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Thanks, this is helpful. You mention having marketing by the time you hire the VP Sales, and you link to a few posts on hiring VP of Sales- do you have any link

Thanks, this is helpful. You mention having marketing by the time you hire the VP Sales, and you link to a few posts on hiring VP of Sales- do you have any links/thoughts on hiring marketing?

kwindla 11y ago
Jason Lemkin, again: http://www.saastr.com/hire-the-right-type-of-vp-marketing-or-youll-end-up-with-a-bunch-of-blue-pens/ http://www.saastr.com/hire-the-right-type-of-vp-marketing-or... My experience is weighted towards building and selling enterprise products (so, selling to Fortune 500 companies). I actually think the VP of Marketing hire is even harder, for enterprise-oriented startups, than the VP of Sales hire. Most of the candidates you'll find with "big company" experience will want to do a lot of "big company" style marketing -- focusing on branding rather than lead gen, hiring expensive agencies, and positioning via high-profile partnerships. All of which strategems are problematic for startups, to say the least. A VC friend of mine told me once that one of his investments had hired and fired 9 VPs of Marketing, I think over something like an eight-year span. (We were having a conversation about how hard it is to find -- and to evaluate before hiring -- marketing people who understand both enterprise selling and startups.)