Straight answers
Extra Medium is a marketing agency in Manchester, and its fractional CMO practice puts a senior marketing leader inside your company part-time. You get the strategy, the plan and the accountability of a chief marketing officer for a set number of days a week, without hiring one full-time into a tight Manchester talent market.
Manchester’s tech and startup scene has outgrown its senior marketing bench. Northern Powerhouse growth means scale-ups across the city, from Ancoats startups to MediaCityUK production companies, hit the same wall: revenue is real, spend is real, the founder is still making every marketing decision at midnight, and a full-time CMO search takes months against London salaries pulling talent south. A fractional CMO fills that gap on a start date, not a recruitment timeline — senior judgment in the room while the business keeps moving. The model itself is explained on our fractional CMO page.
The job is ownership, not advice. Diagnosis first: where revenue comes from, what each channel produces, what gets stopped. Then one written strategy everyone argues from, a calendar run against it, your agencies and freelancers briefed and held to outcomes, and a senior voice in the leadership meeting translating what marketing can do this quarter and what it cannot. It is the difference between a company that does marketing and a company whose marketing is led. At Extra Medium the seat comes with a working studio behind it, so the plan and the people who execute it are never in different buildings arguing by email.
Published UK figures put fractional CMO day rates typically between £750 and £1,400, with monthly retainers from £3,000 to £15,000 depending on days and remit — market ranges, not our price list. Set that against a full-time senior marketing hire’s package, recruitment fees, and the months a search takes in a competitive market. Engagements are business-to-business contracts, commonly structured outside IR35, with no permanent headcount added. Extra Medium prices each engagement on days and scope, agreed up front and in writing before work begins; the wider cost picture is on our fractional CMO cost page.
Key takeaways
A chief marketing officer who works inside your company part-time — typically one to three days a week — owning the strategy, the plan and the results, on a business-to-business contract instead of a full-time hire.
It depends on the size of the function being run. A company with a small team and one agency usually needs one to two days; a scale-up mid-launch may need three for a season. The shape is set in the first conversation, against what actually needs leading, and it can flex at launches.
In writing. Describe where marketing stands through our contact page and we will reply with the engagement shape we would recommend and the figure in writing. No call is required to get there.
Let’s talk
Don’t know exactly what you need? Good. That’s our job. Tell us where the business is headed and we’ll tell you honestly whether we can help — and if we can’t, who might.
Usually replies within one business day.
