Get CMO-level marketing direction, without the full-time hire
I lead marketing for B2B companies from pre-launch through Series C. As your Fractional CMO, I craft the strategy, build your foundation, and develop the systems and processes to fuel your growth and acquisition strategies.
Your early-stage, growth-focused, fractional CMO
When you build a business, you must be thinking about growth and acquisition strategy from the very beginning. I’ve seen too many early-stage startups forego any marketing direction and build the wrong foundation (or don’t have one at all).
For many of my clients, they need CMO guidance, but don’t need or want a full-time hire just yet. That’s where I come in.
I work with pre-launch to Series C B2B eCommerce and SaaS startups to;
- Build the foundation for your marketing team; the tools, processes, workflows, brand references, and core knowledge
- Find your ideal customer profile and document the voice of customer
- Test different acquisition channels and monitor the results to learn where to invest
- Launch websites, editorial calendars, content strategy, and sales enablement materials
- Hire, train, and build out your core marketing team
- And much more
Finding a fractional CMO: 8 Key roles and responsibilities of a temporary marketing manager
How it works
1. Discovery call: We talk about where you are, where you want to be, and whether I’m the right fit. If I’m not, I’ll say so.
2. Audit and plan: First 3-4 weeks. I assess your current state, including the team, tools, tracking, content, pipeline, and product. We’ll discuss where to start, what I suggest, and what I’ll be tracking.
This is also when I start poking around your tools and processes, and setting up (if needed) new workflows, dashboards, and attribution.
3. Ongoing leadership: After a trial period of a few months, I move to month-to-month on contract. I’ll be in your Slack, standups, and board prep. I typically allocate 10 hours/week per client, but it can vary widely. This is a retainer rather than an hourly situation so I can handle whatever pops up next.
4. Handoff: As you grow, we’ll know when it’s time to hand off to a full-time CMO. I’ll help to find, hire, and transition them cleanly with all the tools and resources they need to succeed.
As with all my clients, my goal is to grow you to a stage where it’s time for a full-time hire.
Build strategically from the start.
Who is Rachel Andrea Go?
I’ve been a marketer since 2013, and I’ve spent the last several years inside B2B companies at exactly the stages where getting marketing wrong is most expensive. That means I’m familiar with:
- Acquisition models for pre-launch through Series C. I’ve seen and executed (and learned from) the plays that work and the ones that sound good but waste runway at each stage.
- B2B buyer journeys, with long sales cycles, multiple stakeholders, content-heavy nurture paths, and sales-marketing alignment.
- Founding a marketing function from scratch. I’ve been boots-on-the-ground when there’s no team, no tooling, no data, and no one to hand things to.
- Rebuilding a marketing function after the wrong foundation. I can diagnose what’s load-bearing, what needs to go, and in what order.
Check out some of what I’ve done below! (And on my portfolio)
How I Set up Marketing for an eCommerce Shipping and Fulfillment Company as Their Fractional CMO
If you’re a B2B founder between pre-launch and Series C, and you know marketing matters more than your current setup reflects, let’s talk shop. Worst case, you get an outside read on your situation. Best case, we build the foundation that takes you to the next stage.
Reach out for a strategy call.
Fractional CMO FAQs
For those of you still here, I’ve listed a few questions and answers you might find useful below.
What is a fractional CMO?
A fractional CMO is a senior marketing leader who owns your marketing function part-time, usually on retainer. An agency owns a deliverable. A consultant advises and exits. A fractional CMO sits inside your leadership, sets the strategy, builds the team, and runs the engine. For B2B companies under $10M ARR, it’s how you get CMO-tier judgment before you can justify a $250K/year full-time hire.
What does Rachel actually do as a fractional CMO?
I build the marketing function from zero, or fix a broken one. That means the strategy, the positioning, the content engine, the hiring, the contractor network, the reporting systems, and the weekly execution. I was the first marketing hire at Deliverr (acquired by Shopify for $2.1B), MyFBAPrep (Inc. 5000 and Financial Times 3 years in a row), and ZonPrep, and built each marketing team from scratch. I’m also the first CMO at iDrive Logistics. Onboarding measured in hours, not months.
What’s a “marketing engineer” and is that what Rachel is?
A marketing engineer is a marketer who builds systems and treats acquisition like infrastructure. I build the content engine, the contractor network, the reporting layer, and the workflows that let marketing run without me in the room. At Deliverr, that engine took the blog from zero to 500,000+ monthly visits before the $2.1B Shopify acquisition, and managed with one of the smallest teams in the space. I build marketing the way an engineer builds a product.
When should I hire a fractional CMO vs. a full-time CMO or an agency?
Hire a full-time CMO when your company can support a $250K+ base plus equity and marketing is a standalone function with headcount under it. Hire an agency when your strategy is already settled and you need channel execution. Hire a fractional CMO when you’re build-phase. I specialize in pre-launch through Series C, because at those stages you need CMO-tier judgment, but haven’t yet justified the full-time hire.
Who does Rachel work with?
I work with co-founders and C-suite leaders at build-phase B2B eCommerce ops companies (fulfillment, logistics, FBA prep, supply-chain connectors) and B2B SaaS companies in the same stage (pre-launch through Series C). Named clients include Deliverr (acquired by Shopify for $2.1B), MyFBAPrep (Inc. 5000 three years running, #1 in logistics 2023, Amazon-recommended), Skubana (acquired by Extensiv), Hubstaff, ZonPrep, and iDrive Logistics. Industry-fluent on Day 1.
When is the right time to hire a fractional CMO?
Usually when marketing is either missing or stuck. Concrete triggers: you’re pre-launch and need to land the first 100 customers; you just closed a seed or Series A and marketing is suddenly a strategic function; you’ve hired an agency and the output doesn’t move pipeline; your founder-led marketing has plateaued.
Honestly, if you’re past Series C with a mature marketing team, I’m not the right fit. I’m a builder, not a caretaker.
How does an engagement with Rachel work?
First, a discovery call. If we’re a fit, we start with a three to four week audit and planning phase where I assess what you have, interview your team and your customers, and learn about your product or service. Most of my engagements have a six-month trial period, and then a month-to-month retainer after that. When you’re ready to hire a full-time CMO, I help you hire them and hand off.
How much does a fractional CMO engagement cost?
My full fractional CMO retainer is between $9,000–15,000/month (depending on equity agreements), covering ~40 hours/month of strategy and execution. Content-tier engagements for companies that need the content engine before full CMO scope are between $7,000 to 8,000/month. I don’t charge setup fees or hourly billing.
Equity-inclusive structures are available for the right build-phase companies. Pricing is fixed at contract signing.
How long do engagements typically run?
Most clients stay two years or longer. I was with Deliverr for ~4 years, and MyFBAPrep for 5. The longest engagements are companies I joined pre-Series A and stayed with through their growth curve, which is the pattern my practice is built for. Month-to-month contract structure means either side can exit anytime, but in practice build-phase engagements compound: the first year is setup, and the next two are the scale story.
Does Rachel just strategize, or does she actually execute?
Both. The “strategy-only consultant” pattern fails for build-phase companies because there’s no one to run the plan. I write the strategy, then do the first round of execution myself until there’s a team and systems to hand to. Brett Haskins (COO, iDrive Logistics) called me a “‘hired gun’ for early to mid-stage tech marketing companies” in a January 2025 LinkedIn recommendation. That’s why engagements run multi-year, not 90 days.
Check out more of my testimonials.