How to Hire a Marketing Manager: A Guide for Startups

You’ve got a product past the MVP stage, a CRM filled with early adopter customers, now it’s time to scale.

That’s where marketing comes in.

Marketing is the lifeblood of a successful, high-growth startup. Good marketing is more than publishing content that gets lost on the internet; good marketing tells your company’s story and helps ensure that you are heard.

A skilled marketing manager can help your startup achieve this and more. A marketing manager’s role is to seamlessly align a company’s value proposition, content creation, and business development objectives into a cohesive strategy that fuels growth.

This guide will walk you through how to assess how a marketing manager can plug into your startup, what to look for in prospective candidates, and best practices for managing the candidate search, from initial job posting through to making a hire.

What does a Marketing Manager do?

Marketing managers often wear a lot of hats, especially in a startup environment.

Larger companies with big budgets and room for staff can afford to bring on marketers who do the work and those who manage the work (along with a level above them to manage the management). Most early-stage companies can’t afford that, so it’s important to hire a marketing manager who is just as much a practitioner as they are a manager and strategist.

At a high level, all marketing managers, whether they are generalists or specialists, should possess the following skills and competencies:

• Content development and strategy: Look for a marketer with good content creation chops. We’ll get to the specific channels you choose to hire for later on.
• Brand management: You may need input from a marketing hire to help craft the brand, including the brand style guide, persona, and message.
• Multi-channel campaign development: You will likely want to select a few channels to go deep into in order to reach your customers. Look for a marketing hire adept at managing multiple channels and not just one.
• Fluency in marketing metrics and analytics: Marketing can easily be a money pit if you do not have a handle on your data: traffic, conversions, engagement, and so on. Look for a marketer who can find the data behind their content decisions.
• Exceptional project management: As if it’s not clear, this is an intense job that requires the right blend of strategy, creativity, and lots of hard work. It’s important to find a marketer who demonstrates strong project management and time management skills to juggle it all.

Startups move fast, pivot often, and require marketers who can keep pace—that means building while learning, testing, and iterating. Businesses need to decide whether they need a generalist who can wear many hats or a specialist with deep expertise in a critical area.

A seasoned CMO from a larger company may not be the right fit if they’re unwilling to roll up their sleeves and help shape the fundamentals, from defining the value proposition to identifying the ideal customer.

Types of Startup Marketers

The problem with “marketing” is that it can mean so many different things in different contexts. As you search for a marketing manager, you’ll come across the following types:

• Brand marketer: Brand marketers excel at crafting a compelling company vision and story for a brand. These are good hires if you lack a cohesive brand identity and need one to untap that next phase of growth.
• Product marketer: Product marketers excel at creating bottom-of-funnel collateral to help attract, educate, and convert leads into customers. Look for these types of marketers to create sales pages and collateral for your sales teams, run enablement sessions, and work with your product team to improve customer adoption.
• Organic marketer: Organic marketers are pros at bringing in visitors to your website and content through content creation and optimization. These marketers excel in channels like SEO (search engine optimization), organic social media posting, and more.
• Paid marketer: Paid marketers leverage outside channels like Google and social media, but run paid ads and campaigns to drive immediate traffic to your website. These marketers especially must be data-oriented to justify the spend on ad campaigns.
• Event marketer: If you have the budget for it, event marketing can be a powerful acquisition channel, whether it’s putting on a conference, a webinar, or hosting a dinner for prospects.

Choose the type that aligns most with the channels you wish to use to acquire customers before writing any job posts.

Do you need a Generalist or a Specialist?

Hiring your first marketing manager is about finding the right fit for your company’s stage and growth trajectory. Look for someone with a growth mindset, scrappy experience at early-stage startups, and a willingness to learn, test, and get their hands dirty, not just delegate.

In general, there are two categories of marketing managers:

• Generalists: Generalist marketers are going to be a “jack of all trades” type of hire that can manage multiple channels at once. They may lack deep expertise in one, but their breadth makes them an adaptable hire, which makes them flexible and good for a company looking to try multiple channels to see what works.
• Specialists: If you are dead set on a channel, then it is worth hiring a specialist with deep expertise to manage it. A specialist marketer will bring years of experience and insights to your company, giving you results faster.

