You’ve made the decision to hire a marketing manager so you can focus on advising clients and managing staff. What is the practical next step to take to find a marketing manager?
You know you have the time to spend up-front in training. You’re tracking your marketing budget and results and know you’re ready to take the next step. You have a clear marketing process that a new hire will be able to step into.
But now you aren’t sure what to do next. Here are the practical steps we’d recommend you take to find a marketing manager:
Make sure your job description is clear.
In your marketing, you consider your prospects and their needs when determining what messages to use. Just like your marketing, your job description needs to have language that will be understood by your target audience. The career site Indeed recommends that your job description be between 700 and 2000 characters, so we recommend using those characters in a job description for a marketing manager to fill these categories:
- A concise job title
No need to make it sound like something it isn’t – “relationship manager” “brand ambassador” and other job titles may not get you as many of the quality applicants you’re looking for. Go with the most clear option you can, which in most cases is going to be simply “marketing manager”.
- A list of objectives
Have clear, actionable, and measurable objectives. Is this person responsible for growing social media? How much engagement do you expect within one year? Is this person responsible for writing blog posts? How many words & how often? Your marketing manager will be able to come back to his job description in a year to measure how well he has fulfilled your expectations.
- A description of where the position fits
Because you have that clear marketing process already worked out (and if you don’t, you might not be ready to hire a marketing manager), list exactly what parts of the process you expect your marketing manager to contribute. Describe how you want this person to coordinate with PF and other staff members.
Then, use the rest of those characters to…
Communicate your values.
You have already designed your hiring process to reflect your values and screen applicants who will be a good fit. Save yourself time by communicating up-front what those values are. Use your job description to indicate exactly how your values play out in your accounting firm and how you are kept accountable.
If you want to find a marketing manager that reflects your value of graciousness, you might describe regular client reviews. If your value is collaboration, talk about how and when your team meets to plan and brainstorm around client issues.
By showing in your job description you are committed to your values, you’ll stand out from other accounting firms and also appeal to the applicants whose values match yours. In case you have trouble getting started, here is a marketing manager job description template.
Use your network.
Once you have your job description written up, use your network to find a marketing manager. If you’re an accountant who works with creatives, chances are you know someone who knows someone with the skills you need. Tech clients? Same deal. Most of the accountants we work with have had the most success finding marketing managers using their already existing network vs. headhunters or job posting sites. Turns out, you’ll get a lot of noise from job posting sites from people who may not even read your whole job description.
So,
- Post your job application as a landing page on your website.
- Share it to social media.
- Send it to key clients who might be a good resource.
- Don’t rush the process. Sit back and see what happens.
Once you have a quality applicant, make sure to stick to your hiring process that will help you hire on values with checks and balances to make sure the fit is right up front. Investing in that process up front will save you time and energy in the future.
Once you’ve found the right person, make sure to follow these tips to set your marketing manager up for success. Then, talk to your PF client marketing manager so we can start coordinating with your amazing new marketing manager!