Gary McRae · Fractional CMO
The person behind MCR.AE.
Twelve years inside APAC marketing teams, fintech, legal tech, professional services, regulated industries. Now operating solo, by design.
I run MCR.AE myself. There is no junior team, no white-labelled output, no agency back-office. The work that lands at your team is the work I made. That's a deliberate choice, one I made after years of watching senior marketing roles get diluted into management of other people's drafts.
The work that taught me what governance is for
The transformation I most want back is one I led inside a financial-services business during a regulatory crunch. Marketing function in disarray, three competing roadmaps, a regulator asking unfriendly questions. The week that fixed it wasn't the week we ran a campaign, it was the week we wrote down the operating cadence and got the cofounders to sign it.
Discipline becomes a competitive advantage when the alternative is chaos. That's the lens I bring to fractional work now: the chaos is the default state. The system you leave behind is the artefact that compounds.
The pattern across twelve years
Across twelve years across APAC, the work has clustered around four situations: a Series A founder still searching for the customer who'll definitely buy; an SME MD with a marketing function that grew without governance; a regional brand mid-restructure with vendor sprawl; a regulated-sector business needing AI-era guardrails before the next audit.
The job is similar in each case. Find the order. Build the cadence. Leave a system the next hire can inherit. The vocabulary changes; the discipline doesn't.
How to use this site
If you're a funded founder past Seed, the engagement ladder on /services is the right starting point. If you'd rather just talk, the /contact form takes about ninety seconds and goes straight to me. I reply within one working day.
Otherwise, find me on LinkedIn.
For SG SMEs, the practical implication
PMC-accredited. Engagements may qualify for EDG support.
Singapore Practising Management Consultant (PMC) accreditation makes my engagements eligible to be considered under Enterprise Singapore’s Enterprise Development Grant, up to 50% support for qualifying scope. I help you frame the engagement in EDG-claimable categories and supply the documentation your application needs.
Final approval and the actual claim outcome rests with Enterprise Singapore, not with me. Most SG fractional CMO competitors don’t surface PMC accreditation at all; it’s a real signal, not a guarantee.
Credentials, in plain English
- PMC, Singapore Practising Management Consultant. Recognised under TR 43 / SS 680 by Enterprise Singapore. Unlocks EDG eligibility for SG SME clients.
- CAIG, Certified in AI Governance. Practical reading: I know where the IMDA Model AI Governance Framework applies to your marketing decisions, and where it doesn't.
- Twelve years APAC, across fintech, legal tech, professional services, and regulated industries. Senior in-house roles before the fractional practice.
Decide whether we're a fit in thirty minutes.
I'll tell you honestly. If we're not, you'll leave the call with a clearer view of what you actually need.