Common Questions
Why Hire a Fractional CMO or COO?
Everything B2B leaders ask before making the call, answered directly, without the sales pitch.
Everything B2B leaders ask before making the call, answered directly, without the sales pitch.
A fractional CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) is a senior marketing executive who works with your company on a part-time or project basis, providing the strategic leadership of a full-time CMO without the full-time cost. The term "fractional" refers to the fraction of their time dedicated to your business, typically 10 to 20 hours per week, while bringing the same depth of experience and accountability as a C-suite hire.
A fractional CMO leads your marketing function on a part-time or project basis. Day to day, that means setting priorities, managing your team or agency partners, developing go-to-market plans, tracking pipeline, and connecting marketing with sales and operations.
At BentonNewell, the work can also include brand positioning, demand generation, search visibility, content strategy, and investor communications.
A marketing agency executes specific deliverables, ads, content, websites, campaigns. A fractional CMO provides strategic leadership and accountability for the outcome. The distinction matters: an agency does what you tell them to do. A fractional CMO decides what to tell the agency, aligns that direction with your business goals, and is responsible for whether it works.
Many companies benefit from having a fractional CMO manage their agency relationships, the combination is often more effective than either alone.
A consultant typically provides advice and recommendations, then steps back. A fractional CMO stays in the work, they attend your leadership meetings, manage your team, own the function, and are accountable for results over time. Think of it as the difference between someone who tells you what to do and someone who does it with you.
The right moment is typically when one or more of these is true:
Across the market, fractional CMO engagements generally range from roughly $5,000 to $20,000 per month depending on scope, hours, and experience. This is a general industry range. BentonNewell scopes each engagement around your organization's needs and discusses pricing openly during a discovery call.
For comparison, a full-time CMO salary typically runs $200,000 to $350,000+ annually, before benefits, equity, and recruiting costs.
Most engagements begin to show measurable results within 60 to 90 days. The first 30 days are an assessment and priority-setting phase, understanding your market, your team, and where the gaps are. Execution begins in earnest in months two and three. Specific timelines depend on how developed your existing marketing infrastructure is and what the primary business objective is.
Fractional CMOs are often a strong fit for organizations with roughly $2 million to $50 million in revenue that need experienced marketing leadership on a flexible basis. Common examples include Series A and Series B companies, established medical practices, and businesses preparing for their next stage of growth.
A fractional COO (Chief Operating Officer) is a senior operations executive who works with your company on a part-time basis to improve internal processes, systems, and organizational efficiency. Where a CMO focuses on growth and revenue, a COO focuses on the execution infrastructure that enables sustainable growth, workflow design, team development, financial reporting, revenue cycle management, and operational alignment across departments.
Sustainable growth depends on marketing and operations working together. Marketing creates demand, and operations determine how consistently the organization can serve it. A leader who understands both can spot bottlenecks, coordinate teams, and keep the plan grounded in day-to-day realities.
Dana Newell provides both functions, building marketing strategies around your team's capacity, existing systems, and business goals.
BentonNewell serves healthcare, healthtech, life sciences, MedTech, medical device, physician-led practices, B2B SaaS, and professional services organizations. Dana Newell brings 35+ years of experience in physician practice growth, healthtech commercialization, life sciences marketing, and business operations.
Most engagements start with a 30-minute discovery call. We'll talk about your goals, where you're getting stuck, and whether fractional leadership makes sense for your situation. You can expect an honest conversation and a clear recommendation.
BentonNewell works with regulated-industry B2B companies that need a marketing and operations executive who already understands their world.
If you're weighing whether a fractional CMO or COO is the right move, the fastest way to find out is a direct conversation.
Schedule a Discovery Call