Hiring A Marketing Generalist: Pros, Cons + Tips

Hiring a marketer might seem simple until you realize there are a million variations in skill sets, titles, and responsibilities. It's easy to get lost in nomenclature, rush into making (potentially) wrong decisions for your business, and land in cycles of bad candidates and budget-draining hires.  

How to navigate the maze, bring order into chaos, and decide if you need a marketing generalist, or a specialist?

Keep reading and find out more. 

Marketing generalists vs marketing specialists

On the most simplified level, there are two main types of marketers: generalists and specialists.

Generalists have a broad range of skills and knowledge across various marketing disciplines. These professionals tend to have a well-rounded understanding of overall marketing strategies and tactics, making them versatile in their roles.

Some common job titles for generalist marketers include Marketing Manager and Marketing Coordinator. These roles usually require a mix of skills in areas such as market research, advertising, social media management, and project management.

Specialist marketers, on the other hand, have deep expertise in a specific marketing discipline. For example, there are specialists in search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, content marketing, email marketing campaigns, marketing automation, social media marketing, and many more.

Specialists often have specific job titles that reflect their area of expertise, such as SEO Specialist or Email Marketing Manager. These marketing professionals are highly skilled in their respective areas and may work closely with generalists to execute specific campaigns or strategies within a larger marketing plan.

Hiring one or the other isn't wrong. What you do need to do, however, is make sure you understand the difference between generalists and specialists, as well as how each category splits into different fields.



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Advantages of hiring a marketing generalist

Despite general career advice gurus urging marketing professionals to specialize, marketing generalists can be very helpful in some use cases. Similarly, when your needs are specific and your goals are laser-sharp, hiring a specialist might be a much better option.

A marketing generalist can:

See the bigger picture

Marketing generalists find it easier to see the bigger picture because they are not bogged down with the details of one specific discipline. They can see how all the different marketing efforts and tactics fit together and work towards achieving the overall marketing goals.

Help you build a team of specialists

A marketing generalist is often a jack-of-all-trades within the marketing department, possessing the versatility to switch between various marketing initiatives as needed. This broad expertise allows them to facilitate team building by identifying the roles and skills needed to strengthen the marketing strategy.

They balance the team by recruiting specialists where depth is needed, and further generalists where versatility is advantageous. The generalist’s wide-angle view of marketing enables them to understand how each team member can contribute to the campaign's success, ensuring that each specialist’s deep knowledge is leveraged within the context of the overarching goals, thus creating a coherent and effective marketing team.



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Come with more flexibility

Generalists are adaptable by nature as they have a broad understanding of various marketing skills and disciplines. They can easily pivot when needed, whether it's due to changes in industry, emerging marketing trends, or consumer behavior.

They are also the most likely to roll up their sleeves and learn a brand new thing when needed, so if you need someone proactive to get things done (quickly, rather than flawlessly), go for a generalist.

Advantages of hiring a marketing specialist

There are many advantages to hiring someone who specializes in a marketing channel, type of marketing campaign, or even industry. Some of the bigger benefits include:

Deeper expertise and knowledge

Specialists are experts in their area of focus, which means they have an in-depth understanding of the tactics, strategies, and tools needed to achieve success. They stay up-to-date with industry advancements and constantly strive to improve their skills and knowledge.

This specialized expertise can be invaluable when it comes to executing specific campaigns or tackling complex challenges within a marketing strategy.

Greater precision and effectiveness

Specialists have honed their skills in a specific area, making them highly proficient and effective in their work. This can lead to greater precision and better results for your marketing efforts.

For example, hiring an SEO specialist with years of experience can help optimize your website and improve its search engine rankings much more efficiently than trying to do it yourself or relying on a generalist who may have only limited knowledge in this area.

Time and cost savings

By hiring a specialist, you can save time and costs associated with training and bringing them up to speed. Since they already have deep expertise in their discipline, they can hit the ground running and start producing results quickly.

Additionally, specialists are often more efficient at their work, which can result in time and cost savings in the long run.



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The impossible mission of being a full-stack marketer

Marketing generalists are often seen as people who can just do it all – but the harsh truth is that truly being a full-stack marketer is nearly impossible. You can, in theory, have a broad understanding of how different marketing channels work, how different marketing campaigns are set, or how to use different marketing tools, but being excellent in all of them is a challenge.

