Why Hiring Outsourced CMO Services Can Accelerate SaaS Growth
Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) is the person who oversees all marketing activities of an organization. CMO services include every marketing service from advertising to social media, email marketing, content marketing, search engine optimization, website design, and account-based marketing. The CMO will also be responsible for managing the company’s overall brand awareness and identity.
To grow a business, every department must be working in tandem with each other. If one department isn’t performing well or there is no coordination between departments, the entire business could suffer. The CMO works alongside the C-suite team of the company to make sure that all departments work together as a team to further the common business goals.
As a B2B SaaS, you might not be in a position to hire a full-time CMO. In such cases, outsourcing CMO services is the ideal solution. By doing this, you get all the benefits of having a CMO at a reduced cost and increased flexibility.
In this piece, we discuss the benefits of outsourcing CMO services and how to find the best CMO for your B2B SaaS company.
What are the responsibilities of a CMO?
A CMO takes up a host of responsibilities to fulfill various needs of a company. To put it simply, the CMO leads every step of the marketing process to achieve growth for the company. Some days the CMO will take the role of a leader to guide the marketing department, whereas, on other days, the CMO will actively develop a comprehensive marketing strategy to plan for a launch.
Here are some of the common responsibilities of a CMO:
Strategizing
A CMO must know how to create effective strategies to help companies reach their growth goals. Outsourced CMO service often involves conducting a marketing audit, having a deep understanding of how the target market works and what consumers want. This includes knowing what types of products to sell, where to sell them when to sell them.
The insight provided by a CMO is invaluable for making executive decisions in a company. Through market research, a CMO can help decide which products should be launched by a company, which products should be discontinued and how to increase customer satisfaction.
Problem Solving
CMOs need to have an eye for detail, and they need to understand the problems that a business faces. A CMO needs to understand all aspects of a business so that the marketing leader can provide solutions to any marketing problem.
For example, your B2B SaaS might be struggling to grow its customer base despite having an excellent product. The CMO will first have to identify the marketing problem in this case. After research, if the CMO finds that the lack of growth is due to poor customer experience, the CMO will develop a strategy to improve customer service.
Executing
Once the CMO has identified the problem and developed a solution, execution is next. The CMO will implement the plan and monitor the results. If the results do not match up with expectations, the CMO will change the initial plan.
The CMO needs to make a clear marketing plan and coordinate with the marketing team to ensure that the intended results are achieved when it comes to execution. Through execution, the CMO might also realize that additional marketing efforts are required and take immediate action.
Monitoring
The CMO’s job is not over with the implementation of a strategy. Instead, they will be required to constantly monitor the strategy and assess the results generated by it. In this sense, the CMO plays a never-ending role in the product cycle.
For example, let’s say that your company launches a new service, and you predict to generate $ 100,000 from it monthly. The CMO will monitor this and ensure that the targets are being met. If the same does not happen, the CMO will have to find the reasons and change the marketing strategy.
Providing Leadership
A CMO is often tasked with managing multiple departments within their organization. This means they have to juggle several responsibilities at once. In addition, they also have to ensure that each department is working together towards the same goal.
For example, CMO services will help your company decide when to launch a product, how to advertise it, what to do if the product’s sales start declining, and so on.
Marketing Expertise
The most important role in marketing is that of the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO). A CMO is responsible for marketing, including strategy, planning, execution, and measurement. In other words, your marketing leader is the CEO of marketing.
A CMO should understand the entire marketing process from conception through implementation. Your marketing executive must understand the various stages involved in creating a successful brand.
Without a CMO, it will be easy to get lost in the world of marketing. For example, let’s say you have to decide between advertising online or using programmatic TV ads. With the help of the CMO, you can assess which form of advertising will bring the best results.
Customer-Centric
Hiring a CMO ensures that your company is making customer-centric decisions. Instead of going by your gut, your CMO will invest in researching customer preferences and the industry’s best practices. This will give a competitive advantage to your company by ensuring that your marketing decisions are focused on increasing customer satisfaction.
For example, you might be confused between two different varieties of a product. You will likely shoot in the dark without a CMO and hope for good results. With a CMO, you can test the consumer preference for both varieties to determine the demand and supply, thereby making a better decision.
Accountability
The CMO will be responsible for all the decisions related to marketing products. This will allow you to set goals for your company’s marketing campaign and expect the CMO to act on them.
As the CMO takes the marketing reigns, it will be their job to ensure that your company’s marketing budget is being utilized fruitfully. The CMO will be required to display a positive return of investment from marketing in terms of increased market share, customer base, and sales revenue.
