One of the biggest challenges we face in running a global B2B marketing program from New Zealand is generally having a fraction of the budget our competitors have in other markets. Not whinging, just a fact of exchange rates and the size of our home market forcing many B2B tech businesses to go offshore incredibly early.
Over a number of years’, I have developed a Hub and Spoke approach to build a virtual marketing team that is highly cost effective, highly productive and can be used by a sole marketer (or small team).
The scope of marketing has grown to the point where very few of us (if we’re honest) have all the skills needed to deliver a global marketing program. And if you’re the sole marketer you simply don’t have the time to do everything, anyway. So how to fix this?
You need to build a team of experts (the ‘spokes’) around you (the ‘hub’) that act as if they were part of your internal team - but you are only paying them for the time you need them to be active. It means you can have a higher level of competency and experience and achieve a whole lot more than being limited by the skill set you can currently access. It also means they don’t necessarily need to sit in the same country you do.
The key to this is they ‘act as if they are part of your internal team’. One of the big points of difference in this model is that while you are engaging with external contractors, they need to be willing participants in your wider ‘team’. This means:
Think about everything that needs to come together to produce a video case study.
You need someone to build the brief, identify the key messaging, liaise with the customer - and that is most likely to be you.
You'll also need:
While you can probably do some of this yourself – even with a team of AI Assistants there are still probably parts of this you would be better off outsourcing. If you have everyone involved working as a team with shared understanding of what the purpose is, how it is going to be applied, the kind of brand messaging you want to convey – you are going to get a better outcome.
If the team works together in achieving this – connecting the dots between themselves - you are potentially going to get an even better result with minimal need for you to be involved in the delivery mechanics…so long as your brief is sound.
List out all the marketing skill sets you will need to deliver against this year’s plan. While not exhaustive – think about:
Next - asses your internal ‘team(s)’ strengths against those requirements. Where are your gaps? It doesn’t necessarily mean you couldn’t do it; just that given all you have on your plate there are other things that make more sense for you to own. Look to get someone else to do the rest – they are your ‘spokes’ that makes the wheels turn faster.
You don’t need to identify team members all at once; but it gets increasingly easier to bring people on board once the model is up and working… so get your most critical players on board upfront.
In running a Hub and Spoke approach, it is important to operate as if you were an internal team. Some things I found useful include:
So there you have it - the hub and spoke model. Why am I sharing it? If you’re trying to work marketing miracles – it can help to have some ideas as to how to make magic happen. I’ve no doubt there are variations on this you can put in play – but it can be useful to put a name to it and identify what did work.
If you’re reading this and not sure where to start (or you don’t have a marketer to lead this), it is certainly something I can help you set up for your business. I work as the Hub in the short term – setting up the spokes you need to execute on your plan. I'll then recruit the Hub you need to make this all happen on a long-term basis - because I will know exactly what skills they will need. Let’s talk.