Should you outsource your marketing or take someone on in-house?

At some point, most growing businesses reach a tipping point where 'the owner does the marketing in between everything else' stops being enough. You need more. The question is: what does 'more' look like?

The two most obvious options are taking someone on in-house or bringing in an outsourced marketing consultant. Both can work brilliantly. Both can also go wrong. Here's a look at each.

Taking someone on in-house

The appeal is obvious - someone who is fully dedicated to your business, embedded in your team, available every day. If your marketing workload genuinely justifies a full-time role, and you have the budget and the time to recruit, manage and develop that person, an in-house marketing person can be a great move.

The challenges are also real. A good marketing manager costs significantly more than their salary once you factor in employer's NI, pension, holiday cover and recruitment fees. They'll need briefing, managing and supporting, which takes your time. And if they leave after a year (which, in marketing, happens rather a lot), you're back to square one.

There's also the question of breadth. One person, however talented, brings one set of skills. They might be a strong social media manager or a sharp strategist, but rarely both, and rarely design or PR on top. Plugging that same gap in-house usually means training someone up, running another recruitment round, or leaving it undone.

Outsourcing

An outsourced consultant works alongside your business, close enough to understand it properly, but without the overhead of employment. You pay for what you actually need, scale up or down as your requirements change, and you're not responsible for managing someone's career development or covering their holidays.

For the skills outside my own, design, video, photography, I bring in a trusted network of freelancers I've worked with for years, rather than trying to be a jack of all trades.

The best outsourced relationships don't feel like using a supplier. They feel like having a marketing manager who happens to work flexibly. I have clients who have worked with me for five, eight, ten years, they know I know their business, and I know they trust me to get on with it.

The downside? If your marketing workload is genuinely full-time, outsourcing will cost more per hour than employment. And if you need someone physically present every day, a consultant working remotely won't suit every business.

So which is right for you?

A rough guide: if you need someone for fewer than three days a week, outsourcing almost always makes more financial sense. If you need someone full-time and you're ready to manage them properly, taking someone on in-house might be the right move - though even then, many businesses keep a consultant alongside their in-house team for strategic oversight and specialist support.

Not sure which fits where you are right now? I'm happy to have a conversation about it, even if the answer turns out to be that taking someone on in-house is the better option for you. I'd rather you make the right decision than the wrong one.