You’ve got three ways to bring in marketing help: hire full-time, bring in someone fractional, or use an agency. Which one fits comes down to two questions: what’s missing on your team, and how you want to buy the help?
It’s a lot to contemplate but it’s manageable, especially when you break it down. I built a simple tool to guide you through the process. You can spin through the assessment in about a minute, or you can click What’s the logic behind this? to get straight to the good stuff.
The two key questions
First, is the gap direction or production? Do you need someone to work out what to do, or do you already know and need it done? Direction takes someone senior, and production can come from cheaper hands, but the line is blurry.
Plenty of senior people do both, especially fractionally. A fractional marketing leader can set the plan and execute the parts that need their judgment. That’s the player-coach. The person who can tell you what your dashboards should measure and then build them for you.
Second, how do you want to buy it? In the room every day, or flexible and not so embedded? One person, or a team? Ongoing, or for a set period of time?
These questions form a grid: how senior the need is, crossed with how you want to buy it. Full-time and fractional each come in senior and junior versions, which is why it’s never a clean three-way. The assessment above places you on the grid.
What marketing support can look like
Full-time when the work is steady and here to stay. Consider a VP or head of marketing when there’s a full week of senior-level decisions, and a junior or mid-level hire when the plan’s set and you need reliable hands in the room every day. If you need both permanently, hire a senior leader and give them the budget to either build an internal team or hire contractors to execute.
Fractional is the best choice when the need is senior but not full-time. A few strategic calls a week, but not every single day. If there’s also a lot to produce, the fractional leader can set the direction and steer an agency or contractor. Or, if the volume is manageable, a fractional marketer who’s a player-coach can design and execute the plan. If the need is senior but temporary, like transition during turnover, prepping for a funding round, guiding the strategy before your first hire, that’s interim work with an end date.
An agency is the right call when you need high output across several channels at once, or specialized craft you shouldn’t staff for: video, a site build, a platform migration. And don’t forget freelancers for when the work is focused, contained, and doesn’t need daily presence.
How to weigh the costs
None of these options is reliably “cheaper” or a “better value.” Instead, accept that you’re prioritizing something. An agency fee is a team priced for throughput. A fractional rate is one person’s time with no account layer, so more of what you pay reaches the work. A full-time hire is a fixed cost you carry every month, whether it’s busy or slow.
Let’s start with the full-time seat.
So compare against what you want to prioritize. High-volume production is most cost effective from an agency or skilled freelancer. A few strategic calls a week is cheaper fractionally than a salary you use two days out of five. A full week of senior work every week is cheapest as a hire. For what fractional engagements run and how they’re priced, here’s what I’m seeing.
Where it gets blurry
When it’s a close call or a tradeoff to consider, the assessment tool flags it. For instance: Steady, high-volume work you already know how to direct could go to an agency or a full-time team. The tiebreaker is whether you want to own the capacity. If it’s permanent and you’d rather control it, hire. If the need is narrow, SEO or GEO for B2B SaaS, use a specialist either way.
Urgent work that comes in waves is the hardest to place. A full-time hire sits idle in the quiet stretches, and outside help can’t always be instant. You’re choosing whether to pay for the idle time or accept some lag.
And any outside help needs someone inside to feed it data, access, decisions. Make sure you know where that sits before you consider hiring anyone.
If you land on fractional, here’s how to find and vet one. And if you want to talk through where you’re stuck, that’s what I do.