What Does Your Flexible Marketing Team Look Like?

Marketing is an essential part to every business and given the times that we’re in right now it is vital more than ever that we are able to pivot, adapt, and reposition ourselves without cutting back on your essential marketing functions.

It goes without saying that every business will go through peaks and troughs, and most businesses will certainly be feeling the troughs in this current economic climate.

The aim of the game is to ride the highs of the peaks and to minimise the pain of the troughs. To support you through the troughs, you need your team and most of all you need your sales and marketing team as they are responsible for the growth of your revenue.

However, the challenge most business owners are facing right now is managing their staffing and resourcing requirements.

All is not lost though. Through creative methods, you can actually come out on top and ahead of the game when it comes to your sales and marketing resources.

One such option is design and hire a flexible team.

Now, depending on the size of your organisation you may need to have a hybrid team which may consist of permanent full-time resources as well as flexible resources. For other organisations you may just need a flexible team.

This is exactly the space where MarketingTemps has been playing in, and we’ve been especially successful in helping our clients over the last few years. Since 2012 we have been providing our clients with the ability to hire flexibly, and to put hybrid teams in place.

While this is not a new concept, it is a concept that is underutilised, more often than not because of a lack of understanding.

Most business leaders are not recruitment or HR specialists, so to help you out, I've made a quick list of the flexible resources that you may be interested in considering so that your business can continue operating and ideally growing.


The In-betweener

An in-betweener is an interesting breed of resource. They tend to be in-between work, looking for a short-term opportunity to tie them over into their next role.

In-betweeners are fantastic for short-term requirements that you may need maybe for one or two weeks, but not for the long term.

All in-betweeners are highly skilled because they have been doing this line of work for the majority of their career which has allowed them to develop highly effective skills, industry knowledge, and solid expertise.

An in-betweener will come in, get the job done and leave which is perfect if you need something done quickly, affordably, and easily. The in-betweener will then go to the next opportunity and everyone will be happy.


Visa Holders

The Visa Holder has many forms - the student, the backpacker, the working holidayer, or the temporary skill shortager as well as other visa categories which are relevant or applicable. While they are not Permanent Australian Residents or Citizens, many of them are driven to be so.

The beauty of the Visa Holder is that they have a global perspective – they bring with them wealth of experience from another country, sometimes multiple countries. They are highly flexible and adaptive which is definitely a trait we require in business. Visa Holders are multilingual, highly skilled, and available for full-time, part-time, and even contract requirements.

Often overlooked, their high levels of versatility are exactly what makes them exceptionally valuable during this current time.

Sometimes the Visa owner may need sponsorship, and then other times they may not, however what is evident is that they bring with them wide range of skills and specialisations that make them fantastic additions to hybrid and flexible teams.


Serial Tempers

The Serial Temper is quite a curious creature. These are a group of people who have made a career out of the variety that temping has to offer, and they generally enjoy moving between organisations.
With their specialist skills they’re often mistaken for freelancers (see below).

The Serial Temper can come in to fill a certain resource gap for example maybe they are filling in for someone who is on annual leave, long service leave, or on maternity leave. They will fill the gap during this period of leave to minimise any skills shortage within the company.

Then when their time is up, they are happy to move on to their next temping project. While they are specialist, they do possess a wide range of skills which makes them extremely useful across multiple projects.


Part-Timers and Full-Timers

Your part timer and full timer are a breed of resources that are the more “traditional employees” that we are familiar with.

They are looking to build careers, build experiences, and are more interested in stability
.
Your part-timer or full-timer will quickly become part of the family and become an integral part of your team. They are a fantastic addition for fixed teams, and also set the foundation for hybridised teams as well.

Most part-timers and full-timers will have a specialist role to fulfil, but this will depend upon the level at which they are being employed.


Freelancers and Agencies

Freelancers and agencies come in for projects – they swoop in, complete the project, then swoop out until you need them again. There is no commitment - they just come in and do the job.

Freelancers and agencies are highly skilled in specialist areas which include design, UX (user experience), and writers of various degree.

Freelancers and agencies are becoming more and more popular because they get the job done, and there is no requirement to hire them beyond that - and best of all, you can reengage them further down the track, if you like them, or you can always find another one if you don’t.


So how can I use these flexible resources?

No matter the size of your business or your current phase of growth, at this point in time it is of vital importance that you invest in your sales and marketing, continue to grow your business or at least maintain its current level of growth.

To make it possible for you to keep doing so it's worth considering creating a flexible team using a mixture of the above resources. It may be appropriate for you to consider hybridising your team with a mixture of fixed, as well as flexible resources.

While employees will be counted against your hiring budget, some flexible resources can be costed against your marketing budget and in this way, they won't come under headcount.

If you’re a business leader that is looking for a creative way to maximise your sales and marketing so that you can grow your business in this current climate, then let’s have a chat.

Send me at kam@matchboxbusiness.com or give me a call on 0418 458 889.

Kam