The Making of a Product Marketing Manager — Part 2

I recently spoke with a few veteran Product Marketers across a variety of technology companies from Facebook to Salesforce to Google and Adobe and dived into a few core topics that are important to Product Marketers, aspiring Product Marketers or anyone hiring or working with one in my last article: “The Making of a Product Marketing Manager — Part 1”.

In Part 2, we continue the conversation of “The Making of a Product Marketer” with a few key discussion topics:

1. A Product Marketers most important work relationship is with ….
2. Tools Product Marketing Managers use for a product launch
3. Advice for folks who want to transition into a PMM role
4. Publications of interest for PMMs
5. Groups & Meetups for PMM’s
6. The people most admired as Product Marketers

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1. A Product Marketers most important work relationship:

The answer to this question was split evenly between two core functions: namely Product and Sales. Depending on the company and stage, Product Marketers oftentimes lean heavily towards one group or another.

If a company is still in product development phase, Product Marketers generally spend most of their time with the Product & Engineering team helping them understand their customer and market, and managing the alpha and beta feedback discovery sessions which inform the product roadmap.

If a company is ready for a commercial launch and offer a complex product, they usually turn their attention towards enabling Sales to sell the product in the market, and make sure that Sales teams are equipped with the value proposition, differentiation, market position of the product and how to talk about it in market.

According to a few Product Marketers: “friction with the Product Management or the Sales team is healthy”.

The argument here is that some level of disagreement between PMM and PM or PMM & Sales can be a good thing, and here’s why. Disagreement oftentimes forces teams to look at a variety of perspectives before creating a solution that works and can be executed.

As a PMM, it’s important to work with PM and Sales on the problems they are working on and offer a creative and oftentimes completely different perspective to a solution. Stay true to your convictions if you believe you have the qualitative and quantitative data or general experience.

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2. Tools that you use often for product launch.

This question varied quite substantially when I spoke to a number of Product Marketers and spanned from Excel, Google docs (primarily Google Sheets), Jira, Confluence, Sharepoint, Smartsheet, Dropbox, various CRMs, & Slack.

Over communication as a PMM is oftentimes incredibly important as the assumption that everyone understands “the what”, “the why”, “the how” and “the when” is sometimes inaccurate.

Many times the PMM works on a number of deliverables that need various stakeholder input and approval so a centralized repository of information needs to be organized in a way that resonates with the majority of stakeholders at a company.

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3. What is your advice for folks who want to transition into a Product Marketing role?

There is a certain strategy to becoming a Product Marketer, and there are certain characteristics that make PMM’s more and better at their job than others. Here are a few characteristics that were most popular: Technical acumen, cross-functional ability, being able to break down the complex into the simple, understanding risks, understanding opportunities, reading between the lines, strong listening skills, interpreting customers, executing on a plan or vision, working with creative teams, understanding macro and micro forces at play, strong business acumen and the list goes on.

Other ways that PMM’s can shine and add tremendous value are:

• The ability to make strategic recommendations to PM teams and add input to the product roadmap
• Thought leadership in industry and understanding how ecosystem plays with each other
• Being able to work with nearly every function in an organization
• Understanding opportunity costs and prioritizing where to spend their time

There is usually far more movement from Sales into Product Marketing than from any other roles in the organization according to the PMM’s I’ve spoken with. While a PMM sits and owns the top of the funnel (some would argue the entire funnel), Sales tends to own the bottom of the funnel.

Sometimes Product Managers (PM’s) like to move between PMM and PM as some roles at certain organizations are more product heavy rather than marketing program heavy.

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4. What are your favorite publications or articles on PMM or Marketing in general?

• OpenView: The role of Product Marketing in Your Startup & The Definitive Guide to Product Marketing Optimization
• Medium Publication: The Product Launch: Product Marketing & Commercialization (shameless plug here)
• MarketingProfs.
• DirectMarketingNews
• Aha Blog: The Product Manager vs. the Product Marketing Manager

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5. What are some groups or meetups that you attend?

There are quite a few Product Marketing Meetup groups in SF and the greater Bay area and beyond that are broken out by niche.

Based on the feedback I heard, we could be doing more. Product Marketers are in dire need for more organization around PMM groups to share best practices. (Tweet me if you’re interested in collaborating)

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6. The people most admired as Product Marketers

When I asked the group of PMM’s which people they admired most and why, the answers ranged from people who had a Product Marketing background to CEOs to artists who build a great product/brand.

• Loni Stark who is the head of PMM at Adobe
• Steve Jobs for leading Apple as a Marketing-first org
• Taylor Swift, as she knows how to build strong emotional ties with her customers

Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this and are interested in more articles like these, please stay in touch! ! And if you’re seriously interested in go-to-market, check out my online class on Product Marketing & Go-To-Market, which hundreds of CEO’s and Product Managers have taken with major success.

My book “Product Marketing Debunked. The Essential Go-To-Market Guide” is available on Amazon!