AMA: Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing, Mary Sheehan on Product Launches
January 16 @ 10:00AM PT
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Have you ever been part of a launch where the eng/product team brought in product marketers or customers after work has kicked off (but before launch) and influenced feature development? What was that like?
Sometimes when product kicks off work they have assumptions about how people think about certain features. Marketing, support, and even customers can come to the table with real stories that may invalidate the assumptions product had early on in the feature dev process.
Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing | Formerly Google, AdRoll • 6y
Yes, definitely. Although it’s not ideal, it can happen and you can make an impact in terms of helping them understand product feature prioritization, since they probably...
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Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing | Formerly Google, AdRoll • 6y
This is a great question! It's easy to get stuck with the same GTM checklist for every launch and feel like there's no creativity. An easy fix is to push the boundaries...
2356 Views
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Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing | Formerly Google, AdRoll • 6y
Although I’ve managed over 250 launches, not a single one has gone perfectly. That may sound crazy, but know that most of the time when something goes wrong, only I or a ...
2694 Views
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How do product marketers lead a product launch when roadmaps and priorities are constantly changing?
There is a lack of alignment at my company and our teams act in silos. Consequently, my roadmap and goals seem to change on a weekly if not bi-weekly basis because marketing keeps getting pulled in different directions. There needs to be some sort of roadmap and role that aligns sales with product, but I'm not sure if that should come from product marketing or not. I want to initiate this conversation, but I don't know if it's overstepping my role or not. Advice here?
Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing | Formerly Google, AdRoll • 6y
There are 2 major questions here - one has to do with priorities changing (e.g. no strategy) and the other is indirectly about out of control roadmap timelines - I'll ans...
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How do you think about the scope or deliverables for various launches?
Do you have a tiering system? What factors do you consider?
Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing | Formerly Google, AdRoll • 6y
I definitely recommend tiering launches by the level of potential impact and therefore the level of activities. While starting the GTM plan, you need to decide how “big”...
2327 Views
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How do we approach the launch plan that was pre-decided and what changes in approaches would you recommend?
A product marketer jobs starts way before the product launch. However, it is difficult situation when the product launch is delayed from eng side.
Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing | Formerly Google, AdRoll • 6y
I'd recommend to play the "new person card" and ask a lot of questions: what market problems does this solve? How did they ID these market problems? What customers or pro...
1730 Views
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Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing | Formerly Google, AdRoll • 6y
Post-launch momentum, what I call "Rolling Thunder," is one of my favorite topics! I think a lot of times people throw in their hats when the launch moment is done, but t...
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Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing | Formerly Google, AdRoll • 6y
Ideally, it's a combination of the GM, product management and product marketing. The GM would set the overall business goals for the year or quarter including revenue. Th...
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In your organization does the product marketing also work with a portfolio marketer?
In our organization we have Product Marketers assigned to audiences (customer segments) and products. It is difficult to align efforts and avoid duplication - have you seen a model like this work well and how?
Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing | Formerly Google, AdRoll • 6y
Yes, we do. In fact, I think Adobe is probably the best example out there I've seen of Portfolio marketing. At a high level, they've divided the Adobe business into 3 bus...
2350 Views
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Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing | Formerly Google, AdRoll • 6y
At Adobe, it's been a pleasure so far to work with many cross-functional teams for a product launch. For my team, Adobe Advertising Cloud, which is on the B2B side, we wo...
2464 Views
2 requests