CMO-ish: When Your Fractional CMO Title Has a Vibe, Not the Skills

Is The ‘Fractional CMO’ Trend Is Undermining Real Strategic Leadership?

This Reddit post, “Which one of you is to blame for all this fractional CMO nonsense?”, jumped out at me like a frog in a frying pan. And after reading it, I had some really strong feelings. It touches a nerve for anyone who is a CMO, wants to be a CMO, or is building a fractional CMO business.

The gist? People in the marketing community believe the term “Fractional CMO” is diluting executive titles and creating confusion between strategic leadership versus tactical marketing.

The Rise of the "Fractional CMO"

The original Reddit post critiques the trend of mid-level marketers branding themselves as "fractional CMOs," despite lacking the comprehensive, strategic expertise you typically associate with a Chief Marketing Officer role. One person summed it up bluntly:

"Basically just a marketing freelancer for early stage startups that charges $200/hr and calls themselves a CMO with no actual executive level experience." Reddit

Oof. If that’s the perception and it’s probably not wrong in many cases, it creates a credibility problem for all CMOs. It also then requires a heavy lift for all of us in real strategic leadership roles to repeatedly educate hiring managers or prospective clients on some basic, but critical questions:

1. What skills do you actually need to support your business goals?

2. What expertise should you be looking for when hiring?

3. How do you ensure that person can deliver what you need?

   
   

Strategic Leadership vs. Tactical Execution

This distinction matters. Deeply.

• Strategic Marketing Leadership

  This is about truly understanding an organization's long-term goals and vision, understanding shifting markets and buyer dynamics, and aligning marketing with that business strategy and revenue goals.

  It requires not just tremendous understanding of marketing fundamentals, but how marketing supports or works in partnership with sales, customer success, and product and the broad understanding of how business works.

  It is being able to act as “CEO of marketing”, bringing together brand, communications, demand, marketing ops and more, ensuring they’re all working in lock-step to move the business forward. 

  
  

• Campaign and Tactical Execution

  This is the day-to-day: implementing specific marketing initiatives, managing social media accounts, coordinating event or conference logistics, creating content, and running email and advertising campaigns.

  It requires managing the nitty gritty details of CRM and marketing automation tools, building dashboards, optimizing campaigns. But it’s not the same as setting the course. Tactical marketers make the ship run—strategic leaders choose where to sail.

When these two roles are conflated, everyone loses.

Why This Matters

Mislabeling tactical marketers as strategic leaders creates real consequences:

• Eroded Trust: Stakeholders will absolutely lose confidence when promised strategic leadership turns out to be task management.

• Wasted Resources: Without clear strategic direction, marketing becomes less focused, disjointed, inefficient, and frustrating for everyone.  

• Stagnant Growth: A lack of true strategic leadership prevents companies from adapting, competing, and scaling.

As one Reddit user aptly noted:

"Is there any industry that does more to jeopardize its own credibility and allow linkedin lunatics with no fundamental knowledge or skills to flood high level positions at major companies than marketing?" Reddit

For decades, Marketing has struggled to overcome its “fluff” reputation. Clear definitions and role distinctions matter now, more than ever.

Moving Forward: Clarity and Authenticity

To fix this, we need:

• Clear Role Definitions: Don’t blur the line. Strategic and tactical roles both matter—but they’re not interchangeable.

• Authentic Branding: If you’re great at execution, own that. Don’t claim a CMO title if you haven’t led at that level.

• Understand Experience: Strategic leadership isn’t something you absorb in year three of your career. It comes with time, scar tissue, and pattern recognition.

After 15 years in PR and communications, and another 15 leading marketing teams, I’ve learned this: it takes more than a decade to truly understand how to build and lead a top-tier marketing function. Each role has taught me something new about solving complex problems, the nuances of different industries and buyers, working with executives, and driving impact. That depth is what makes me (and all true CMOs) valuable. 

Those skills come with experience - plain and simple. If hiring managers truly want strategic guidance (and better results), it comes from people like me who have “been there and done that”. It comes with a price tag, sure, but like anything else, you get what you pay for.