Clear answers to the questions growth-stage B2B clean energy companies ask before engaging a fractional CMO.
A fractional CMO provides CMO-level strategic marketing leadership on a part-time or project basis. I embed with your leadership team to develop go-to-market strategy, define market positioning, build messaging architecture, manage agencies and internal staff, and align marketing with your commercial objectives. Unlike an agency, I'm accountable to your business outcomes — not to deliverables.
An agency produces deliverables. A fractional CMO sets direction. Agencies are excellent at execution once strategy is defined — but most growth-stage clean energy companies don't have a defined strategy yet. I provide the strategic layer that makes agency work effective, and I can manage your agencies so their output actually serves your commercial goals.
I work primarily with growth-stage clean energy companies — typically Series A through Series C, or pre-revenue companies that have recently closed significant project financing. The common thread is that you've proven the technology works, your commercial pipeline is growing, but your marketing hasn't kept pace with your business.
Winning RFPs and PPAs requires more than technical performance — it requires a compelling story about commercial maturity, risk management, and long-term partnership viability. I build the positioning, messaging architecture, and sales enablement materials that make your BD team's pitch the most credible and compelling in the room, and I help you understand which elements of your story each procurement audience needs to hear.
Founder-network pipeline has a ceiling — it's capped by one person's bandwidth and relationships. I create the demand generation infrastructure that produces qualified inbound interest: thought leadership programs, sector-specific content, digital presence strategy, conference positioning, and earned media. The goal is a pipeline where qualified buyers are reaching out to you, not the reverse.
Technical buyers and commercial buyers need different messages — but both need to trust you before they'll buy. I translate deep technical differentiation into clear commercial value without dumbing it down or overclaiming. The rule I work by: the people writing your marketing copy should be able to have a substantive conversation with your engineering team.
Clean energy and cleantech is where I'm focused and where I do my best work — battery storage, next-generation geothermal, solar and solar-plus-storage, industrial decarbonization, clean hydrogen, and emerging cleantech more broadly. That said, I'm open to other complex B2B technology sectors where the go-to-market dynamics are similar: long sales cycles, technically sophisticated buyers, and products that require education before purchase.
Engagements vary by need. Some clients need a defined strategy deliverable — a go-to-market plan, a messaging architecture, a positioning document — and then execute internally. Others need ongoing fractional CMO leadership, where I'm embedded with the team on a retainer basis, attending leadership meetings, managing marketing functions, and driving execution. We'd scope the right model in our initial conversations.
Quickly. My background spans the full energy value chain — from Schlumberger (SLB) to green hydrogen — so I understand the underlying physics, policy environment, and commercial dynamics of most clean energy technologies without needing an extended onboarding period. The ramp I actually need is on your specific company: your buyers, your competitors, your current positioning, and where you're trying to go.
Yes. Clean energy is a global market, and I've worked with companies operating across North America, Europe, and international markets. The go-to-market dynamics vary by market — policy regimes, procurement structures, and buyer sophistication differ — but the core marketing challenges are consistent.