Making Your First Marketing Hire Work

Do I Need a Marketing Person?

You need a marketing person when you have a product, a target segment and revenue targets, but nobody owns how the right buyers find you, remember you and choose you. If sales already has more leads than they can handle, the problem is sales capacity. If revenue depends on a few relationships or one lucky channel, marketing is how you build a second, repeatable source before the first one runs out.

How to Hire a Marketing Person for the First Time

Write the commercial outcomes, the metrics and the priorities before you write the job spec. Split the role into judgement work, which is deciding who to target, what to say and where to spend, and execution work, which is producing and running campaigns. Hire for the part you will keep in house, and source senior judgement externally until the plan is proven.

When Should I Hire a Marketing Manager?

Hire a marketing manager when the plan exists and the gap is consistent delivery. They should inherit a clear ideal customer profile, a priority list and a number they own. If those are not ready, a manager will spend their first quarter building the things a senior marketer should have built with you.

The Job Spec Nobody Can Fill

First marketing job specs usually describe two people, a director level brief and an executive level brief stapled together. Candidates who can do both cost accordingly, so the company gets six months of good work in one direction and quiet disappointment about the other.

Split the Judgement From the Delivery

Judgement work is deciding who to target, what to say, which channels earn budget and how success is measured. Delivery work is producing and running everything that follows. Judgement work is intermittent and needs seniority, delivery work is constant and needs capacity.

Five Things That Need to Exist Before Your First Hire Starts

A new marketing hire inherits whatever you have already built. If the list below is not in place on day one, your first month of their salary buys setup work rather than progress. Most of it is judgement and setup work a fractional CMO can build with you before the role is advertised.

• A written plan for the next two quarters with priorities in order
• A defined ideal customer profile built from deals you have won
• One number they own, agreed with sales and leadership
• Reporting that already works
• A senior marketer to review decisions with

Interviewing When You Are Not a Marketer

Ask what they owned the number for, what they stopped doing and why, and how they would prioritise between two customer segments next quarter. Those answers separate accountability from activity.

First Marketing Hire for a Startup

A startup's first marketing hire usually needs to be a generalist executor, but they still need a plan written with the founder. The mistake is expecting them to find product-market fit and run campaigns at the same time. Founders should own fit until it is proven; the first marketing hire owns the repeatable path to the right buyers once it is.

Questions About Your First Marketing Hire

Do I need a marketing person?

You need a marketing person when you have a product, a target segment and revenue targets, but nobody owns how the right buyers find you, remember you and choose you. If sales already has more leads than they can handle, the problem is sales capacity, not marketing. If revenue depends on a few relationships or one channel, marketing creates the repeatable second source.

How to hire a marketing person for the first time?

Start by deciding whether the gap is judgement or execution. Write the commercial outcomes, the metrics and the priorities first, then split the role into judgement work and delivery work. Hire for the part you will not outsource, and get senior judgement externally while you prove the plan.

When should I hire a marketing manager?

Hire a marketing manager when the plan exists and the gap is consistent delivery. They should inherit a clear ideal customer profile, a priority list and a number they own. If those are not ready, a manager will spend their first quarter building the things a senior marketer should have built with you.

What should our first marketing hire actually be?

In most scaling B2B companies the first hire should be a capable executor working to a plan somebody senior has already written. Hiring a junior and expecting strategy is the most common and most expensive version of this mistake.

Should we hire a marketing manager or a marketing director first?

It depends on whether the plan exists. If direction is set and the gap is delivery, a marketing manager is the right first hire. If nobody can define the quarter's priorities and tie them to revenue, the missing piece is leadership rather than headcount.

How do we write a job spec for a role we have never had?

Work backwards from the commercial outcome rather than from a task list. Decide what marketing must produce over four quarters, split the judgement work from the execution work, and hire for execution while sourcing judgement elsewhere.

What does a first marketing hire cost in Ireland?

A marketing executive or manager is a manageable cost. An SME marketing director or head of marketing typically lands at €120,000 or more a year once employer PRSI, pension, bonus and recruitment fees are included, before any campaign budget.

First marketing hire for a startup, what is different?

A startup's first marketing hire usually needs to be a generalist executor, but they still need a plan written with the founder. The mistake is expecting them to find product-market fit and run campaigns at the same time. Founders should own fit until it is proven; the first marketing hire owns the repeatable path to the right buyers once it is.

Who should I hire for marketing if I do not know marketing myself?

Hire someone who has owned a number before and can explain their choices. Pair them with senior marketing judgement from outside, for example a fractional CMO or a mentor, until you can evaluate their plan yourself. The founder does not need to be the marketer, but they do need to be able to say whether the plan is commercial.