Here’s a thought-starter: how do you create your marketing team in the tech space or any other niche industry when your sole focus up to this point has been on creating the best possible product?
It’s a common concern for many companies looking to progress from start-up to scale-up and that have often enjoyed rapid early success in the marketplace.
As exhilarating as it can be to successfully launch a new product or bring your services to market, the next step of how to build your marketing team can be a challenge – particularly when there’s barely enough time in the day to run the business.
After all, there’s no point creating something unique that fills a gap in the marketplace if whatever early momentum you’ve generated runs out of steam due to a lack of broader awareness. While it’s one thing to create an amazing product, it’s another to break out of the niche and become a market leader.
That’s where your marketing team comes in. Their role is to help create the strategy that gets your product in front of the right audiences, design the creative that portrays the product in the most compelling light, and ultimately present everything in such a way that commands your audience to take action and buy precisely what it is that you’re selling.
So far, so simple. But putting together a crash-hot marketing team is easier said than done when it falls a fair way down the list of priorities for business owners with more pressing matters to deal with.
What if you could simply rub a magic lantern and have a bunch of marketing genies emerge to take care of all your marketing needs for you? Look no further. From identifying the key positions you’ll need to fill to highlighting average Australian salary ranges, here’s how to build your marketing team in five crucial hires.
Marketing – it’s a colourful business. Credit: Merakist on Unsplash.
Marketing Team Roles – Chief Marketing Officer
Often the first marketing hire a company makes – in large part because many Chief Marketing Officers fly solo and, with their years of experience, do the work of multiple employees – your CMO is in charge of steering the marketing ship.
They should be a strategic thinker with an understanding of target audiences and market trends, who can set the tone of your collateral and ensure your marketing strategy aligns with your overall business goals.
An experienced CMO will have a proven track record in creating successful marketing campaigns, as well as the ability to lead the team around them. Their goal should be to ensure your marketing efforts are laser-focused, cost-effective, and ultimately yield maximum results.
Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Salary in Australia
They don’t come cheap. A quick glance at Payscale.com suggests Chief Marketing Officers in Australia command an average base salary of $186,198.
Marketing Team Roles – Creative Director
When the question of how to build your marketing team arises, this role is a crucial hire.
The Creative Director is tasked with crafting compelling brand stories and creating visually arresting campaigns designed to capture your audience’s attention.
They work hand in hand with the CMO and wider marketing team to translate the strategy into striking concepts that resonate with your audience.
Look for a Creative Director with a solid design portfolio that showcases their artistic flair and innate understanding of branding and design principles.
They should have swagger, style, and a backstory worth talking about. Most importantly, they should have the confidence and communication skills needed to guide the design and content writing teams on how to create engaging marketing assets that always produce an impact.
Creative Director Salary in Australia
You’re looking at a six-figure sum here, too. The average salary comes in at $102,434.
Marketing Team Roles – Senior Content Writer
Every marketing team needs a wordsmith or two to craft persuasive and compelling content. Enter the Senior Content Writer. They do more than just write persuasive copy that targets your audience and keeps it engaged. They are also responsible for taking that overly-complicated, sometimes boring product information and turning it into something that sounds both highly desirable and is easy to read.
Your Senior Content Writer should work closely with both the Creative Director and CMO to ensure your brand voice remains consistent across all your marketing channels.
Look for a Senior Content Writer who uses words creatively and confidently to tell a compelling story. They should have experience in writing for a variety of platforms – including websites, social media channels, emails, and other similar marketing collateral.
A talented writer will ultimately bring your brand to life through captivating storytelling and drive activity with enticing calls to action.
Senior Content Writer Salary in Australia
There’s a fair whack of cash to fork out on this role. You’re looking at roughly $89,927 per writer.
Marketing Team Roles – Graphic Designer
If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a talented Graphic Designer is worth their weight in gold. They work closely with the Creative Director to craft designs that draw attention to your collateral and align with your brand identity.
From eye-catching logos to expertly rendered social graphics and a diverse suite of additional sales collateral, a skilled Graphic Designer makes sure your marketing materials are as visually appealing as they need to be – every time.
Look for a Graphic Designer with a portfolio that showcases their versatility and creativity. They should be proficient in a range of design software, be ahead of the curve with tech, and have a solid understanding of colour theory, typography, and layout principles.
Working hand in hand with the expert eye of your Creative Director, it’s the Graphic Designer who brings your visuals to life and makes a lasting impression on your audience with their eye-catching designs.
Graphic Designer Salary in Australia
It’s a reasonable drop from a Creative Director salary, but significant nonetheless. You’re looking at $57,035 as a guide.
Marketing Team Roles – Campaign Manager
Last but not least, you need a Campaign Manager to bring all the pieces of the puzzle together and ensure your marketing campaigns are being executed effectively. Their role is to oversee the implementation, tracking, and optimisation of marketing initiatives across various channels and ensure they’re creating an impact.
An effective Campaign Manager will be well-organised, detail-oriented, a great communicator, and know their way around project management software. They collaborate not only with the CMO, Creative Director, Senior Content Writer, and Graphic Designer – but more importantly, with clients – to ensure campaigns are delivered on time and achieve the desired outcomes.
Campaign Manager Salary in Australia
This critical role commands an average salary of $72,484, according to Payscale.com.
Combined, these salaries come in at an average of $508,078.
So there you have it – how to build your marketing team in five crucial hires. But with the total salaries on Payscale across all five positions clocking in at more than half-a-million dollars, there’s no denying that creating your in-house marketing team from scratch doesn’t come cheap.
And many start-ups and tech company CEOs get their marketing wrong from the outset – hiring a fractional CMO or part-time Marketing Manager, outsourcing their project management to an offshore Marketing Coordinator, sourcing a bunch of designers on Upwork and stitching together a Frankenstein marketing team that has little chance of success.
How to Build Your Marketing Team – an Alternative Approach
As an alternative, Hunt & Hawk is here to help take the hassle out of putting together an expert marketing team.
We have a full suite of personnel and the know-how needed to produce expert collateral at a fraction of the cost of hiring an entire in-house creative and marketing team yourself.
So, a simple solution to the question of how to build your marketing team is to let us do the hard work for you. It’s easy and economical to build your team with our people.
Keen to get started? Get in touch at dare@huntandhawk.com to work with a team tailored specifically to your needs.
