What does a fractional marketing director cost in the UK?

How fractional pricing works

A fractional marketing director is a senior marketer who works for you part-time, on an ongoing basis, usually alongside other clients. You pay for a share of their time rather than a salary.

Three pricing models are common. A day rate, where you buy days month by month. A monthly retainer, a fixed fee for an agreed number of days or a defined scope, which is the most common model for ongoing work. And advisory, a smaller monthly fee for a few hours of senior input with no hands-on delivery.

Whatever the model, work out the effective day rate: the monthly fee divided by the days you actually get. A £3,000 retainer is £1,500 a day if it covers two days, and £750 a day if it covers four. Those are very different offers.

Public UK ranges

Most providers don't publish prices. The figures here come from the few that do, from fractional role listings and from contract rate data.

Fractional Quest, a placement platform, cites fractional CMO day rates of £800 to £2,000, monthly retainers of £3,000 to £10,000 for four to eight days, and advisory arrangements at £500 to £1,500 a month. Porter Wills, a fractional CMO firm, publishes entry retainers of £2,500 to £4,500 a month, mid level retainers of £4,500 to £7,500, and standard day rates of £800 to £1,500. Fractional CMO roles listed through Core3 showed £800 to £1,300 a day, and through Exec Capital £550 to £800.

Two patterns stand out. Day rates cluster between £600 and £1,500 for most small and mid-sized businesses, with higher rates reserved for very senior people or large companies. And most retainers assume between two and eight days a month.

Interim marketing directors, who cover a full-time gap rather than working part-time, are priced differently. Enterprise interim roles we found were advertised at £1,200 to £1,500 a day, while a charity interim role was advertised at £350 to £450 a day on PAYE.

What changes the price

Days per month is the biggest factor. Two days buys planning, oversight and a monthly review. Six to eight buys someone who runs the team week to week.

A director who also builds campaigns, writes briefs and fixes tracking costs more per month than one who only directs others, but may save you an agency fee. Seniority and sector matter: someone who has run marketing at a larger company, or knows a regulated sector, charges more. Managing an in-house team and three agencies takes more time than guiding one marketing executive.

Three month minimums are common, and longer commitments sometimes come with a lower monthly fee. On-site days usually cost more than remote ones, and some providers charge travel on top.

What you get for our Lead package

Our Lead package is £3,000 a month for fractional marketing director or fractional CTO work. It includes two days a month, which is £1,500 a day, plus email and message support between those days. Extra days are £1,200 each, and we agree a three month minimum.

It is hands-on. We don't just set direction, we fix what is blocking it, whether that is tracking, the CRM, the website or the reporting. A typical month includes a planning session to agree priorities against the numbers, check-ins with the team or agencies, hands-on work on the highest value problem, and a short written report on what moved, what didn't and what we recommend next.

We work remotely from Mallorca, one hour ahead of the UK, and travel to London when it matters.

Questions to ask before you sign

How many days a month does the fee include, and what happens if we need more? Will you do hands-on work, or only direct others? Who else will you be working with, and how will you make time for us?

What will you report each month, and against which numbers? What is the minimum term and the notice period? Who owns the plans, documents and accounts you create? And can you show a result from similar work, with a number we can check?

If you are weighing up a fractional hire, a Discover workshop at £950 looks at where marketing stands now and tells you plainly whether you need a fractional director, an agency, or neither.