What does a fractional head of performance cost in the UK?
By Tom Goodwin, Founder of GAMEPLAN.
A fractional head of performance in the UK typically costs £3,000 to £12,000 per month. That range covers one to four days a week of senior leadership, billed as a monthly retainer or a day rate between £750 and £1,500. The comparison that matters: a full-time head of performance costs £90,000 to £140,000 in base salary, and £120,000 to £180,000 once you add national insurance, pension, bonus, equipment and the recruitment fee to find them. Fractional removes the on-costs, the notice period and the 12-week hiring search. You buy the decisions, not the desk.
I have spent 15 years in performance marketing since 2010, including managing £20m+ of paid media at Medialab and running an agency through to acquisition. The fractional model exists because most growing businesses need senior judgement two days a week, not a senior salary five days a week. Below I break down what you actually pay for, how the pricing works, and when it stops being the right call.
How much does a fractional head of performance cost per month?
Pricing tracks commitment. Here is the structure I see across the UK market in 2026.
| Commitment | Typical monthly cost | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| 1 day / week | £3,000 - £4,500 | Strategy, measurement oversight, monthly reviews |
| 2 days / week | £5,000 - £7,500 | The above plus hands-on channel direction and team coaching |
| 3 days / week | £8,000 - £10,500 | Near-embedded leadership, hiring input, board reporting |
| 4 days / week | £11,000 - £13,000 | De facto head of performance, just not exclusive |
| Project / audit | £2,000 - £6,000 fixed | A defined piece: account audit, measurement rebuild, channel launch |
Most of my fractional clients sit at one or two days a week. That is enough to set strategy, hold the agency or in-house team to account, fix measurement, and report to the board, without paying for hours spent waiting for someone else to deliver.
Why is fractional cheaper than a full-time head of performance?
Because the headline salary is the smallest part of a permanent hire. Run the full cost.
| Cost line | Full-time head | Fractional (2 days/week) |
|---|---|---|
| Base / fees | £110,000 | £72,000 / year |
| Employer NI | ~£14,000 | £0 |
| Pension | ~£3,500 | £0 |
| Bonus | £10,000 - £25,000 | £0 |
| Recruitment fee | £20,000 - £30,000 once | £0 |
| Equipment, software, desk | £3,000+ | £0 |
| Ramp time | 8 - 12 weeks unproductive | Week one productive |
| Total year one | £160,000 - £185,000 | ~£72,000 |
You save more than half, and you carry no redundancy risk if priorities change. If you need to scale the engagement up or down, you change the day count, not the headcount.
What do you actually get for the money?
A good fractional head of performance does the work a permanent leader would do, compressed into the days they are present. In practice that means:
- Owning the number that matters. Usually blended efficiency (MER) or contribution margin, not vanity ROAS.
- Holding the agency or media team to account. Most businesses overpay for execution and underbuy for direction. I review the work, not just the dashboards.
- Fixing measurement first. Bad attribution makes every spending decision wrong. I rebuild tracking before I touch budgets.
- Setting the channel architecture. In paid search that increasingly means broad match plus Smart Bidding fed with clean conversion data, not legacy exact-match sprawl.
- Reporting to the board in language the board uses. Cash, payback, margin. Not impressions.
When I held a Google Premier Partner team to account, the discipline was the same: clear targets, clean data, ruthless prioritisation. Premier Partner status, which we earned in February 2024, sits in the top 3% of agencies, and the habits that get you there are exactly the habits a fractional leader installs.
How does the day-rate model work in practice?
You agree a monthly retainer for a fixed number of days, then I allocate those days where they create the most value. A typical week at two days might look like one day of hands-on work inside accounts and one day split across the leadership team, the board update and the agency call. Days are not rigidly diarised: the point of fractional is judgement, so I spend the time where the marginal pound is being won or lost that week.
For project work, I price the outcome, not the hours. An account audit is a fixed fee with a fixed deliverable. A measurement rebuild is scoped and quoted. You know the cost before you commit.
When is fractional the wrong choice?
I will tell you when it is not for you, because the model only works honestly.
- You need someone in five days a week executing in the platform daily. That is a full-time specialist, not a fractional leader.
- You have no team and no agency at all. Fractional leadership multiplies a team; it does not replace having one. If you need pure execution, you need an agency or a permanent hire first.
- You are pre-revenue with no budget to manage. Until there is meaningful spend to optimise, you do not need a head of performance, fractional or otherwise.
If any of those describe you, a fractional engagement wastes your money and my time. I would rather say so up front.
How does fractional compare to hiring an agency or a consultant?
Short version: an agency executes, a consultant advises, a fractional leader decides and stays accountable. A consultant writes you a strategy and leaves. An agency runs your channels but optimises for its own retention. A fractional head of performance sits on your side of the table, owns the outcome, and holds everyone else, including the agency, to the plan. For most scaling businesses spending £30k+ a month on media, that accountability layer pays for itself in the first quarter through reduced waste alone.
What does a fractional engagement typically deliver in the first 90 days?
In the first 30 days I audit and fix measurement, because everything downstream depends on it. In days 30 to 60 I reset channel strategy and budgets against the real numbers. By day 90 you have a reporting rhythm the board trusts, a team or agency working to a clear plan, and a documented view of where the next pound should go. The cost of that quarter, at two days a week, is roughly £18,000. The waste it typically removes from a £30k-a-month media budget is larger.
If you are spending real money on performance marketing and want senior leadership without a senior salary, I run fractional engagements from one day a week. Tell me your current spend and the number you are trying to move, and I will tell you honestly whether fractional is the right fit. Start here: /work-with-me/fractional-performance-leadership.