When to Hire a Marketing Manager

As is the case with any hire, deciding when to bring on a marketing manager cannot be made off the cuff.

You have to determine your organization’s readiness for bringing on this role. This isn’t just about having a sufficient budget. Your team needs to perform a needs assessment to determine what impact you need out of a marketing hire and whether there’s currently enough strategic and tactical need to sustain the role over time.

Typically, the following are signs that it’s time to bring in a full-time marketing hire:

• Non-marketing people are doing marketing work – with mixed results.
• Marketing is working now, but it needs full attention to scale.
• You are preparing for a major launch, either for your product or a new market segment.
• You can’t get by with a freelancer or agency.

How to Write a Marketing Manager Job Posting

Your job posting will dictate the type of candidate that you attract and bring into your hiring funnel. Bland or generic job postings may appeal to a broader audience, but they won’t necessarily appeal to the right hire that your team needs.

A good job posting begins with a job description that covers the responsibilities and duties of the role. Start by describing the role, challenges the hire will work on, and skills they will need. Then move on to write your job posting, which you will use to market the role and attract ideal candidates.

When writing a job posting, I like to start with the following three things:

• Assess the needs of my team
• Define the ideal candidate profile I want to hire
• Note the responsibilities and roles of the job

And from there, the basic job posting template I use includes the following:

• A company description: Go beyond the basics and use clear, descriptive language to give your prospective candidates a taste of what your company culture is like.
• Summarize the role: Make sure to include a brief description of the role, key responsibilities, and type of experience you’re looking for. Make sure to define success for the role, too, and the team structure.
• Skills: Decide on the channels you are looking to leverage and the level of experience you need in the role. These should dictate the specific skills that you look for.
• Benefits and location: Finally, include where the job is (if it’s not remote), expectations around being in the office, and benefits that come with the job.
• Compensation: I’m an advocate for being upfront about compensation. Pay will depend on location and experience. According to Payscale, for a startup with fewer than 100 employees in the internet/technology industry, you can expect to offer a base salary between $98,600 - $140,500.

Once your job posting is written, it’s time to attract candidates and evaluate them to find your next hire.

The Hiring Process for Hiring a Marketing Manager: What to Expect

Interviewing is a key step in any hiring process, but many companies aren’t using their interviews strategically.

This especially goes for marketing manager interviews. These interviews provide an opportunity to assess whether a candidate is the ideal fit for your company or just sounds good on paper.

When interviewing marketing managers, I recommend involving multiple team members in the process so you get diverse, informed perspectives on each candidate. Whenever you interview a candidate, I find it’s helpful to bear the following in mind:

• Develop a process and stick with it. Don’t add/remove steps as you go, or you’ll end up frustrating candidates.
• Define a clear purpose for each step. Don’t do something “just because.” Every step you take should have a clear purpose that allows you to effectively evaluate each candidate. If you can’t clearly say why you’re doing something, cut it.
• And don’t cut corners! Hiring is one of the most important tasks for any fast-growing company, so don’t skip important steps for the sake of speed. In many ways, the marketing manager is the face and/or mouthpiece of your organization. Rushing through the hiring process could lead to negative consequences for your sales, brand, and customer acquisition strategy.

At a high level, the typical marketing manager interview process looks like this:

• A recruiter screen: As with any other hire, make sure the candidate meets the minimum requirements for the role and is likely to be a fit for the organization. Focus on their expectations for the role, basic skill questions, personality fit, and their interview timelines.
• A hiring manager screen: Make sure there is a strong chance that the candidate fits the role. Focus on getting to know the candidate at both a technical and personal level to ascertain whether they match the role needs and your internal culture.
• A practical assessment: Hiring screens can be effective at judging how a candidate interacts with your team, but a practical assessment gives you a chance to see their process in action (and the results they can generate). This is typically followed by a live walkthrough of their approach. Pay close attention to how well they capture your organization’s voice and how effectively they align your brand with the needs and expectations of your target clients. Usually, this takes the form of:
  • A sample presentation for a marketing campaign they would run.
  • Diagnosing a traffic drop (or change in traffic pattern), or a similar real-world scenario.
  • A sample piece of content they would create for a marketing campaign.
• A “meet the team” interview: This could be a full-day or a half-day, depending on the size of your company and product organization. This is typically composed of a few parts:
  • A product deep dive with your senior team and the stakeholders involved in client-facing or product roles to gauge their grasp of the product and customer.
  • Marketing and growth strategy discussion with relevant stakeholders, including other marketing team members as well as sales.
  • 1:1 interviews with potential colleagues to assess the candidate’s skills, thought processes, and leadership approach.

