One important shift in responsibility that you’ll notice across stages in the role of the Marketing Leader in product development. At Series A, we had a basic offering, were still finding ICP, and had an idea of the PMF. The focus was to create brand awareness, take the product to as many users as possible, and see how different customers used the product. The positioning was around our idea of the ICP, and how we fit in the industry's landscape. By Series B, we took the early customer feedback and usage patterns and worked extensively on the product for the top categories of customers where we saw fast product traction. We also were in a loop of customer acquisition and interviews, and feeding the learnings back to the product. At Series C, we had defined ICPs, a clear idea of PMF, and a crisp awareness of why our product won. The positioning was refined to align with what the company did, how it fit in the industry landscape, and to encompass all use cases of the product.

Your org structure evolves naturally as you scale if resources are optimized during early stages. Structure evolves based on what's working for the startup for marketing goals, and where the marketing leader wants to focus. If Paid is a great channel for your company versus Content, you may need a senior resource as the Head of Paid, and they can work with a junior Content Manager. It is good to review structure every 6 months during early stages based on what's working. Involving your team in reviewing common learnings from different sub-teams is also a way to make them understand how and why the org structure is evolving. A sudden change in reporting, new hiring, or function creation, without keeping your team in the loop, can alienate them rather than having them as allies united to reach a common goal.

At Series B the marketing leader manages external talent and vendors to an extent since they want to set a way of working with the newly hired partners. The leader is also in most cases the person to align the partners with the company vision and expectation from the vendor. Firing or switching of the agencies and vendors also happens at this stage, as you are still iterating, and finding the perfect partner for your business needs. By Series C, the vendor and way of working is streamlined. This is a good time to hand over this to your seasoned team.

A pure managerial role in startups doesn't exist from Series A to Series D. At the early stage of the startups, you hire more generalists to experiment, do what's needed, or find what will work. At later stages, the heads execute ways to double down on what works, run a well oiled machine, and also think of strategic ways to grow their functions. For example, your Head of Communications will be responsible for company perception, media relations, social profiles, and co-create customer/partner events. Some of these responsibilities will be fairly day-to-day, but the strategic thinking from the head is important to venture into the unexplored territory, which may bring growth. The percentage of strategic work increases as the company grows, as channels are defined, and as teams become seasoned. It is important to define the top one or two strategic initiatives the heads will run per quarter to bring clarity.

At Series B/C you are experimenting a lot with new ways of marketing, and if you are in multiple markets, starting to go deeper in these markets. It is always tempting to hire field marketing resources, or functional experts who can help win a particular strategy (paid acquisition/content marketing/automation lead). This could be a pitfall, and before hiring, it is good to think about some key questions: Are you hiring for skill or expertise? How long will it take for the hire to pay for themselves? Is the hiring domain an experiment or a proven strategy? What is the frequency and saturation level of the hiring strategy? Are there any alternatives to hiring, such as freelancers, agencies, or part-timers? Different marketing initiatives work at different stages, so it is always good to hire quick learners who are proactive and adaptable early on, compared to functional experts at a Series B/C level.

Smriti Kataria

This org chart shows how we strategically scaled the marketing function at Near across investment stages to ensuring that it was optimally positioned to drive key results at each point.

One important shift in responsibility that you’ll notice across stages in the role of the Marketing Leader in product development

Your org structure evolves naturally as you scale if resources are optimized during early stages

At Series B the marketing leader manages external talent and vendors to an extent since they want to set a way of working with the newly hired partners

Marketing Org Structure in B2B SaaS Across Company Stages

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