Brent Wees | Fractional CMOs & The 90-Day Win
This video is a podcast interview with Brent Wees discussing the role and strategies of fractional Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs) in achieving significant business wins within the first 90 days of engagement.
Conclusion
Fractional CMOs focus on establishing clear strategic marketing processes, improving communication, and ensuring alignment within the organization. They address foundational marketing issues and provide structure to help companies, especially tech startups, grow effectively.
Key points
🔍 Identifying Strategic Gaps: Assessing the linear strategic process for marketing and identifying gaps in briefs, brainstorming, and production schedules.
📊 Process Improvement: Ensuring that marketing asks are properly documented, reviewed, and executed with all necessary stakeholders involved.
🗣️ Effective Communication: Maintaining clear and consistent communication throughout the marketing process to avoid scope creep and ensure accountability.
📈 Quick Wins: Implementing immediate improvements to demonstrate value and build momentum.
💡 Open Communication: Encouraging CEOs and leadership teams to actively participate in marketing discussions and share their insights.
🤝 Team Collaboration: Building relationships with existing teams, understanding their skills, and integrating effectively.
🚀 Supporting Growth: Helping companies, especially tech startups, understand and leverage marketing for growth.
👥 Leadership and Advocacy: Providing leadership and direction to marketing team members, advocating for their ideas and contributions.
🧠 Marketing Education: Educating clients on the importance of strategic marketing and the role it plays in achieving business goals.
📋 Long-term Planning: Balancing short-term goals with long-term strategic planning to ensure sustainable growth.
Summary
- Introduction: The podcast introduces the topic of fractional CMOs and their impact within the first 90 days.
- Brent’s Background: Brent Wees shares his experience as the founder of Idea Meet Plan and his work with tech companies and startups as a fractional CMO.
- Identifying Strategic Gaps: Brent emphasizes the importance of assessing the company’s linear strategic marketing process and identifying gaps in briefs, brainstorming, and production schedules.
- Process Improvement: Brent discusses the need for proper documentation, review, and execution of marketing asks to ensure accountability and avoid scope creep.
- Effective Communication: Brent highlights the importance of maintaining clear and consistent communication throughout the marketing process.
- CEO and Leadership Involvement: Brent advises CEOs to be actively involved in marketing discussions and share their insights to help the team understand the company’s vision and goals.
- Team Collaboration: Brent emphasizes the need for building relationships with existing teams, understanding their skills, and integrating effectively to achieve marketing goals.
- Advice for New Fractional CMOs: Brent advises new fractional CMOs to listen, be patient, and respect the existing team’s skills while providing clear leadership and direction.
- Balancing Sprint and Marathon Engagements: Brent discusses the pros and cons of sprint versus marathon engagements, highlighting the need for a balanced approach based on the client’s goals.
- Achieving Sustainable Growth: Brent shares examples of long-term engagements that helped clients achieve sustainable growth by addressing foundational issues and aligning marketing strategies with business goals.
Quotes - 00:50: “My name is Brent Wees, and I’m the founder of Idea Meet Plan. I’m a longtime agency guy, and I’ve been doing fractional work for numerous tech companies.” – Brent Wees
- 01:50: “The first problem I look for is their linear strategic process for their marketing.” – Brent Wees
- 02:00: “Many of these companies just have a marketing person or a small team or external providers that they just dump asks onto.” – Brent Wees
- 02:15: “The first thing I ask is walk me through your marketing process. How are things asked for? How are things delivered?” – Brent Wees
- 02:50: “Are briefs being done? Is that being then moved into brainstorming with those stakeholders with all the necessary parties?” – Brent Wees
- 03:30: “The brief is an important document because you could be two stages out in your marketing or strategic process, and someone may have a new idea they want to insert.” – Brent Wees
- 04:10: “The brief is a necessary document because you can always just remind all the stakeholders, don’t forget, this is what we’ve agreed on for this project.” – Brent Wees
- 05:00: “Sharing information is critical, but it needs to be more than just forwarding an email with ‘see below.'” – Brent Wees
- 06:10: “If the CEO can make time to be a part of the creative side of marketing, it can be of massive benefit to everyone inside.” – Brent Wees
- 07:05: “Always explain the fractional system to the team. Explain how much you’re actually there and ask them how you can be of service to them.” – Brent Wees
- 07:50: “Make sure you get a thorough list of all parties internally and externally that are adding to the current marketing mix and ask for all current budgets.” – Brent Wees
- 08:40: “Prepare the current year’s body of work, the different assets that are going out, and a tactful list of pros and cons.” – Brent Wees
- 09:30: “There are those situations where if a fractional CMO is coming in, and you are really taking an honest look at yourself and going, I’m not happy here, maybe it’s time to dust off that resume.” – Brent Wees
- 10:50: “I’ve been brought in to assess internal and external teams and make recommendations for who stays and who goes.” – Brent Wees
- 12:20: “You need time and mindful time to do some deep work and have the right conversations to understand the true need.” – Brent Wees
- 13:30: “Most of my clients are actually long-tail, month-over-month marathons where they get a certain number of hours a week or month from me.” – Brent Wees
- 14:40: “I have clients that we get together once a year and maybe work for five or six months on a large project, and then I back out again.” – Brent Wees
- 15:55: “Most of the clients that I work with are month-over-month. Sprinting for a fractional person, I would just point them at an agency.” – Brent Wees
- 17:20: “I try to build a relationship because I think that we need time and mindful time to do some deep work and have the right conversations.” – Brent Wees
- 18:40: “The brief is the foundation behind everything that gets done after that. It’s the map before the brainstorms and while things are in production.” – Brent Wees