How to Hire a Head of Marketing for a Web3 Startup In Two Steps
Jack Butcher (Visualize Value founder):
2020’s Work From Home accelerated the shift in people’s identity so the majority is based on their online persona.
“If you are a Native Digital, you see the digital world as your primary life, and the analog world as an addition, extension, or even distraction from your digital life.
Volodymyr’s digital dominance has led to historic pressure being put on governments and corporations to inflict more economic pain on Russia than has ever been levied on any country, ever. It used to be that what happened in the analog world dictated what happened in the digital world—but now, the two have flipped (and most people don’t see this radical transformation happening in plain sight). Digital stories, digital messages, digital photos, digital conversations, and the subsequent digital movement in support for Ukraine that has had catastrophic consequences for Russia in the analog world.”
Ukraine is the broadest-scale example of digital marketing driving analog results.
I learned marketing in the much safer trenches of the online creator world.
Safer but not easy. As a solopreneur, I had to be my own marketing, sales, product, finance, fundraising departments. I learned to save money and find leverage.
I found the most leverage on digital platforms.
Later, I joined a Web3 company that was spending millions on marketing in all the wrong places. They created PowerPoint plans in a vacuum. They spoke analog to a digital audience.
Red Flag: Our CMO had 135 Twitter followers.
Results? The sickening smell of burning money...
The funny part?
A recently hired junior employee had double the Twitter followers vs the company’s (3,500 vs 3,000). And he 2Xed his followers in 6 months while the corporate account only increased by 10%.
Marketing ignored him.
The difference isn’t age. It’s identity.
Your head of marketing must be digital first. They live in the digital world. You have a higher chance of finding this person in the trenches… ie by NOT hiring a CMO.
STEP ONE: Hit pause before hiring an experienced big company CMO
Typical startup advice goes like this:
If you only build and don’t tell anyone about it, your startup will fail. Spend on marketing. Yes, and…
Instead, slow-hire your C-Suite:
Startups try to offset their imposter syndrome by over-hiring senior people, creating an overheavy C-suite too early
They over-value what they don’t know. Starting a digital media company? Hire from CBS. Getting into financial services? Hire from Goldman Sachs.
Yet, people working in large firms have very different styles from what’s needed at (scrappy, do anything) startups
Those who’ve spent their lives in large firms can’t make the (ego) transition to a scrappy, aggressive outbound caller.
At OppenheimerFunds, brokers and analysts called me all day long with ideas. I felt so popular. I was running $6 billion, so I looked like a human ATM, doling out commissions left and right. Fast forward to starting a hedge fund, and I was the one calling people.
In marketing the situation is even worse.
Startup marketing has changed. The closer to the action, the better.
Information is free. Attention is expensive. Your head of marketing needs to be in the trenches vying for consumer’s time.
The creator economy laps startups in marketing efficiency. Creators approach marketing like guerrilla warfare: low resources, fast feedback, and psychological experiments on Twitter and TikTok.
B2B? Trying to gain the mindshare of corporate CEOs? Make no mistake! They are on TikTok. That’s your competition for their attention.
This is not an environment for senior CMOs with monolithic plans.
Spend on marketing at the ground level, with someone who is aggressive, flexible, and has their finger on feedback loops of Twitter, TikTok and YouTube trends.
But, you say, we’re b2b…
I hear you. I use LinkedIn and it’s served me well. But, if you’re Web3, don’t fool yourself.
Your potential customers aren’t reading 20 page case studies, they’re scrolling TikTok and Twitter.
Be where your customers are.
Now you’re NOT going to hire an experienced CMO. What now?
SECOND: How to “Roll your own” CMO (and a surprising twist)
1. Hire a Head of Marketing
Words matter. Less C-Suite titles and more “heads of” means more scrappy, more jack of all trades. (Ironic, me writing you here as the COO and acting COO of a startup!)
I lead marketing…to set the tone…to attract the right person.
We are building a marketing team based on this ethos.
2. Match your needs to their strengths when hiring
Don’t hire your head of marketing and then start asking marketing questions. Figure out your marketing basics before you hire a Head of Marketing.
Before you break into I’m-allergic-to-marketing hives, know this: I’ve been there too.
My first day at USC MBA, our class flowed into a large auditorium where we’d sit for all our required classes. Each student described their interest. We quickly learned that the class had naturally divided: right side: finance, left side: marketing. Oil and water. I was on the finance side.
If I can learn to embrace marketing, so can you!
Here’s some questions I’d start with:
Who are our customers? Are they businesses? What about their end consumers? Build 1-4 “typical” customer personas.
Where are our customers? (physical and online conferences, social media platforms, industry-specific channels)?
Don’t make assumptions. Many “busy” CEOs are on Facebook and TikTok! Research where they actually are.
Company Persona: What is the desired culture and persona of your company? How might this persona interact with the personas you want to reach (business people and end consumers)?
Which skills will you need (SEO, writing, social media hacking, blogging) and what type of person can fill these plus grow into a strategic role.
Notice how the skills came last?
You may need a digital marketer. But, first figure out who you are talking to and how. The type of person you need becomes obvious.
3. Coach your Head of marketing to think like a C-Suite Executive
Your head of marketing should grow into thinking like the “CEO” of the company’s internal Marketing-As-A-Service business. Whoa, 2 CEOs? Not really.
As Amanda Natividad shared:
“Be the CEO of Content, and deliver marketing as a service to your organization.”
Marketing as a Service (MaaS), exists to serve. Delivering leads and education. Connecting parts of our business to the broader ecosystem.
C-Suite executives think in results delivered, not actions taken.
With this C-Suite perspective, your head of marketing thinks strategically while living in the trenches conducting guerrilla warfare against the algos to boost your company’s brand and visibility above the rest.
This is a bar-bell approach to marketing. Go on the ground tactics plus high end strategy. Stay out of the messy middle!
We are satchel. Exciting and scrappy. People first. Creating change. Trustworthy and edgy. Hard-working. Optimistic.
We’re gradually emerging from stealth while building a Web3 Compliance Fabric to connect the new and old worlds of finance. We’re leveraging cutting-edge technology to create new financial possibilities.
Interested?