Why B2B Companies in Los Angeles Are Turning to Fractional CMOs

For many Los Angeles companies, hiring a full-time chief marketing officer is simply out of reach. Turning to a B2B fractional CMO in Los Angeles allows companies access to an executive-level marketing specialist with less financial commitment. B2B companies can tap into leaner, faster, and more strategic leadership, and a good example is fractional CMOs for startups, as they need to scale quickly with minimal marketing budget. 

And why should this matter? B2B firms that don’t have the help of a CMO don’t have the expertise or guidance required to have a long-term marketing strategy. CMOs tie long-term strategies to revenue and offer strategic direction, such as go-to-market planning and brand and thought leadership strategy. 

However, marketing budgets have dropped from 9.1% in 2023 to 7.7% in 2024, leaving CMOs with less money to do more. Fractional CMOs are more crucial than ever before. Budget constraints are only one challenge B2B firms face. You must also navigate the rapid rise of startup ecosystems and the mounting pressures of scaling. 

These pressures highlight why so many Los Angeles B2B companies are rethinking how they approach marketing leadership. To understand why fractional CMOs are becoming the go-to solution, it’s important to first look at the unique challenges B2B organizations face today.

What Marketing Challenges Do B2B Companies in Los Angeles Face Today?

B2B marketing challenges in Los Angeles differ significantly from B2C firms, as there is a clear gap between resources and deal complexity. Some of the challenges B2B firms face include: 

Lengthy Buying Cycle

B2B firms face a delayed revenue cycle as the buying cycle can take up to 11 months, and in some cases, even longer. A lengthy buying cycle contributes to the following: 

• Slower revenue realization: Deals that can take up to a year or longer to close put pressure on cash flow and halt revenue streams. These delays put firms under pressure to hit their quarterly targets, halt expansion, and delay financial forecasting.
• Higher risk of deal attrition: When deals take a long time to close, they’re more likely to fall through. The longer the cycle, the more likely there’s a chance of stakeholder turnover, shifting priorities, or budget cuts — which can all disrupt the deal. A massive 77% of the buyers stated that deals are complex or difficult to close. 
• Rising customer acquisition costs: The longer your sales journey, the more marketing touches you’ll need, for instance, content, events, and nurture programs. 
• Increasing complexity: The buying process usually involves 6 to 10 stakeholders, and each has around five buying questions for B2B firms to address. 
• Challenging to attribute ROI: When deals take additional time, it’s challenging to pinpoint which facet of a marketing campaign is responsible for which result. 
• Intensifying competitive pressure: When deals take long to close, it opens the floor to other players. This can lead to lost leads and poaching from competitors. 

Niche Audiences 

Unlike B2C, where broad awareness campaigns can be effective, B2B companies see better results with a more precise, targeted approach. Casting a wide net often falls short, and account-based marketing (ABM) has become essential. For B2B firms developing a growth strategy in California, reaching niche audiences means focusing on:

• Personalize marketing messaging: Address pain points and speak directly to decision-maker roles. ABM often delivers a high return on investment (ROI), with more than 81% of marketers reporting stronger ROI.
• Plan for longer sales cycles: Account for the extended decision-making timeframe of high-value, high-stakes accounts by creating long-term nurture programs.
• Increase focus on ROI: Recognize that with a smaller buying pool, losing even one client can drastically reduce margins. Every campaign must tightly align with desired ROI and sales outcomes.
• Go deep with content strategy: Move away from broad-based content approaches and instead demonstrate expertise through thought leadership, technical insights, and industry credibility.

Fragmented Martech 

The adoption of AI has led to over 12,106 martech solutions, a thought that could leave many B2B firms feeling challenged. These create data silos that impair audience insights and personalization. B2B firms also have to contend with tool spread, which further inflates costs. 

What a B2B Fractional CMO Brings to the Table

You can think of a Los Angeles B2B fractional CMO as the conductor of your marketing strategy, orchestrating every channel and campaign to work in harmony toward measurable growth. Partnering with a fractional CMO offers many benefits as they carefully coordinate all the marketing components to create targeted campaigns and strategies. 

MarTech Optimization

These are still the early days of the marketing digital transformation. More than 70% of companies are at the early or non-integrated stages, leaving a large gap that martech can fill. 

Building a tech stack is challenging when you don’t have enough resources to sift through thousands of options, or the expertise to know which are better suited to the company’s marketing efforts. A fractional CMO knows how to target a search for the right tools and how to apply these tools for maximum results. 

Revenue-Focused KPIs 

Vanity metrics can cause serious underperformance and poor decision-making as the efforts aren’t aligned with metrics that matter. With the help of a fractional CMO, B2B firms can delve into the much harder metrics to measure, highlighting revenue-focused activities that are key performance indicators (KPIs). Companies should measure these marketing metrics: 

• Impressions: How many times the content is viewed
• Search engine rankings: Where pages rank on search engines 
• Click-through rates: How many times readers click on an ad, based on the ad’s impressions 
• Cost per click: How much it costs every time a user clicks on a paid ad
• Conversion rate: The number of users who take the desired action on campaigns 
• Customer acquisition cost: How much it costs to acquire a new client 
• Return on investment: How profitable certain marketing actions are

Cross-Channel Campaign Leadership

A marketing strategy has many moving parts — campaign creation, setting goals, competitive analysis, budgeting, and marketing targets. There are many players to coordinate, and for each division to meet the demands and stay on track, they need a clear direction and tangible deliverables. An effective fractional CMO ensures these tasks and processes are maintained: 

• Consistency across channels, such as paid media, content media, and social media 
• Strict budget allocation across all campaigns 
• Proper sharing of data and insights so that all components of the campaign are aware of the deliverables
• Clear measurement of revenue and pipeline-aligned KPIs
• Seamless customer journeys 

Strategic Alignment With Sales 

Marketing isn’t designed to be a servicing function, but it can quickly turn into one. The collaboration between sales and marketing allows companies to build a solid client buying journey as it helps buyers make knowledgeable decisions. It also helps B2B firms realign their strategy to the most convenient and accessible marketing journey for their customers. 

