ABOUT
About Justine Herlin: Founding Marketer, systems builder, constant learner
I am a Fractional Founding Marketer. My work usually starts with ambiguity: no clear operating model, pieces that do not connect, too many priorities, or a blank page that needs turning into something usable.
That is the kind of problem I like.
01 / Identity
Who is Justine Herlin?
Justine Herlin is a Fractional Founding Marketer based in Spain, with more than ten years of experience across agency, in-house and fractional roles. She builds and runs marketing functions for early-stage companies, connecting positioning, GTM, demand generation, MarTech, measurement and operating systems. Her work spans startups, nonprofits, professional services and international organizations.
02 / Career pattern
The pattern behind my career
The labels I have been given have varied: Fractional CMO, Digital Marketing Lead, Head of Marketing.
The work has been more consistent than the titles.
My roles tend to expand when a business needs someone to connect the pieces. At McCann, my work grew beyond one market. At Mantu, I joined as a social media strategist and went on to build and lead the function. At Climate-KIC, I worked across teams with different audiences and priorities. At Women as One, building marketing drew me into operations and product too.
Each time, the job was to find what was missing, give it structure and stay close enough to make it run. Founding Marketer is the closest name for that.
03 / Working style
How I think and work
Marketing is a system, and I build it the way you build with Lego: foundations first, then one brick at a time, each one locked into the last.
The loop repeats on every project: audit, prioritize, build, test, adjust, and I document in parallel, not after, so the system does not reset with the next hire. I do not spread resources across five channels in month one. I focus on the layer everything else depends on, get it solid, then expand. External pieces, a tool, a specialist, an agency, come in once the base can carry them.
I like being close enough to execution to see the signal myself. That is why my work moves from positioning to CRM architecture, from copy to analytics, from a founder discussion to the workflow that makes the decision real.
AI changes the math here. A senior marketer can keep a function lean for longer than a traditional hiring plan assumes, provided someone decides carefully what needs a person, what can run as a workflow, and where a specialist will do better.
I am comfortable challenging a plan when the underlying logic is weak. A good working relationship is not one where I agree with every idea; it is one where we can get to a better decision quickly and then execute it.
Before any brick goes down, the harder questions are usually:
- What should we prioritize?
- Which assumption are we actually testing?
- What needs to exist before this channel can work?
- What should be documented so the company does not keep relearning the same lesson?
- Where does a tool genuinely remove friction, and where is it just adding complexity?
04 / Continuous learning
How I stay sharp
I learn continuously. I join communities. I study new methods, from modern demand generation and product thinking to no-code, development, automation and AI-assisted work, then keep what proves useful in real workflows.
Communities
- Fractionals United
- InClimate
- Women and Climate
- Work in Climate
- Marketing Flow
- No Code France
Certifications and programs
- HubSpot
- Demand Curve
- Reforge
- SheCodes
05 / Personal
My story, briefly
I am from Lille, in the north of France. Spain has been my home for more than ten years, the country I fell for during an Erasmus exchange in Valladolid while completing my Master's in International Marketing at IAE Lille. I have lived in Barcelona, then Valencia, and now Bilbao, in the Basque Country.
Off the clock, you will usually find me walking my dogs along the coast, deep into a thriller, doing a sudoku, painting, or having pinchos with my partner. Just as often, you will find me back at my computer, starting a new project or tinkering with a workflow or a tool. I have a strong bias for action, and I cannot really help myself.
I am also a permanent student of permaculture, gardening and the natural world, which is probably why I keep ending up working with positive-impact organizations. We need more people who build for a better world on purpose, for this generation and the ones that follow.
06 / Work with me
Work with me
If your company has traction but marketing still depends on founder effort, disconnected specialists or a system that has not caught up with the business, I may be useful.