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The 2025 Reality of the Solo Marketing Coordinator
By Debra Andrews, founder of Marketri
Every industry has its myths. In marketing, one of the most persistent is the idea that a single person, usually a well-intentioned, early-career Marketing Coordinator, can run an entire modern marketing function alone.
On paper, the role still looks deceptively manageable: coordinate campaigns, keep content moving, support sales, maybe schedule some social posts. In practice, the 2025 version of that job is closer to running mission control at NASA…except with fewer people, fewer tools, and a lot less oxygen.
After years of working with mid-sized B2B companies, I can say this with certainty: the “marketer of one” model is officially outdated. Not because people have changed, but because marketing has.
Marketing Grew. The Role Didn’t.
Modern marketing is not one discipline. It’s a constellation of them. Even the simplest initiative touches multiple functions: AI tools, automation, analytics, messaging, content, design, brand, demand gen, SEO, sales enablement, and more.
Yet many organizations are still structuring their teams like it’s 2010.
A typical marketing coordinator today is asked to:
- Build campaigns
- Manage budgets
- Write content
- Run automation platforms
- Interpret analytics
- Support sales
- Handle social
- Update the website
- And, oh yes, “own AI”
No single professional, junior or senior, can be all of these things at once. The work has outpaced the role. What was once a foundational position has quietly become a catch-all for everything no one else has time to do.
AI Didn’t Fix the Problem. It Exposed It.
There’s a belief that AI will solve the talent gap in small marketing teams. I wish it were that simple.
AI speeds things up. It lightens the load. It clears mental space. But it also increases expectations. Once AI enters the workflow, the assumption becomes: “We should be able to produce more, faster, with fewer people.”
But AI doesn’t replace strategic thinking. It doesn’t replace positioning decisions. It doesn’t replace judgment, sequencing, prioritization, or the ability to connect marketing activities to revenue.
If anything, AI has widened the gap between execution-heavy roles and the senior guidance they rely on.
The coordinator is still expected to do the work. They’re just now expected to use artificial intelligence to do all of the work.
Where Companies Get Stuck: The Pattern I See Over and Over
After years of helping companies build marketing engines, I’ve noticed the same cycle repeating itself:
- Hire a solo marketer
- Expect them to “run marketing”
- Flood them with tactics and requests
- See the work scatter in 12 directions
- Question why results aren’t materializing
- Burnout or turnover
- Restart
This pattern has less to do with talent and everything to do with structure.
Marketing is no longer an activity. It’s an ecosystem. And ecosystems don’t thrive under one gardener.
The Healthy Alternative: Fractional Support + One Strong Coordinator
The solution I see working consistently isn’t adding more hustle. It’s adding more structure.
A modern marketing engine often needs:
- A strategic leader who can prioritize, sequence, and say “not now”
- Specialists who can be brought in as needed (content, design, automation, analytics, SEO)
- A coordinator who’s no longer drowning, but actually orchestrating
This doesn’t require building a full department. It requires building the right support system.
Fractional models exist for a reason: they give businesses access to strategic thinking and specialized skills at the proportion they actually need.
And coordinators? They go from surviving to growing. They get clarity. They get mentorship.
They get a role that’s manageable, not mythical.
They get a role that’s manageable, not mythical.
Redefining the Coordinator Role for 2025 and Beyond
If I could rewrite the coordinator role in 2025, it would look radically different. Something like:
A grounded executor, not a one-person strategy team.
They keep projects moving, but they aren’t expected to own the entire plan.
They keep projects moving, but they aren’t expected to own the entire plan.
A collaborator, not a lone ranger.
Supported by strategists and specialists instead of improvising everything.
Supported by strategists and specialists instead of improvising everything.
An AI-competent operator, not an AI department.
Using AI to accelerate work, not replace structural support.
Using AI to accelerate work, not replace structural support.
A professional with a runway.
Because the role should be a launchpad, not a burnout cycle.
Because the role should be a launchpad, not a burnout cycle.
This version of the job is sustainable. It aligns with how marketing actually functions today. And most importantly, it allows talent to develop instead of collapse under unrealistic expectations.
The Bottom Line
Most Marketing Coordinators don’t fail. They’re failed by the structure around them. The “marketer of one” model belonged to a different era before AI, before the martech boom, before marketing became a data-driven revenue engine. Holding onto it today doesn’t just strain your coordinator; it keeps your company stuck in a perpetual state of activity without progress.
When businesses redesign the role with real support like fractional leadership, specialist access, and a clear strategic roadmap, they don’t just protect their people. They finally unlock the marketing results they were chasing in the first place.
The future of the Marketing Coordinator isn’t about doing everything. It’s about finally giving the role the structure it always deserved.
