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FRACTIONAL MATH · ISSUE 015
Most founders price a marketing hire off the base salary. That is the smallest part of the bill. Benefits and payroll tax add about 30 percent, a recruiter takes a third of first-year cash, and the new hire needs about six months before they give back more than they cost.
THE NUMBER
$240K to $390K
Year one for a head of marketing at a $10M company, including the recruiter fee.
What the seat costs at three sizes
Rough all-in yearly cost, with bonus, benefits and payroll tax, before the recruiter fee:
$3M company: about $140K to $235K
$10M company: about $185K to $310K
$50M company: about $240K to $455K
These ranges come from BLS, Pavilion, Pave, Robert Half and executive pay surveys. Public data at the small end is thin, so treat them as ranges, not quotes.
The recruiter fee comes on top
A retained search runs about a third of first-year cash. At a $10M company that is roughly $50K to $80K. Smaller companies often use a recruiter who only gets paid on a hire, at 20 to 25 percent. You pay the fee whether the hire works out or not.
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Year one is mostly ramp
Plan on about six months before the person gives back more than they cost. They have to learn your business, your numbers and your team first.
Your most expensive marketing year buys you a partial year of real work.
Seats turn over
At S&P 500 companies, the average CMO stays about 4.1 years (Spencer Stuart, 2025). Nobody publishes that number for smaller companies.
Either way, if the hire leaves, you pay for the search and the ramp again.
The expensive year can repeat.
The real mistake is the order
Most founders hire the big title before there is anything for them to improve. A senior leader from a large company is built to make a working marketing function better. That is a real skill, and it is worth real money in the right spot.
It is the wrong spot when your tracking does not reconcile, your channels are guessing, and nobody can tell you which dollar actually worked. You are paying big-title rates for foundation work, and the foundation does not care how senior the person standing on it used to be.
It makes sense on paper. The big title feels like the safe hire, and no founder gets second-guessed for hiring an impressive resume. But the problem is usually plumbing, not strategy. An experienced fractional operator typically runs $8K to $12K a month (GoFractional rate data), with no search fee, and you can stop when the work is done. Once the function runs, hire someone to make it better.
Build first. Buy the full-time seat second.
Do this Monday
Price the seat honestly. Write down total cash, plus about 30 percent for benefits and payroll tax, plus a third of first-year cash for the search, plus six months of ramp. That number is your real year-one commitment.
Split the work into build and improve. List what has to be built, like tracking that reconciles, a channel plan and a capture mechanism, then list what only needs improving. If the build list is long, you are not ready for a big-title hire.
Decide the sequence out loud. Foundation first, big title second, and put a date on when the function will be stable enough to hand to a senior hire.
Want a faster read on how long your build list really is? Tell us what you run and what you spend, and the Ad Spend Reconciliation Check comes back by reply. It is free, and it shows whether your numbers reconcile before you pay a senior hire to work on them.
See you next week.
Will Gray
Founder, Graystone Performance Marketing
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