Leading the Charge through the Year of the Product
SVP of Product, Ryan Donovan, shares more about how 2019– more than any other year–is shaping up to be Hootsuite’s biggest year for overall product and R&D investment.
I’ve been working almost exclusively on enterprise software and marketing technology for over 20 years, so when I thought about my next career move I knew I wanted to stay in MarTech, but in a hotter space — which means social. I wanted to work for the market leading player within the space and Hootsuite is the unequivocal leader.
In February of this year, I was keen to take on the position of SVP, Product and Design, allowing me to use all the experience I’ve had to lead the organization’s focus on product.
With 2019 being named “Year of the Product” at Hootsuite it means a focus on:
- Growing our overall product and R&D investment by leading and spearheading the largest single headcount growth in a single year in Hootsuite’s history
- Evolving our product’s levels of performance and reliability to new heights
- Making our product’s user experience a differentiator within the realm of social media management
- Establishing a compelling long-term product vision and strategy that grows Hootsuite’s market-leading position while uniquely differentiating itself against competition
- Solving the problems of both today AND tomorrow for our customers to help them realize social as the highest performing digital channel
“Amid all of that experience, Hootsuite is one of the most interesting software development environments I have ever encountered.”
My first day at Hootsuite was our annual kick-off, and the excitement of that day has never diminished. It has been one of the most epically enjoyable four months ever in my career, made especially great by the exceptional caliber of colleagues and one of the most fascinating problem spaces I have ever seen.
My career has been quite diverse, I have had a few tours of duty running digital agencies, systems integration consulting practices, and enterprise support/managed hosting practices for companies such as Microsoft, Sitecore, and an interesting multi-phased tour-of-duty at Cactus Commerce, Ascentium/SMITH, and CommerceServer.net.
Amid all of that experience, Hootsuite is one of the most interesting software development environments I have ever encountered. Beyond having a cutting edge technology stack utilizing all of the latest cloud computing, mobile, and Web front-end technologies, building upon the extremely dynamic platforms of the major social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter presents an absolutely unique software development challenge and opportunity. The pace of change, engineering, and innovation here is extremely rapid compared to most other software companies. The impact of one’s work is immediately realized by hundreds of thousands of customers around the globe.
As I look forward to what’s ahead, on top of executing on the charters within the “year of the product,” we have several other unique opportunities in front of us as an organization in the social space:
- Social as a driver of marketing technology spend is increasing far faster than almost all other categories of digital marketing technologies
- Social is quickly taking over other more traditional channels for marketing interactions between brands and consumers
- With the focus on private messaging, social is also now on the horizon to replace more traditional channels for customer service interactions as well
- The established social networks are constantly adding new capabilities themselves, often times also leveraging the latest advancements in mobile hardware and operating system technologies
- New social networks — especially at a regional level — are also emerging with regularity, offering new platform opportunities
- A vast market opportunity to expand beyond what is already a substantial global presence into many additional territories for which we have little penetration
All of these factors combine together to create an extremely dynamic opportunity to grow the industry’s top social media management solution to far greater heights in the years ahead. Several of these trends will also fundamentally change how both digital marketing and customer service will function relative to how things exist currently.
Capitalizing on this opportunity, and keeping pace with our already phenomenal rate of growth is going to require even more exceptional Product Management, User Experience/Design, Software Development, DevOps, and Security talent.
If you are looking for an opportunity to influence the leading social media management software, in an environment where we’re committed to helping you grow your career by providing an equal measure of mentorship and autonomy, then click here.
