so it’s easy to hold me accountable
Save time – Having one person for the whole marketing function takes it all off your plate and saves you a huge amount of time
Knowledge – Being involved constantly means I will get to know the company much faster than if it were a piecemeal project-by-project arrangement
Long-term vision - Marketing doesn't work immediately, you need to stick at it. Having someone taking the lead means the long-term vision will become reality.‍

When I’m brought in like this I will also: