Below is an excerpt from our 2022 Fintech CMO Survey Report, a deep dive into the opinions and mindsets of a wide range of senior fintech marketers. Over the next few weeks, as firms across the industry set their marketing budgets for 2023, we are highlighting some of the report’s key findings. Download the full report here.
Between the pandemic and the need to ramp up and diversify fintech marketing communications programs, today’s hiring landscape can be tricky to navigate
The past year has been notoriously difficult for hiring, across industries. Amid the “Great Resignation,” the increasingly tight labor market has left many organizations scrambling in their search for ideal candidates – and firms seeking to fill fintech marketing and communications roles have been no exception. Of the CMOs and senior marcomms professionals that have attempted to expand their teams during the pandemic, over 56% said that they have found it more difficult to find talent than in years past.
Of course, the pandemic is not the only factor causing difficulties on the hiring front. Versatile marketing professionals with diverse skill sets are now required as firms realize the need to fortify traditional PR tactics with additional program elements. With many survey respondents noting their intent to increase investment in marketing programs across the board in 2022, the talent war is shaping up to be fiercer than ever, creating an environment in which outsourcing some functions makes increasing sense.
For fintech companies who are maybe a little bit earlier in their growth, key foundational marketing strategies such as persona-building require a lot of time and effort. And with competing priorities from clients and investors, sometimes there just isn’t time to cover all your bases.”
Betsy Daitch, Founder, Betsy Daitch Marketing Advisors
Finding the Right Marketing Team Members
“Finding the right talent is really challenging right now. I have a couple of clients in particular who have been looking to hire heads of marketing and are coming up short,” said Betsy Daitch, Founder of Betsy Daitch Marketing Advisors, a consultancy that primarily works with institutional fintechs. “For fintech companies who are maybe a little bit earlier in their growth, key foundational marketing strategies such as persona-building require a lot of time and effort. And with competing priorities from clients and investors, sometimes there just isn’t time to cover all your bases.”
Outsourcing marketing talent enables firms to focus on their core business activities, freeing up valuable time and resources that would have otherwise been spent on hiring or attempting to learn or train others on new marketing tools and processes. Fortified with the expertise and resources needed to develop and execute a strategic integrated marcomms strategy, agencies offer a robust talent pool with the experience necessary to get the job done right.
Marketing Partnerships: Collaborate to Innovate
Even for established firms with an in-house marcomms team, tapping an outside agency, particularly one with a firm grasp of the industry, brings the added benefit of a fresh perspective, noted several longtime CMOs. Agencies may present additional offerings that are particularly specialized, such as media training or graphic design.
“In the pre-digital marketing era, budgets were huge but you had less confidence about where money was being spent. Print ads took up the majority of my marketing spend and there was far less ability to measure the effectiveness of tactics. Today, we spend much less on a relative basis than we did earlier in my career, but our ability to be precise with that spend is far, far greater,” said Boucher (Instinet). “The biggest single component of my marketing budget mix now is the resourcing of creative and content development. I personally leverage outsourcing a lot, and believe that the use of high-quality external resources keeps your creative process fresher and actually tends to deliver better results.”
Read on for the next blog in our series highlighting the key findings of our 2022 Fintech CMO Survey Report.
