Marketing is essential for any company to succeed. However, hiring full-time marketing staff is a significant investment that shouldn't be taken lightly. Before jumping into the recruitment process, there are a few key things that every company should do to ensure they're hiring the right person and setting them up for success.

Far too many times in my career, I’ve started working with a company that was thrilled to have a marketer on staff only to find out that the product wasn’t past the concept stage, the organization didn’t understand their customer needs, or they flat out weren’t ready for marketing to start building for a launch. Most of the issue lies with companies not understanding the marketing function, not defining the type of marketing function they are looking to create when hiring, or trying to hire a marketer that can do all the functions. None of these approaches to marketing work. To learn more about building a strong marketing function, check out this blog.

Define your brand and target audience

Before hiring a full-time marketer, it's important to have a clear understanding of your brand and your target audience. What makes your company unique? What sets you apart from your competitors? What are your core values? Answering these questions will help you define your brand and assist marketing in creating a messaging strategy that will resonate with your target audience.

Once you have a clear understanding of your brand, you need to identify your target audience. Who are your ideal customers? What are their pain points, interests, and preferences? Understanding your target audience is crucial for developing effective marketing campaigns that will attract and engage your customers.

Set measurable goals and KPIs

Once you have a clear understanding of your brand and target audience, you need to set measurable goals and KPIs (key performance indicators) for your marketing efforts. What do you want your marketing to achieve? Is it increased brand awareness, more leads, higher conversion rates, or something else? A small marketing team should have 1 top-line goal. If you set too many goals, none of them will be achieved.

Setting measurable goals and KPIs will help you track the success of your marketing efforts and make data-driven decisions to improve your campaigns. It will also help you evaluate the performance of your full-time marketer once they're on board.

Consider outsourcing or hiring freelancers

Before hiring a full-time marketer, consider outsourcing or hiring freelancers to handle specific marketing tasks. This approach can be more cost-effective and allows you to test different marketing strategies without committing to a full-time hire.

Outsourcing or hiring freelancers also gives you access to a wider pool of talent with different skill sets and experience levels. This can be particularly beneficial if you're a small or medium-sized business with limited resources.

Hiring full-time marketing staff is a big decision that requires careful consideration. By defining your brand and target audience, setting measurable goals and KPIs, and considering outsourcing or hiring freelancers, you'll be in a better position to make an informed decision and set your marketing efforts up for success.

Get in touch with Banyan and let us help you achieve marketing success; we can take your company to the next level so that you can bring on full-time staff with confidence.