Here are the Top 5 Reasons Why a CMO is important for your B2B SaaS Growth
Every CMO wears multiple hats and performs different tasks depending on the nature of the business. This is focused on executing marketing strategies and growing the company’s revenue.
Let’s look at some of the reasons why CMO services are important for your business:
Drive Growth
Above all, the CMO is required to strategize, execute and monitor plans for consistent growth in a company. As growth is commonly measured in terms of sales revenue, the role of the CMO cannot be overstated. Achieving growth goes hand in hand with the numerous responsibilities taken by the CMO. If the existing plans fail to achieve the set targets, the CMO will reassess the situation and formulate plans. Therefore, the CMO is constantly involved in taking a company forward.
Provide Marketing Advice
CMO is the head of the company’s marketing experts and is naturally expected to provide excellent marketing advice. Implementing the right marketing strategy is critical for the success of any business. Even if the company has a huge marketing budget, if the same is not allocated correctly, it is unlikely to grow the company. For example, if you sell high-end luxury cars and want to set up a marketing campaign for the same. The first step would be determining the platforms where your potential customers can see the advertisements. Without this market assessment, you run into the risk of spending your budget without getting any returns.
Suggest Innovative Strategies
Effective CMO services ensure that your company is constantly implementing innovative strategies. Through their expertise in marketing, CMOs can come up with achieving the marketing goals, coordinate with the marketing team and efficiently utilize resources. For example, the COVID 19 pandemic brought a huge shift in how the market worked. Without a CMO, it will be difficult for a company to execute a change and develop innovative strategies for maximizing revenue in the new circumstance.
Capability Builder
The CMO plays a big role when determining how to build the capability of the company’s personnel. As per recent data, nearly three-fourths of new technology is acquired in consultation with the CMO. Capability building is one of the essential functions of any company. To thrive in the long run, the employees of any company need to grow and provide the best service possible. This is why CMO becomes integral for driving the success of your company.
Increase Customer Satisfaction
Customer satisfaction is key to the long-term success of a business. The CMO understands customer preferences and gaps in the market before developing the marketing strategy. This helps in ensuring that your customers are always happy with the service provided by your company.
The company often sees a decline in the number of customers but does not understand the reason behind the same. The CMO can conduct a market survey and directly engage with customers to get their feedback. This will ensure that the strategies you implement are directly geared towards maximizing customer satisfaction.
Understanding these 8 benefits of outsourcing CMO services can drive growth for your B2B SaaS
At this stage, you know the benefits of hiring a CMO. However, your company might be in a position where it isn’t ready to hire a full-time CMO. This can be for various reasons such as lack of full-time work or restriction in budget. In these cases, an outsourced CMO service is the way to go.
By outsourcing CMO services, you get all the benefits of having a CMO without the negative aspects. Let’s look at this in greater detail:
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Cost-Effectiveness
Outsourcing CMO services are extremely cost-effective. This is because, unlike hiring a full-time CMO, you only need to pay for the services you are using. Depending on the nature of your business, this can be based on the number of hours or the projects you want to outsource.
For example, you might want CMO services to strategize before launching a particular product. After this, you feel that your internal teams can handle the execution. In this case, you will only have to pay for the strategizing, thereby making this a cost-effective solution.
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Flexibility
Unlike a full-time CMO, outsourced CMO services can work with your schedule. You can decide what you want and when the need arises. The outsourced CMO will have to fit your work into their schedule, thereby providing you with incredible flexibility.
You have complete control over determining the number of hours, nature of work, and the amount of work you want to assign to a part-time CMO. Along with this, you can also decide the benefits you want to provide. As the CMO will not be a full-time employee, your company will be subjected to fewer labor law restrictions.
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Quick Integration
Outsourced CMOs work with multiple companies at the same time. They are used to adjusting to new teams and work environments. Due to this, integrating a CMO service provider is relatively quick and easy.
To better understand this, you will have to look at your company’s onboarding process for a new employee. You likely go through an extensive process where the employee is familiarized with the physical office, colleagues, teams, and internal practices.
In the case of a part-time CMO, you can skip all these steps and directly outsource the work at hand.
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On-demand Professional Services
Outsourced CMOs provide on-demand professional services, meaning they work as and when you need help. Your company might go for months without needing CMO services, and suddenly your B2B SaaS may require urgent help from a C-suite marketing professional.
In such cases, the CMO will form a part of your marketing team to help develop a strong marketing program. In addition to that, your new marketing executive can drive the culture of your marketing organization that can facilitate the process of hiring marketing specialists for the required marketing function. In many cases, a marketing agency can offer an on-demand CMO service to help you develop a marketing program with proper metrics to help you scale your digital transformation efforts.
