The $6,900-per-month Hire vs the $1,990-per-month Subscription

The payroll cost story most owners never calculate

A practical worksheet for small Canadian service firms comparing a junior marketing hire with a subscription, using sources and plain language.

Key Takeaways:

• How to estimate payroll add-ons, benefits, tools, and review time so you can plan your monthly marketing spend in Canada.
  
• A simple way to compare hiring and subscriptions by scope, review speed, and the work that reliably ships month after month.
  
• A practical worksheet to decide what to keep in-house, what to hand off, and how to keep approvals from becoming a bottleneck.

Why the sticker price of a hire is rarely the full price

If marketing in your business happens "when we have time," the issue is usually bandwidth. This is a marketing budget problem, not a motivation problem. Website tweaks, posts, emails, and basic ads pile up, and the owner ends up coordinating it all.

In this scenario, a junior hire can seem like the obvious fix. In practice, the backlog often just changes shape. The junior is waiting on direction, the website is waiting on approvals, and the owner is still the editor and project manager.

The missing step is a budget that includes the costs you do not see on the offer letter. In Canada, employers are responsible for payroll deductions such as CPP contributions and EI premiums, and for remitting them to the CRA (Canada Revenue Agency, 2025).

A common budgeting rule of thumb is to estimate the "true cost" of a new employee at about 1.2 to 1.4 times salary, to reflect mandatory contributions, benefits, and paid time off (QuickBooks Canada Team, 2025).

In this case study, we use a simple example salary of $60,000 per year for a marketing coordinator style role, anchored to publicly listed wage data for the occupation across Canada (Government of Canada Job Bank, 2025).

At the high end of the 1.2 to 1.4 range, that salary can land near $6,900 per month once you account for the non-salary load (QuickBooks Canada Team, 2025).

Federal guidance explains that an employer generally pays EI premiums at 1.4 times the employee's EI premium amount and remits those premiums as part of payroll deductions (Canada Revenue Agency, 2025).

What a subscription changes, and what it does not

A subscription changes the operating model more than the math. Instead of "hire a person and hope they keep up," you create a recurring work channel: you submit requests, work ships in cycles, and someone owns the queue.

Ask for Dex is one example of that model, positioned as a monthly subscription that covers ongoing website updates, email work, social posting support, and coordination with design help, with the listed price set at $1,990 CAD per month on its product page (Ask for Dex product page, 2025).

The upside is predictability. The downside is that predictability cuts both ways: if requests are vague, priorities change daily, or leadership will not review drafts, the subscription can turn into a polite backlog.

This is where context matters. New site builds often need deeper one-time work before a monthly rhythm helps. Existing sites that mostly need steady upkeep can fit a subscription better. If you sell through conversations and referrals, your recurring tasks will skew toward follow-up and trust. If you sell through product pages and carts, your recurring tasks will skew toward merchandising and page updates.

A neutral way to compare options is to track execution, not intention. Are pages staying current. Are emails going out. Are assets refreshed on time. Is the owner spending less time translating "make a post" into a clear brief.

Putting the math to work without turning your week into bookkeeping

If you're estimating the true cost of hiring a junior marketer in Canada, the practical next step is a one-page worksheet that treats marketing execution like any other operating cost. List the recurring work that must happen, then list what must happen to make that work actually ship.

For a hire, include the non-salary load you can validate, then add the management reality: direction, review, and training time. For a subscription, include the review time you still owe, plus the constraints of the service model and what falls outside it.

If you want a simple checklist, start here:

• Write the recurring marketing tasks you already delay.

• Write who approves what, and how fast.

• Pick one weekly "shipping" signal, such as a sent email or a published page update.

• Revisit after a month and adjust scope to match what actually happened.

Article Recap

Hiring solves some problems, but salary is rarely the full monthly cost. A subscription can simplify execution, but it still needs clear priorities and fast review to work.

FAQ

1. What costs should I count beyond salary?
   Beyond salary, employers typically need to plan for mandatory payroll deductions such as CPP contributions and EI premiums, plus any optional benefits plan and paid time off obligations (Canada Revenue Agency, 2025; Canada Life, 2025).

2. Is the "1.2 to 1.4 times salary" rule reliable? (QuickBooks Canada Team, 2025).
   It is a starting estimate, not a guarantee. The figure is presented as a rule of thumb and can vary by role, company size, and benefit choices (QuickBooks Canada Team, 2025).

3. When does a junior hire make more sense?
   Hiring can make sense when you need a person embedded in daily operations, when leadership can coach and review work consistently, and when the role includes tasks that cannot be handed off cleanly to an external queue.

4. When does a subscription make more sense?
   A subscription can make sense when the work is recurring and execution-focused, when you want a predictable process, and when you can commit to a regular review rhythm so drafts do not stall.

5. How do I keep scope from drifting?
   Keep a single list of recurring tasks, a separate list of one-time projects, and a clear definition of what "done" looks like. If the list grows, decide what drops before you add more.

6. What should I measure in the first month?
   Measure consistency. Track whether work shipped on schedule, whether approvals were quick, and whether follow-up happened without the owner pushing every step.