Hire a PPC director: fractional or in-house?
A PPC director owns strategy across channels: budget allocation, the measurement framework, channel mix, and the commercial story told to leadership. In-house, BLS puts the median base for advertising and promotions managers at $133,660 (May 2025). A fractional director delivers the same judgment part-time, which suits businesses that need the seniority before they can fill a full-time seat.
A 47-point written audit of your Google, Meta or Shopping account, back in five business days.
Get your auditBook a callDay-to-day
- Allocates budget across channels against blended MER, not channel ROAS
- Owns the measurement framework: attribution stance and incrementality testing
- Sets margin-derived targets and holds specialists to them
- Coordinates Google, Meta, and other channel specialists so they do not compete
- Reports the commercial narrative, spend to profit, to leadership
- Decides channel mix and when to enter or cut a channel
- Owns vendor and agency relationships and the build-versus-buy calls
- Interviews and vets the specialists, freelancers or agencies the company brings in
Salary & rate benchmarks
Which hiring option wins?
- Senior cross-channel judgment bundled into the engagement
- Exposure to many accounts' channel-mix decisions
- No single-hire commitment while you are still scaling
- Comes with the specialist bench underneath
- Less embedded in your commercial and product context
- Competing priorities across the agency's client base
- Strategic continuity depends on the agency's staffing
- Fractional director gives senior strategy without a full salary
- Can sit above an agency or in-house team and hold it accountable
- Flexible scope that scales up or down with your needs
- Direct, embedded relationship with your team
- Part-time attention on a role that benefits from immersion
- No team underneath unless you provide the specialists
- Value depends heavily on the individual's genuine seniority
- Full immersion in your commercial reality and roadmap
- Direct authority to coordinate internal specialists
- Owns the long-term measurement and channel strategy
- A senior salary only justified at meaningful multi-channel spend
- Key-person risk on a strategically critical role
- Needs specialists underneath to execute the strategy
Fractional PPC lead, manager or director: one seat
Buyers search for this seat under several names: fractional PPC lead, fractional PPC manager, fractional director of PPC. The titles differ, but the job is the same. A fractional director owns paid strategy part-time, usually a few days a month, and sits above whoever runs the day-to-day, whether that is an in-house specialist, a freelancer, or an agency.
What separates it from a consultant is ongoing ownership. A consultant delivers a project and leaves. A fractional director is accountable for targets, standards and the monthly narrative to leadership over time, and makes the hard calls, including when to cut spend or restructure. The model fits the gap between a generalist marketer and a full-time director: the paid program has outgrown the generalist, but the work does not yet fill a senior seat five days a week.
How fractional and in-house costs compare
Start from public data. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports a May 2025 median base of $133,660 for advertising and promotions managers, and $166,790 for marketing managers, the broader category many heads of growth sit in. Add roughly 25 to 40 percent for benefits, payroll taxes and tools to get a loaded cost: about $167,000 to $187,000 a year at the advertising and promotions median.
A fractional engagement buys a slice of that seniority. It is usually a monthly retainer for a set number of days, so the honest comparison is days of senior judgment per month against a full loaded salary you may not yet be able to fill. Execution still has to sit somewhere underneath, so add the cost of the specialists or agency the director will direct.
Bring in a PPC director, fractional first, then in-house, once spend spans several channels and you have specialists who need coordinating toward one commercial goal. Below that, a strong channel strategist plus an agency lead usually covers the strategy layer. Move from fractional to full-time in-house when senior judgment is needed daily rather than a few days a month, and the coordination and measurement work genuinely fills a senior role.
Common questions
Want this checked on your own account?
A 47-point written audit of your Google, Meta, or Shopping account. Five business days, no sales call.