What's more, we live in an economy of niches: there is a specialist for almost everything you can think of, especially in marketing. You can be as granular as you want to be: you can search for a SaaS product manager or an AdTech product marketing manager for pre-seed startups in Europe, with experience in agile product management.

In this context, it's unlikely that one can truly master every possible channel, sub-channel, platform, and sub-platform.

The T-shaped marketer: as close as it gets to a Jack of all trades

A T-shaped marketer is someone who has a broad understanding of various aspects of marketing (symbolized by the horizontal bar of the T) and deep expertise in one or two specific disciplines (the vertical bar of the T).

Having both breadth and depth of knowledge makes these digital marketers more versatile, adaptable, and effective in different marketing initiatives. They can see the bigger picture while also being able to dive deep into specific tactics when needed.

Here's an example of a T-shaped marketer framework: 



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Or take this one, a bit more general (the same model can be applied to any of the marketing specialties, from content marketing to social media): 



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While it may be difficult to find a person who is an expert in every single marketing area, striving toward becoming a T-shaped marketer can bring you the best of both worlds. By combining the skills and knowledge of a generalist with the expertise and precision of a specialist, you can create a well-rounded marketing team that can tackle any challenge thrown their way. So when building your marketing team, consider hiring a mix of both generalists and specialists for the best results.

So as always, you'll need to identify your specific needs and goals before deciding whether to hire a marketing generalist or specialist, as both can bring unique advantages to your marketing strategy. Ultimately, having a diverse and well-balanced team of marketers with various skills and expertise will lead to a more cohesive marketing strategy.

Who are marketing generalists for?

Marketing generalists can be a great match for:

• Startups or small businesses with limited resources: Generalists can provide the flexibility and versatility needed in a lean team.
• Companies with constantly changing needs: Generalists can adapt to changes quickly and efficiently without disrupting the overall marketing strategy.
• Projects or campaigns that require a variety of skills: Generalists can handle multiple aspects of a project, making them an efficient choice for time-sensitive or complex campaigns.
• Organizations with a small marketing team: Generalists can fill in knowledge gaps and provide support for various marketing tasks, helping to balance the workload of a smaller team.

If your business fits one of the above, you can always hire a specialist marketing consultant on a per-project basis for troubleshooting on more specific marketing areas. 

Why shouldn’t you hire a marketing generalist?

Before you jump in and push your new marketing generalist job ad into the world, consider the following:

Two words: "paid channels"

Paid channels require highly specialized knowledge and precise targeting strategies to leverage ad spend effectively. If you add programmatic and even social ads into the mix, the whole process becomes even more complex, especially when you take into account the constant algorithm updates and changes in consumer behavior.

In this case, it may help more l to hire a specialist with extensive experience in paid advertising instead of relying on a generalist. Otherwise, you can hire a separate specialist as a consultant to manage or even just set up your campaigns.



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Floppy execution, floppier results

Marketing generalists can do it all, and sometimes they might even do it on fast-forward. The downside of all this versatility is that they may not have enough time to focus on each area and execute campaigns with the required level of precision. This can lead to subpar results and wasted resources.

The Jack of all trades

...is a master of none. Or so the saying goes.

A major drawback of hiring a marketing generalist lies in the risk of executing campaigns with less precision and effectiveness, often resulting in mediocre outcomes. Generalist marketing skills are often broad. While this is useful in some scenarios, this results in efforts being spread too thin across multiple tasks, causing a dilution of focused expertise and potentially inefficient use of resources.

Time is running out

Like everyone else on this planet, your marketing hire has 24 hours a day. Even someone who is very good at many things and has broad experience in a wide range of marketing activities will still have 24 hours a day. They cannot do more than what their workday allows. In the end, you'll not get as many campaigns going as you'd imagine. 

There’s no such thing as multitasking

Believe it or not, nothing and no one can truly multitask. Even computers with multi-core processors can only do one thing at a time. They simply switch between tasks quickly. So when you’re considering hiring a marketing generalist, keep in mind that they may not be able to effectively handle multiple digital marketing initiatives or campaigns simultaneously and produce top-notch results.

