How to choose a marketing specialist for growing business

My name is Stanislav Bakhariev, and I am the founder of Promodex agency, CEO of the first IT Rating ecosystem, and co-founder of the Web Awards contest. I would like to share with you some tips on how to select a marketer for your team. What responsibilities should this specialist have?

I will not write about things that you already know. For example, who a marketer is, what the difference is between online and offline businesses, what the chief marketer and the marketer in his subordinate should do, and more. I will give only information that will help you form a clear picture and understanding of who you need, as well as guide you in choosing a specialist.

What to start with?

We are only discussing online marketing, specifically a specialist who promotes online stores or businesses. From my experience, I typically divide people in this profession into two categories: administrator and entrepreneur. These two categories also have subgroups:

1. AdministratorsThe "parasitic" administrators who only think about their benefit and take every opportunity to profit from you.
The "worker bee" administrators are only able to carry out the tasks assigned to them.

2. EntrepreneursThe "opportunistic" entrepreneurs strive to get kickbacks and work more for themselves than for you. This type is similar to the "parasitic" administrators, but with the head and mindset of an entrepreneur.
The "go-getter" entrepreneurs who have the mindset of a business owner and professionals of this type have a disadvantage. They bring your business to a certain level of profit and leave, or they take maximum responsibility, burn out and leave; but at the same time, while.

If you want to get the most out of a marketer's work, find someone who has a few key qualities. The best specialist for your business is a "busy" administrator + "aggressive" entrepreneur. Unfortunately, such a combination is extremely rare. The business qualities of such specialists are valuable because they follow the lead of the company owner, and they are leaders in their own right when it comes to their areas of expertise. For them, the company's growth and development are important above all else. Their benefit is secondary.

Marketer’s skills

A marketer is a versatile professional who possesses many competencies: A marketer is a skilled professional with many abilities and expertise:

The marketer must have some experience in some area. For example, previously the marketer worked in content marketing. This is the foundation, where the specialist has started. The marketer must have some experience with different tools. For example, if the marketer has worked with content marketing in the past, this can serve as a foundation for future work.

I would also like to underscore the want and aptitude of your future assistant to stay up-to-date with the latest developments in IT. This means that the marketer must be cognizant of all the most recent innovations in the IT sphere. The specialist should keep track of what is happening in our country regarding the digital market and also monitor global trends. Optimally, marketers should form a “catalog of innovations”. Working with a catalog of innovations means creating test tasks for yourself and the team and then analyzing the results.

When interviewing, you should focus not so much on the applicant’s experience, but rather on the numbers that illustrate the results of his or her work on other projects.
A potential candidate's ability to deliver results from previous projects is more important to focus on than their experience level. Ask them questions related to numbers and metrics to get a better idea of their abilities.

Marketing specialist work

At the start of the project, the marketer will introduce the brand to the market. This should include a brand strategy, which is part of the wider business strategy. The brand strategy encompasses:

• defining the purpose and values of the product;
• coming up with a unique selling proposition;
• creating a brand book and more.

Several steps are crucial in promoting a product. Your ideal marketer should know and understand the:

• Differentiate or die! This is a message that I fully support, coming from Jack Trout and Steve Rivkin. What this means is that for a marketing team to be successful, they must be able to find and communicate the special value of their product to their target audience. Your employees must take pride in understanding
• The brand needs to be the focus of 70% of the traffic to the site.
• The marketer looks at your competitors and finds product categories or services that are not emphasized, advertised, or available. They launch in that niche.

The marketer's work affects the performance of every department in the company to some extent. This is especially relevant to the sales department, whose work can be directly influenced by marketing.

Where and how to find the best marketer?

The best option is to look for two specialists: a Marketing Director and a Marketing Manager. This way, you'll have a "two-in-one" specialist who can handle both the administrative tasks of marketing as well as the entrepreneurial side.

A team of employees who work on marketing tasks can be either assembled within the company or outsourced.

Finding a good marketing specialist is not easy. I suggest reviewing similar categories on LinkedIn. Look for those employees who have made a noticeable difference to another company; for example, they increased visitors, and sales or attracted new clients. Another option is to recruit the head of marketing from a digital agency. Such a person is likely to be useful as they are familiar with all the necessary processes for the job. Take care when choosing a candidate.

How much does the good specialist’s work cost

Marketing specialists' salaries can vary widely. A good marketer can command a high salary, while someone with less experience may only earn a fraction of that amount.

• A specialist who is willing to work for a salary of $500-$2000 can be found if you look hard enough.
• The average rate for this type of job is $2,000-$3,500
• If you believe that you are a top professional in your field, you may be able to command a salary of $5000 to $10000. However, most companies cannot afford to pay such high wages for most positions.

The ideal salary for a marketer would be a combination of a fixed rate, plus a percentage of the company's profits. This would give the marketer an incentive to perform to the best of their abilities. However, this decision should be made on an individual basis, as many applicants are satisfied with a fixed rate without a percentage bonus. Although this might be cause for concern, as it could indicate that the applicants are not confident in their skills.

Advice

I want to give some recommendations that will reduce the amount of time and effort you have to put into promoting your business.

“Pocket” or “karma”?

When recruiting a marketer for your company, it is important to find someone who not only works for their benefit, but also for the good of the company. Someone who will work to get results and help grow the business. Someone who is not just an employee, but a partner; someone you can trust. With these kinds of people, you usually end up working together for more than just a year. This isn't some sort of fantasy; it's reality.

Expensive is not always good

I believe that all marketing efforts should now be focused on customer retention, as it is usually much more expensive to acquire new customers. When trying to keep existing customers, businesses should take into account that many consumers are now used to having a lot of choices and variety available to them online. With so many competitors offering different prices and deals, it can be hard to keep customers from straying. Therefore, businesses need to work even harder to keep their existing customer base happy and satisfied.

Test employees

Separate large tasks and assign them to different contractors. Simultaneously, set certain goals that must be met. Each of the contractors will solve tasks in their way. That way you get to choose the best one and achieve maximum results. For example, give the task of contextualization to one contractor, and the task of the next category to another contractor. The condition for continuing cooperation is an ideal rate of return of 200-300% (but at least 100%).

When is the right time to expand?

I think that the right time is when you have recruited enough customers, built up your business processes, and achieved your first steady profit.

When the decision to expand is made, you analyze the portrait of the consumers and determine what they return to your store for. This is how you increase the assortment, or by additional goods that the client needs.

Example: If you sell cement, you need to start selling sand, gravel, weather fillers, and other related products.

This business expansion strategy keeps the cost of the error to a minimum and allows you to quickly work out the accuracy of your choice (hypothesis). Besides, it’s the shortest way to go!

I hope my story was useful to you. All the advice was formed in the process of finding the best solution, it is the result of trial and error in the IT rating brand development. Don’t waste your time and money on going down the wrong path, take advantage of someone else’s experience.

In conclusion, I would like to express special appreciation to my marketing partner and in-house marketer at Promodex for the inspiration to write this article.