Five Tips For Building A Marketing Team That Is Ready To Scale

In today's startup-driven economy, most companies are realizing the importance of building a brand and attracting a loyal customer base. Many small businesses have managed to scale to impressive heights through all of their hard work, while others are still figuring out the means and strategies for growth.

This article provides 5 tips for managing your marketing team and offer pointers to recruiting high-quality talent to help scale your company's marketing expertise:

Know Your Business, plan for growth, and set a timeline for adding new members.

An essential factor in building a marketing team is knowing your business. However, many companies miss this. Rather than building a marketing team that can grow with the business, they often create a team that’s only ready to handle today’s problems and not tomorrow’s.

For example, suppose you have three technical founders and have zero sales experience. In that case, it might help to hire your first salesperson or marketer so you can begin to understand how a sales-oriented person operates.

Also, you must create a timeline that aligns with your company's growth plans so you can hire the right people at the right time. For example, if you expect revenue to double over the next two years, it would be best to add resources in advance of company growth. 

A general rule of thumb is that as sales grow, so should your marketing spend (and staff). Creating a timeline will help you determine how many people need to be hired and when they should start working at the company.

Understand Your Competitors

To build a marketing team ready to scale, you need to understand your competition and what you can do better. Here are a few tips to help you along the way:

Know why you’re different. 

Understand the value proposition of your company’s product and services and how they are unique compared to your competitors. You should also be able to easily describe how your company is different from others in the market.

Know who you are competing with. 

Know who your competitors are and their strengths, weaknesses, and business models. This will help you develop a competitive advantage in your market, making it easier for you to evaluate potential hires.

Have a strong marketing plan in place. 

Your marketing plan should serve as a roadmap for reaching your target audience and developing brand awareness. It should outline how you plan to achieve those goals, what resources you have available for doing so, and how long it will take for you to meet those goals. 

Your plan must be realistic and achievable within the time frame outlined in it; otherwise, it may be difficult for you to hire the right people for your team or keep them on board.

Clearly define roles and responsibilities

If members of your marketing team don’t know what they are responsible for or accountable for, they won’t be able to perform their best. Like a well-oiled machine, your marketing team should be able to produce results day in and day out, at least. 

To make sure your marketing team runs at peak performance, it's vital that you clearly define the roles and responsibilities of each team member. You'll have a clear understanding of how each member works together to support your marketing objectives.

Be Strategic About Your Hiring

How you hire can make or break your marketing team.

This is something many companies don't realize, but it can cost you big time when you don't have a strong marketing team.

The hiring process is the most critical aspect of any growing company. Most founders believe they can do anything they want when they become a CEO. They think they'll hire the best people when everything falls into place. But that's usually not the case. What if you hired a great marketing team, but you don't execute with them?

Here are 3 ways to be strategic with your hiring:

Hire diverse teams

According to Indeed, hiring diverse teams within an organization can improve your company's overall productivity, culture, and morale, and this is crucial for any marketing team that is ready to scale.

Create a retention action plan.

Your action plan should be updated at least once a year. You want your employees to know where they stand with the company and how they can stay on track to achieve their goals. Asking people how they're doing often helps you see if they're still happy with their jobs and still excited about working at your company.

Define your goals.

Defining your goals puts in place something to measure your results against. In addition to asking employees what their goals are, consider what you want them to accomplish by the end of the year or the first quarter, and ask about their progress toward those goals.

Provide resources and support.

Make sure your team has access to the necessary tools and resources. If you want them to be successful at their jobs, equip them with the proper tools to do their best work for you and your clients. (And don't forget about those people who work remotely!)

Providing support to your team includes providing training and mentoring opportunities. Training and mentorship will help keep everyone on top of their game and motivated to achieve their goals. 

Conclusion

Regardless of what type of business you're looking to grow, if you don't have a team of motivated, intelligent people working on your vision with you, it'll be challenging to stay ahead of your competition. 

If a team member is not an excellent fit for your business, it's easier to lag everyone else behind. That's why it's so important to have a team of individuals who believe and understand your brand's vision and are ready to grow with you.