Stretched marketing teams: where outsourced marketing support helps

More admin, and AI has not taken it away

Optimizely’s Marketer’s Survival Guide surveyed 100 marketers and 1,000 consumers in the UK. According to DecisionMarketing, 59% of the marketers said the amount of admin they deal with has increased over the past three years, and 31% said it has risen dramatically.

AI has not closed the gap yet. 65% said their teams feel more stretched since work was outsourced to AI, and 54% said using AI can often create more work than it saves. Even so, 38% plan to invest in more AI assistants over the next 12 months, and 43% see better integration between AI and existing marketing tools as the biggest opportunity to improve efficiency.

Too little time for strategy

Earlier findings from the same report, published in July, showed the knock-on effect. Three quarters of the marketers said the industry is stuck in “survival mode”, nearly two thirds said they spend most of their time reacting to short-term requests rather than planning ahead, and 54% said they move from campaign to campaign without enough time to evaluate performance properly (DecisionMarketing).

51% said they feel stuck in a cycle of constant execution without a comprehensive strategy.

Read the figures with care

The sample of 100 marketers is small, and Optimizely sells marketing software, so the research is best read as a signal rather than a full picture of UK marketing teams. The direction is still familiar: more admin, more requests and less time to step back.

Where outsourced marketing support fits

Not every gap needs a new hire or another tool. Often a team needs experienced hands for the work that keeps slipping: client communication, coordination, follow-ups, proposals, and the time to set priorities properly.

Marketing Support Partners provides flexible marketing support from one week to six months and beyond, working remotely within your team. That can mean client and account management to take the day-to-day pressure off, or an experienced marketing strategy consultant to help you step out of survival mode and plan ahead. Campaign setup and activation stay with your team or agency.

Questions to ask before you bring in support

• Which work is slipping? List the tasks that are late or rushed, not just the ones that feel busy.
• Is it a short peak or a longer gap? A busy month needs different cover from a six-month project.
• Who owns the strategy? If nobody has time to plan, outside advice may help more than extra delivery.
• How will you judge success? Agree what good looks like, such as response times, proposals delivered or a plan signed off.