Thought Leadership and Brand Trust Development 

Thought leadership and brand trust development are crucial to the success of marketing campaigns for B2B firms. Building a B2B customer base is far harder than it seems. In fact, 95% of B2B aren’t actively looking for services or goods, which places the onus on B2B companies to market their products and services as must-haves. 

But B2B customers also won’t fall for cheap gimmicks, and a large component of decision-making will rest on the reputation and authority of the B2B firm. Los Angeles B2B fractional CMOs achieve this by: 

• Influencing the buying decision: A massive 73% of B2B customers said that thought leadership is a more efficient way to vet a potential vendor.
• Opening doors to opportunities: Content remains critical, with 86% of B2B buyers willing to send a request for proposal to companies after reading a thought leadership piece.
• Building long-term brand equity: Trust builds over time, and the more thought leadership content is out there, the more brand equity a B2B company builds, 

Top Reasons LA-Based B2B Companies Are Going Fractional 

Los Angeles-based B2B companies are increasingly turning to FCMOs to resolve their marketing woes. These executive-level marketing specialists provide all the expertise and experience, without the hefty paycheck or HR commitment. B2B firms can target their marketing efforts, instead of creating a host of tasks to make the most of a full-time employee. Other reasons to consider a fractional CMO include: 

Flexible, Scalable Leadership 

Fractional CMOs can meet the company where they are, and their support is on an as-needed basis. Their involvement is usually limited to very specific marketing tasks, such as: 

• Product launches 
• Funding rounds 
• Periods of rapid growth 

Their role can scale with increased demand and cut back as the demand subsides. The flexibility allows companies to maintain costs and still have access to that executive-level expertise. 

Faster Market Entry 

A marketing strategy takes time, and if companies add how long it takes to onboard a full-time CMO, this could lead to unnecessary delays. An FCMO streamlines this process and brings along proven go-to-market strategies and playbooks, which allow companies to tap into new markets, verticals, and even geographies. The fast launch offered by FCMOs reduces costly marketing missteps. 

Seamless Integration With Teams and Partners 

There’s a lot that goes behind the scenes of a B2B business, which usually includes a mixture of in-house staff, freelancers and contractors, and partners. An FCMO coordinates all the moving parts of the marketing machine to make all teams and divisions aware of the desired outcome and to promote clear communication throughout. 

Use Cases: When to Hire a Fractional B2B CMO in Los Angeles

Working with a fractional CMO is an excellent choice for your business at any stage, and especially if your company is experiencing any of these milestones: 

Launching a New Enterprise Product or ABM Campaign

ABM delivers strong returns and requires the help of strategic, specialized skills to realize its true potential. To build ABM, companies need senior-level marketing orchestration as there are tons of data, sales alignment, and messaging to consider. While it’s an intensive enterprise, a fractional marketing support manager can lead an ABM strategy without being full-time employed. 

Entering a New Market or Vertical 

B2B cycles take long to conclude and involve multiple stakeholders, which means expanding into a new market requires a tailored approach and targeted message. An FCMO has the experience to create a strategy for entry and minimize risks in the process. 

Preparing for Funding or Acquisition

When companies are looking for opportunities to invest in, they need to know that the prospect has enough traction and market differentiation to offer them a decent ROI. A fractional marketing manager has the knowledge base to steer campaigns towards investment opportunities. 

Restructuring of Scaling Marketing Resources

Marketing operations can change several times during the lifecycle of a B2B business. An FCMO steps in to bridge the gap between the marketing efforts and actual revenue. They also need to have a tight grip on the budget. 

Why Choose Digital Authority Partners for B2B Fractional CMO Services

At Digital Authority Partners (DAP), we specialize in guiding companies through complex B2B environments to tap into hidden marketing opportunities. We have deep experience in healthtech, fintech, and enterprise SaaS. Our tailored approach ensures that we stay on top of the longer buying cycles, multiple decision-makers, and heightened regulatory or compliance considerations, and offer you access to our strategic marketing leadership for measurable impact. 

We use a full-stack marketing and analytics approach, and we integrate search engine optimization (SEO), marketing automation, demand generation, and CRM optimization with your platforms to tap into sales alignment and revenue growth. 

With our intuitive framework, you can measure every touchpoint, know which campaign is responsible for every deliverable, and scale successfully without worrying about precision. Schedule your free consultation with our DAP Los Angeles Fractional CMO service to find out how we can support your marketing efforts and tactics. 

Fractional CMOs: Flexible Leadership for Complex B2B Growth

There are clear financial advantages to working with a fractional CMO in Los Angeles that stretch beyond not having to pay a hefty salary. Businesses also have an opportunity to tap into high-level expertise that will help them manage their marketing efforts on a tight budget. 

But that doesn’t mean the FCMO doesn’t spend money: the money goes towards marketing efforts that will tailor messaging to a niche market, speeding up the buying process. There’s a strategic advantage to working with an FCMO, as you’re getting a senior marketer to coordinate your marketing operations without the hassle of full-time employment. 

At Digital Authority Partners, we know that you’d much rather work on scaling and world-class customer service than focus your efforts on marketing. We understand that your marketing component is about more than just a service; it's a sales product too. Reach out to connect with our FCMOs, strategize, and implement marketing operations that you’ll feel where it matters: your bottom line.