Following this, you will review the candidate’s performance with your team to make a final hiring decision. You may want to include the following as you evaluate and compare candidates:

• A post-interview panel to discuss the candidate, followed by a decision by the hiring manager.
• Reference checks to ensure the candidate has good character and standing, and to make sure you haven’t missed anything across the hiring process.
• Make an offer!

Now that we’ve explained the interview process at a macro level, we need to specify how to engage candidates through specific questions, skill-based assessments, and team needs. The devil is always in the details!

How to Interview a Marketing Manager

The marketing manager role is highly specialized and plays a key role in your company’s growth. Keep this in mind as you evaluate candidates.

I like to split the marketing manager interview into two parts:

• Seeking out the required skills (again, these should be based on your company’s needs)
• Specific questions to assess those skills and competencies

You want to invite the candidate to share real-world examples that reveal their technical skills, ability to drive growth, project management approach, and communication style.

Let’s walk through each one.

Skills to Look For

When hiring a marketing manager, it’s important to look for the following key skills:

• Strategic planning and brand positioning: Look for a marketer who is more than a doer. Most marketers are good at creating content, but in a competitive environment, you need a strategist and not just a practitioner.
• Content creation and storytelling across channels: ** ** Beyond writing content that is grammatically correct, can this marketer tell a story that holds the attention of leads, prospects, and customers? Look for marketers who craft a compelling narrative, not just a “word calculator” who can generate output.
• Data analysis and performance optimization: ** ** Look for a marketing manager who uses data to inform her decisions and can adjust strategy on the fly.
• Channel expertise: If you are committing to specific channels, then look for deep expertise in those channels. I recommend looking for more than familiarity; hire a marketer who can demonstrate quantifiable and tangible results.
• Cross-functional collaboration and project management: Marketing is a role that stretches its impact to product and sales. In the early stages, it’s important to look for a marketer who collaborates with other departments and juggles (often competing) needs.

Questions to Ask a Marketing Manager

The exact questions you ask during the interview process depend on the specific role. As a general rule, you can break questions down into the following categories:

• Technical
• Multi-channel campaign management and ownership mentality
• Startup culture fit
• Collaboration and team dynamics

Whenever asking questions, no matter the scope, I try to focus on outcomes rather than inputs in earlier-stage companies and startups. Each employee can have an outsized impact on your success; therefore, prioritizing outcomes over “just getting the work done” needs to be a priority.

Technical

Assess the candidate’s fluency with marketing tools, platforms, and analytics. Can they execute and determine the success of digital campaigns, manage CRM and automation systems, and draw insights from data to guide decisions?

• Can you tell me about a specific digital marketing campaign that you’ve led from start to finish? Guide me through your process and the tools that you used. How did you evaluate success? How did you report on this to your team and stakeholders?
• Can you tell me about a campaign that you ran that didn’t achieve its intended results? Please explain the key decisions you made, why you made them, and what you did to assess the campaign and adapt from it.
• Can you share an example of how you used analytics or performance data to pivot or optimize a marketing strategy? How did you use this data to convince your team and stakeholders of your recommended plan of action?

Multi-channel Campaign Management and Ownership Mentality

Is the candidate able to independently plan, launch, and refine campaigns across multiple platforms? Sales strategy relies on reaching your ideal customers at all relevant digital touchpoints — from your website and sales calls to newsletters, social media, and other key content venues. Candidates should demonstrate a proactive, results-driven mindset and take full accountability for both strategy and execution.

• Can you describe a time when you planned and launched a campaign that spanned multiple platforms? Please walk me through your thought process for choosing these platforms and how you ensured consistency and impact across all channels.
• Walk me through a campaign you fully owned, from concept to results. What was your process to set goals? How did you collaborate across teams or delegate work (if applicable)? How did you measure and adjust along the way?
• Can you describe your approach to project management when you’re running multiple campaigns and balancing several deliverables across various deadlines? Please describe how you juggle the competing priorities and see each campaign through to its deadline.