T-shaped is probably better

As also mentioned before, a T-shaped marketer can offer the best of both worlds. While generalists may be able to handle multiple tasks, they may not have the deep expertise needed for certain specialized marketing areas. By hiring a mix of T-shaped digital marketers in your team, you can ensure that you have both versatility and precision covered.



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Marketing generalist job description

Of course, your marketing generalist job description could look different. But if you're looking for a template to get started, here are some key elements that you may want to include. Remember to have your director of marketing review this before the job listing goes live.

Company overview

Use this section to quickly introduce your company, its values, culture, and mission. Speak about who you are, what you do, and the kind of customers you serve.

Job responsibilities

This section should be dedicated to listing down the main responsibilities your new hire will have. Some examples include:

• Developing and implementing marketing strategies to meet company objectives
• Creating marketing materials
• Content distribution and management on various channels, including social media, email, and website
• Collaborating with cross-functional teams, such as the product development or customer experience teams, to ensure alignment of messaging and brand voice
• Reporting on key marketing metrics and providing insights for continuous improvement
• Staying up-to-date on industry trends and developments to inform marketing strategies



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Skills and qualifications

Include the soft skills that you're looking for in a marketing generalist. Some key points to consider:

• Strong communication skills
• Project management skills
• Experience with market research
• Analytical skills 
• Problem-solving skills 
• Being a strategic thinker
• Knowledge of marketing tools, analytics tools and platforms
• Channel-specific skills (e.g., digital marketing, content creation, and social media management, and so on.)
• Some familiarity with target markets, such as a B2B marketing environment

Required qualifications

This section should outline the skills and knowledge that are essential for your generalist role. Some examples could be:

• 2+ years of experience a a digital marketing manager, content marketer, marketing associate, or a similar marketing role
• Proficiency in marketing tools such as Google Analytics, Hootsuite, and Mailchimp
• Interpersonal skills 
• Organizational skills 
• The ability to build a customer journey map
• Experience interviewing actual customers and potential customers 
• The ability to run market research 
• Experience with audience segmentation
• A degree in marketing 

Add here any specific key skills you need your marketer to have. It could be related to different aspects of marketing, like:

• Managing a product launch
• Experience with managing business social media accounts
• Target audience analysis
• Running paid campaigns
• Managing influencer marketing initiatives
• Building a marketing process
• Experience with content marketing (or, if you want to, more specifically in building inbound marketing materials and other marketing collateral for sales activities) 
• The ability to analyze customer behavior 
• Experience working with B2B businesses, B2C businesses, or a particular business model
• Strong proofreading skills 
• A proven track record of helping startups find product-market fit 

Additional qualifications (optional)

This section is where you could list any additional or preferred qualifications that are not essential but would support any actions marketing generalists would take to succeed in this role and in meeting common goals for the business. Examples include:

• The ability to run A/B testing and data analysis
• Familiarity with SEO best practices
• Previous experience in project management roles or working on cross-functional teams

Offer and package

Most hiring managers, founders, and business owners think they cannot afford to hire an excellent marketer. But what you should understand is that, along with a market-competitive salary, there are many other ways to attract top marketing talent. Consider adding some of the following to your job offer:

• Flexible work arrangements, like remote work and flexible hours
• Professional development opportunities
• Perks and benefits, like gym memberships, or team outings
• A positive and inclusive company culture
• A passion for marketing and creating unforgettable campaigns
• Your general approach to marketing
• What experience in marketing you or your team members have 

Wrapping it up

Hiring a marketing generalist can be a great option for some companies, especially those with limited resources that need to cover a relatively wide range of marketing activities. Carefully consider the pros and cons before making a decision. At the end of the day, what matters most is finding the ideal candidate for your company and its strategic marketing needs.

Want to hire a marketer, make sure they're the perfect fit, and build an unstoppable marketing team?

Contact Mayple. We work with 1,000 vetted marketers and we use machine learning to match businesses like yours with the best marketing talent for their specific needs. Whether you're looking for a specialist, a generalist, or a T-shaped marketer, we've have a strong track record in successful B2B marketing recruitment. 

There are no contract minimums, you can cancel at any time, and we'll handle the marketer's payment and regular check-ins for you.