Your marketing manager should own the agreed marketing plan, its execution and the reporting needed to improve it. Their responsibilities should come with a defined budget, decision authority and access to specialist support. The exact scope depends on your business. The title alone won’t establish it.
That distinction matters when you start comparing candidates. Someone who can coordinate several channels and suppliers may be a good hire. Someone who can personally improve paid acquisition may be a better one. You need to know which problem you’re recruiting them to solve.
What problem should this hire solve?
“Take marketing off my plate” is an understandable starting point. It needs translating into work someone can actually own.
For example, consider a hypothetical Dubai-based B2B supplier. It receives enquiries through its website, exhibitions and referrals, but the founder can’t tell which marketing activity produces worthwhile sales opportunities.
The immediate requirement might be to connect campaign activity to qualified enquiries, establish regular feedback from sales and direct spending towards the strongest sources.
That is a clearer brief than “grow our online presence”.
However, if enquiries are already suitable and sales follow-up is inconsistent, adding a marketing manager may leave the main problem untouched.
“We need this person to improve ______, because ______ is currently preventing it.”
Then check whether marketing can reasonably influence the result.
What should a marketing manager own?
For a business with an agreed commercial direction, a marketing manager’s remit could look like this:
| Area | What the manager owns | What the business must provide |
|---|---|---|
| Marketing priorities | A focused plan connecting activity to the agreed objective | Target customers, commercial priorities and budget |
| Campaign delivery | Briefs, schedules, coordination and campaign improvements | Appropriate design, content and technical capacity |
| Budget management | Allocation and monitoring within agreed limits | Clear spending authority and access to cost information |
| Agency or freelancer management | Defined briefs, feedback and assessment of delivery | Contracts, access and clarity about who directs suppliers |
| Performance reporting | Consistent measures, interpretation and recommended actions | Reliable data and feedback from sales or operations |
| Lead handover | Agreed qualification criteria and a visible handover process | A sales owner responsible for follow-up and progression |
This is a starting point, not a universal job description.
An ecommerce company may need greater emphasis on acquisition costs, conversion and repeat purchasing. A B2B services firm may care more about qualified opportunities and the contribution of marketing to its pipeline.
The useful distinction is between owning a workstream and personally performing every task within it.
A manager can be accountable for campaign delivery while briefing a designer and coordinating a developer. Expecting them to also be your best copywriter, video editor, media buyer and technical SEO specialist deserves a second look.
A longer job description does not create more hours in the week.
What makes the brief specific to Dubai?
Local relevance should change the hiring requirements in a practical way.
Start with the customers. Are you selling to UAE residents, local businesses, regional distributors or international buyers using Dubai as a base? These are different audiences, even when the company address is the same.
Language requirements
Which customers need Arabic, English or another language? Does the manager need to write the material, or manage qualified language support?
Physical presence
Does delivery involve filming, visiting branches, attending events or spending time with customers? Specify the work that genuinely requires someone on-site.
Market scope
Is the priority Dubai, the wider UAE or expansion into another GCC market? Don’t quietly add regional expansion to a local execution role.
Enquiry channels
If customers contact you through calls, forms or WhatsApp, define how those enquiries reach Sales and appear in reporting.
“UAE experience required” is less useful than explaining which local knowledge the job genuinely needs.
Ask candidates to show how they have handled comparable customers, channels and commercial constraints. Location is relevant context. It isn’t a complete assessment of capability.
How much authority should they have?
If the manager owns delivery, they need permission to make routine delivery decisions.
Agree which decisions they can make independently, which need consultation and which require approval.
Set boundaries for supplier selection, publishing, brand claims and website changes too.
Otherwise, “take ownership” can become “prepare recommendations and wait for the founder”. The organisation chart changes, but your inbox doesn’t.
Management still needs oversight. A short review of results, decisions and exceptions is more useful than approving every routine adjustment.
Which marketing manager KPIs are fair?
Choose measures that connect to the business objective and reflect the person’s actual influence.
For the hypothetical B2B supplier, a useful starting set would be:
| Measure | What it helps you understand | Ownership |
|---|---|---|
| Sales-accepted marketing enquiries | Whether marketing is attracting relevant prospects | Shared definition and review with Sales |
| Cost per accepted enquiry | Whether acquisition is becoming more efficient | Marketing, using an agreed cost basis |
| Enquiry-to-opportunity conversion | Whether accepted enquiries progress into credible opportunities | Shared with Sales |
| Completion and evaluation of priority tests | Whether the team is systematically improving execution | Marketing, subject to agreed support |
Define the terms before setting targets. What qualifies as an accepted enquiry? What counts as an opportunity? Which costs are included?
Revenue matters, but a marketing manager may not control Sales response times, pricing, stock availability or closing performance. Those dependencies should appear alongside the revenue objective.
For ecommerce, the scorecard would change. Customer acquisition cost and contribution after marketing expenditure may be more useful than enquiry measures.
There is no reason to give two very different businesses the same dashboard simply because both employ a marketing manager.
What should happen in the first 90 days?
A first-90-day plan should combine learning with useful execution. The balance depends on the condition of the existing marketing setup.
| Period | Main priority | Evidence of progress |
|---|---|---|
| Days 1–30 | Establish the baseline, confirm priorities and address obvious delivery problems. | Agreed measures, account access, a workable plan and initial corrective actions. |
| Days 31–60 | Run priority campaigns or improvements and strengthen coordination. | Tests in progress, clearer supplier briefs and regular Sales feedback. |
| Days 61–90 | Evaluate results and decide what to continue, change or stop. | Evidence-based recommendations, a next-quarter plan and fewer routine decisions returning to the founder. |
These are planning checkpoints, not guaranteed commercial results.
For a business with a long sales cycle, closed revenue may not reveal much within three months. Progress in qualified opportunities and campaign learning can provide earlier evidence.
If reliable tracking is missing, fixing it matters, but the plan should explain what useful work can proceed at the same time.
Agree numerical targets against your starting position, budget and capacity. A round percentage chosen during an interview is not much of a performance plan.
When would another role or delivery model fit better?
A marketing manager makes sense when there is ongoing marketing work to coordinate and sufficient clarity about the direction.
Other needs may point elsewhere:
When the main constraint sits within one discipline, such as paid acquisition, CRM or SEO.
When the business needs more senior judgement on positioning, priorities, investment and team design.
When several execution skills are needed, with a capable internal person available to direct and assess the work.
When daily coordination, customer knowledge and close collaboration justify sustained internal ownership.
These options can work together. A manager may need external specialists. A fractional leader may need an internal team.
Seniority and delivery model are separate decisions. Establish the expertise and capacity required before choosing how to engage them.
What should you establish before recruiting?
Write a short hiring brief that answers seven questions:
What business result should this person help improve?
What work will they directly own?
What decisions can they make?
What budget and specialist support are available?
Which measures will show progress?
What should be established or improved in the first 90 days?
What evidence should a candidate provide to demonstrate fit?
Use that brief to assess candidates. Ask for examples of comparable responsibilities, decisions and results, including what support they had and what they personally contributed.
You’ll have a much more useful conversation than asking whether they can “handle all our marketing”.
Define the capability before you commit to the hire.
TalentOracle’s Execution Blueprint brings these decisions together: the capability required, ownership, success measures, business dependencies and first 90 days.
See a Sample Execution Blueprint →