fractional cmo-as-a-service.

Senior marketing leadership for your business — without the full-time overhead.

What is a fractional CMO?

A fractional CMO is a senior marketing executive who works with a business on a part-time or project basis, providing CMO-level strategic leadership without the cost of a full-time hire. At Commonwealth Marketing, the fractional CMO service is delivered by Derek Holota — a marketer with more than a decade of CMO and Global Brand Director experience across the UK and Canada — and backed by the Commonwealth Marketing Operating System (CMOS) and professional indemnity insurance.

Who is the commonwealth fractional cmo-as-a-service for?

The Commonwealth fractional CMO service is designed for founders, CEOs, and leadership teams at growth-stage companies and mid-market firms who need senior marketing leadership but are not yet at the stage — or scale — where a full-time CMO is the right commercial decision. It is particularly relevant if:

  • You are scaling quickly and your marketing function has not kept pace with the business

  • You need a senior voice in leadership conversations, but your marketing team is operational rather than strategic

  • You are preparing for a fundraise, acquisition, or market expansion and need a credible commercial narrative

  • Your agency is underdelivering but you are not ready to build an in-house team from scratch

  • You have a marketing budget but no clear system for where it should go

Image of Derek Holota

derek holota, fractional cmo

Our Fractional CMO-as-a-Service is led by Commonwealth’s Founder and Managing Consultant, Derek Holota.

Derek brings to every engagement:

  • CMO and brand director experience across B2B professional services and technology

  • Direct expertise in go-to-market strategy, brand positioning, M&A communications, and inbound marketing

  • Hands-on capability with HubSpot, agentic AI systems (Zapier, Notion AI), and no-code development platforms

  • The full infrastructure of the Commonwealth Marketing Operating System — so senior thinking is always backed by analytical depth, not just instinct

What does the fractional CMO-as-a-service include?

The Commonwealth fractional CMO engagement is structured around your business's current priorities, not a generic retainer scope. Every engagement begins with a Sprint-based diagnostic to establish the strategic baseline, followed by an agreed leadership cadence calibrated to your needs. Typical engagement components include:

  • Strategic marketing leadership: Attendance at leadership team meetings as the senior marketing voice — bringing commercial rigour to decisions about positioning, channel investment, and brand direction.

  • Marketing team oversight and direction: Providing operational leadership to your existing marketing team or agency: setting priorities, reviewing output, closing the gap between activity and commercial impact.

  • Sprint-backed project delivery: Where specific strategic outcomes are required — a new go-to-market strategy, a reputation audit, a founder brand build — Derek draws on Commonwealth's productised Sprint model to deliver defined outcomes on a defined timeline, rather than open-ended consulting hours.

  • CMO-level commercial counsel: One-to-one strategic input for the CEO or Founder on marketing investment decisions, board-level positioning, and the commercial narrative for investors, partners, or acquirers.

How does the Commonwealth fractional CMO-as-a-service work?

The Commonwealth fractional CMO service runs differently from a traditional fractional CMO retainer. Rather than billing by the hour or locking you into a six-month contract, Derek works within Commonwealth's Managed Hub model: structured engagements with defined scope, clear outcomes, and the CMOS platform handling the analytical workload so his time is spent entirely on the strategy that moves the needle.

The engagement follows a straightforward three-stage structure:

  1. Diagnostic Sprint: A structured assessment of your current marketing function, brand position, and commercial objectives — delivered within 14 days. This becomes the foundation for the leadership engagement that follows.

  2. Leadership cadence: A regular rhythm of strategic input, team oversight, and commercial counsel — agreed in scope and frequency before the engagement begins.

  3. Sprint delivery: Where specific strategic outcomes are required, they are delivered through Commonwealth's productised Sprint model — fixed scope, fixed timeline, guaranteed outcome.

This structure means you always know what you are getting, what it will cost, and when it will be delivered. There is no Agency Tax. There is no scope creep. There is no billing for time that does not produce value.

What does a fractional CMO cost?

Commonwealth Marketing's fractional CMO engagements are priced by scope and frequency, not by the hour. Every engagement begins with a 45-minute Strategy Roadmap Call — at no cost — where Derek assesses your business, your objectives, and the right structure for the engagement. Pricing is confirmed before any work begins.

Book Your Strategy Roadmap Call
Book Your Strategy Roadmap Call

Why choose a fractional CMO over a full-time hire?

A full-time CMO in the UK commands a salary of £120,000–£200,000 per year before employer costs, pension contributions, and the overhead of recruitment. For growth-stage companies and mid-market firms, that investment is difficult to justify before the marketing function is mature enough to fully absorb it.

A fractional CMO provides the same strategic leadership — the same commercial thinking, the same seniority, the same board-level credibility — at a fraction of the cost and with no long-term employment commitment. Commonwealth's fractional CMO model adds a further layer: the CMOS platform ensures that senior time is never wasted on work that can be automated, and professional indemnity insurance means every engagement carries the accountability that freelance arrangements cannot.

Frequently Asked Questions

  • A fractional CMO is a senior marketing executive who provides CMO-level strategic leadership to a business on a part-time or project basis. Commonwealth Marketing's fractional CMO service is delivered by Derek Holota — a marketer with over a decade of CMO and Global Brand Director experience — backed by professional indemnity insurance and the Commonwealth Marketing Operating System.

  • Fractional CMO costs in the UK vary widely depending on experience level and engagement scope. Commonwealth Marketing structures fractional CMO engagements by scope rather than by the hour, with pricing confirmed during a free 45-minute Strategy Roadmap Call. Discrete Sprint-based engagements start at £2,500. Full-time UK CMO salaries typically range from £120,000 to £200,000 per year — a fractional model provides equivalent seniority at a substantially lower cost.

  • A business typically benefits from a fractional CMO when it has outgrown an operational marketing team but is not yet at the scale where a full-time CMO hire is commercially justified — particularly during periods of rapid growth, fundraising preparation, market expansion, or post-acquisition integration. Commonwealth Marketing's fractional CMO service is designed for exactly this stage.

  • A fractional CMO provides ongoing strategic leadership — attending leadership meetings, directing the marketing team, and owning the commercial marketing agenda over time. A marketing consultant typically delivers a defined project or piece of strategic work, then steps back. Commonwealth Marketing's model combines both: Derek provides fractional CMO leadership within a structured, outcome-based engagement framework, with discrete Sprint deliverables where specific outcomes are required.

  • Every engagement begins with a Diagnostic Sprint — a 14-day structured assessment of the business's marketing function, brand position, and commercial objectives. From there, Derek and the client agree on a leadership cadence: the frequency, scope, and format of ongoing strategic input. Where specific deliverables are required, they are produced as productised Sprints — fixed scope, fixed timeline, fixed price.

  • Every fractional CMO engagement at Commonwealth Marketing is led by Derek Holota — Founder and Managing Consultant. Derek holds more than 12 years of senior marketing experience, including roles as Director of Global Brand & Communications at Dye & Durham and Chief Marketing Officer at Mezzle. He does not delegate engagements to junior consultants.