For example, let’s say your company has recently launched a new product. You expected the product to succeed, but that has not happened because a product-led growth strategy doesn’t always work.
In this case, you will need a CMO who can conduct market analysis and determine the reason for failure. With outsourced CMO services, this can be done on short notice rather than laying down the plan months in advance.
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Increased Revenue
Hiring part-time CMO services can provide all the benefits discussed above. Through the marketing and leadership expertise of the CMO, your company can achieve faster business growth and increase its revenue. The vast years of experience and deep expertise on market positioning, product marketing, and what works in the real world can drive your B2B SaaS growth significantly faster.
Along with all such benefits, outsourcing CMO services positively impacts the overall revenue. We discussed how a part-time CMO would provide on-demand services based on the needs of your business. This reduces the overhead cost for your company. As outsourcing is less expensive for your company, it will increase the profit margin.
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Diverse Experience
Outsourced CMOs usually work with multiple companies at once. Furthermore, as they work part-time, they have a greater chance of getting more experience under their belt across different verticals. This means that you have a better chance of getting more diverse experience with an outsourced CMO than you will get by hiring a full-time CMO that has worked at fewer companies.
Having a marketing executive with diverse experience can be extremely fruitful for your business. They are more likely to develop innovative solutions for existing business problems. Along with this, their decisions will holistically look at the issues involved rather than following a pigeonhole method.
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Better Time Management
As an outsourced CMO will likely get paid based on the projects rather than a fixed salary, they are more likely to manage their time better. Unlike full-time employees, outsourced CMOs will be incentivized to quickly finish their projects such that they can maximize the value of their time.
For example, an outsourced CMO might be working on implementing an online marketing plan and strategizing to launch a new product. The sooner they get done with implementing the marketing plan, the faster the marketing department can launch marketing campaigns.
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Process Development
When it comes to process development, documenting every step is critical, whether using video recordings, Google Docs, or other software. Documentation allows for faster onboarding for new employees and the scalability of any marketing effort.
Your fractional Chief Marketing Officer should be partly responsible for guiding the team to document successful outcomes across your marketing campaigns. Any seasoned CMO understands the importance of documenting every successful marketing initiative for your marketing channels so you can quickly scale certain tactics using the correct marketing technology.
5 things to focus on to find the right fit with outsourced CMO services
Now that you have a good idea of what to expect from outsourced CMO services, you might be wondering how to find the right fit for your company. Even on a part-time basis, bringing in a CMO is a prudent business decision.
As you will be sharing confidential business information and investing in marketing strategies, you should make sure that you get the best person for the job.
Let’s take a look at the factors that you should consider while outsourcing CMO services:
1. Unified company vision
The CMO takes a marketing leadership role in the company and is responsible for all the marketing operations. It is vital that the CMO has a strong vision for the company, and it aligns with the one shared by the C-suite, sales teams, and marketing team.
For example, the CMO might wish to set a timeline for the product launch and decide on a particular growth trajectory. Before hiring the CMO, you should ensure that the rest of your company shares this.
2. Requesting Client Testimonials
Client testimonials are a great way to determine the quality of service provided by an interim CMO. This will give you a clear idea of what their work looks like in practice rather than simply hearing about it.
Furthermore, the CMO will not have an option of interfering with the client testimonials, thereby providing a much better picture of their work.
If possible, you should ask for testimonials from clients in a similar position as yours. For example, if you run a small company under 50 employees and want to outsource CMO services for online marketing, then look for clients who want the same. This will give you a much better idea of the effectiveness of the CMO’s work.
3. See Prior Experience
Prior experience, particularly when it is relevant for the services you want, is an excellent way of comparing different CMOs. If the CMO has worked on similar projects before, it will benefit your company.
Since the CMO works as an experienced marketing professional for your B2B software company, infield experience is more valuable than educational qualification.
4. Focus on Analytical Skills
A CMO will be required to make complex decisions daily while considering various factors. This will involve analyzing market data, understanding consumer preferences, and setting a target for growth so you can scale faster.
Strong analytical skills are key for the long-term growth of the company. This is particularly important in the current data-driven age.
5. Test Interpersonal Skills
While technical and analytical skills are important, the marketing leader you choose should also display strong interpersonal skills. To effectively lead the team, the CMO must communicate, guide, and understand the entire team.
Conducting an interview is a great way of assessing the interpersonal skills of the CMO. You want top marketing talent that can integrate with the company culture and run tasks on their own so you can focus on the core business.
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