Looking to hire your first marketer? 4 points you need to consider.

Looking to hire your first marketer? 4 points you need to consider.

You may have secured funding. Your tech stack has been built. You’re ready to launch your business in market. Now, do you need to hire your first marketer? 

Marketing is a broad job industry, and it includes many different disciplines, including digital, social media, content, account-based, product, brand, and plenty more.

Then there are the acronyms: From CTA, CTR and MQL to ATL, BTL and TTL, it seems like there’s a new one popping up every other week!

Before you do any hiring for your first marketing role, you need to define your goal. Are you looking to generate brand awareness or are you focused on lead generation and acquisition? Maybe you want to retain the existing customer base and increase your customer lifetime value?

After that, here are 4 points you need to consider when hiring your first marketer: 

Must have skills vs. desirable skills

You need to be clear about the must have skills and experience needed for the role. Does the need for a ‘big picture’ creative strategist outweigh hands on, campaign execution experience?

Don’t get distracted by the endless possibilities that you would love your ‘perfect’ candidate to have – be realistic and hire for the skills that your business requires today, and where it will quickly evolve to in the future and what your budget can realistically afford.

Can some of the desirable skills, perhaps team management or specific technical/systems, be taught on the job? 

Are they a good cultural fit?

Take the time to think about the overall culture and personalities within your business, or the culture you are looking to create. Are you dismissing great candidates that would be an ideal fit with your team?

Do you need a “creative”, or in fact do you really need a ‘doer’ that can implement your existing campaigns with flair? Building a business based on culture, and hiring people that compliment this, is a good way to ensure longevity and low turnover of staff, and provide a happy, thriving workplace. 

Have your eye on the future

Building your business for the long-term is the key – get the right people in the door and invest in them. Recruit for the priority expertise and culture, then invest the time and money to cross and upskill. The prospect of professional development will keep staff engaged, let them grow into their role and is a great way to retain good people. 

Is an empty position costing you money?

Often positions are vacant for a long time because employers are holding out for the perfect candidate. This is where you really need to evaluate what is really important in this new hire. What is the true cost to your business if you don’t make a hire in the next 2-4 weeks? Will you be able to deliver the next campaign, or grow your company footprint without the additional staff? If you don’t know or it makes no difference, then perhaps the role isn’t as critical as you think. It might be time to reassess the skills that you’re searching for.

The Nudge Group have been helping start-up and scale-up business ascertain the specific skills required for their growing brands, if you’d like some advice, we’d love to chat.

#giveitanudge Dayna Stewart | The Nudge Group | [email protected]