Startup Culture Fit

Can you envision working with this person and fitting into the overall environment at your company? Can they build a marketing strategy from the ground up? This is a chance to determine your candidate’s character and demeanor, in addition to what they bring as a marketing manager.

• Describe a time you faced a marketing challenge with limited resources or a tight deadline. How did you adapt when requirements or timelines shifted, and what was the outcome?
• Have you ever had to build a marketing strategy or function from scratch or with little historical information? How did you approach it, and what were your first steps?
• What specifically motivates you to pursue this role and work on our projects, and how do your past experiences align with what we’re looking for?
• Share how you stay current with the latest trends and advancements in the industry, and give an example of how you’ve applied new knowledge or practices to your design work.

Collaboration and Team Dynamics

Determine whether your marketing manager candidate is a team player who possesses the skills required to communicate articulately, consistently, and professionally. More than simply being able to work with others, look for a marketing manager who takes an active role in driving things forward.

• Tell me about a time you worked closely with other departments (like sales, product, or design) on a marketing initiative. How did you ensure alignment and clear communication?
• How do you ensure your communication — whether written or verbal — is clear, consistent, and effective with both internal teams and external audiences? What’s your approach to ensuring the brand’s voice and tone come through across all deliverables?
• Can you share an example of how you’ve helped elevate the skills or confidence of someone on your team? How do you approach coaching or feedback?
• How do you approach feedback from others in your writing and content creation process?

What Makes Someone a Good Fit for a Startup Marketer Role?

Nearly every tech company calls itself “agile and fast-paced,” but this is especially true for early to mid-stage startups. What’s more, marketing managers tend to have their fingers in different pies — a reality that gets further exacerbated at a startup.

One moment they’re designing a multi-channel marketing strategy for a new product line, the next they’re making a copy edit on the website. At the start of the week, they may be focused on their analytics and campaign performance. By the end, they may be leaning into their PR experience by sending out a press release and conducting cold outreach to social media influencers.

That said, even the most seasoned marketing managers may not be ideal fits for an early-stage startup environment. Beyond the core skills listed above, look for someone who:

• Brings a self-starter mentality: A seasoned professional capable of working independently and running the marketing function by taking initiative, proactively engaging with other business units, and keeping leaders informed on project status and impact.
• Demonstrates adaptability: Capable of shifting gears quickly and confidently, from high-level strategy to hands-on execution. Additionally, someone who doesn’t lose focus or get rattled when objectives, priorities, or strategic direction change.
• Shows versatility: A true Swiss Army knife who is equally comfortable crafting campaign strategy, analyzing metrics, and executing across communications, content, and digital platforms.
• Possesses curiosity and resourcefulness: They ask insightful questions, explore new tools and ideas, and approach challenges with creative problem-solving. Their curiosity doesn’t just fuel their own growth; it inspires others, sparks fresh thinking, and uncovers new opportunities for the team.

Planning for Growth: How a Marketing Manager Can Scale with Your Business

Your organization won’t be in startup mode forever. As you move toward your growth objectives, a marketing manager can play a critical role in laying the groundwork for a scalable, strategic marketing function. While they may start as a one-person team, the right hire can grow into a leadership role, building systems, processes, and eventually a team to support long-term success.

Look for a candidate who can:

• Develop scalable marketing processes: Create standardized workflows, processes, and frameworks that can grow with the company.
• Implement data-driven strategies: Use analytics to identify growth opportunities and continuously optimize campaigns for maximum impact.
• Build cross-functional collaboration: Work effectively with leadership and across organizational functions to align marketing efforts with broader business goals.
• Grow, lead, and mentor teams: Evolve from being a solo, “one-person-show” by methodically building a team aligned with the organization’s skill needs, while coaching and mentoring junior staff to strengthen and expand the marketing function.
• Adapt to evolving priorities: Stay agile and flexible, adjusting strategies as the company’s goals and market conditions change.

Hiring is Just One Part of HR: Download the Startup HR Survival Guide For the Rest

Hiring is a key piece of your startup’s success, but it’s only one element of a robust and effective HR strategy.

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