AMA: Albertsons Companies Vice President of Marketing, Francisco T. Bram on Stakeholder Management

Product marketing is the process of taking the right product to the right market with the right narrative at the right time. Key stakeholders within an organization should look for product marketing to help inform them on what market segments or industry verticals the business should prioritize. As a product marketing manager, you will partner with each marketing team to build a comprehensive, multi-channel integrated marketing plan. Think of the marketing organization as an orchestra, where each individual function plays a key role in the overall symphony. If one instrument or musician is off, the result will be noise. To ensure everyone is aligned and in synchrony, there needs to be one consistent music sheet that outlines when each instrument plays, its duration, tone and one conductor that is keeping everyone informed and on the same page of the music sheet. That’s the role of Product Marketing. PMMs develop the GTM plan (the music sheet) in collaboration with each function. Once that plan is developed, resourced and sign-off by everyone, then PMMs turn into conductors, ensuring everyone is following the same plan, keeping everyone informed of the progress and phase of the plan and ensuring everyone is acting under one narrative, one tone of voice. You may also work with each function to clearly define each role and then share a GTM R&R framework. Below is my interpretation of the high-level definition of the most important marketing functions, however I recommend that you validate these assumptions within your organization: Product marketing. Owns the GTM strategy and are the marketing campaign architects. They leverage insights to develop a product narrative, segment the market and coordinate an integrated multi-channel marketing strategy. Brand marketing. Owns the strategy, voice and narrative for the business brand. Their goal is to drive business volume by increasing the company's brand equity & reputation. Creative marketing: Owns art direction, tone of voice, visual guidelines and campaign creative headlines and taglines. They bring concepts to life. CRM: Owns lifecycle communication to the existing and prospective contact lists. They can deploy comms through owned channels, such as email and in-app messaging. Performance marketing: Owns paid media strategy and deployment. They deploy search and social ads and optimize SEO strategies. Web marketing: Owns web content strategy and conversion. They create web content, design web infrastructure for optimal performance, measure traffic and engagement. Content marketing: Owns customer content. Mostly relevant for B2B orgs, they create content to drive marketing leads, educate customers and promote thought leadership. They create content that is gated, meaning, to access this content, users need to provide their contact information (e.g., eBooks, whitepapers, case studies). PR & media: Owns earned channels, such as media relations. They write press releases, brief the press and manage media & industry analysts. Regional marketing: Owns regional growth strategies. They generate sales leads through demand generation campaigns and account-based marketing tactics.

It starts by establishing a common ground. This means talking to UX Design Leaders and Marketing leaders and understand how each defines their Role and Responsibilities. Then compare the two and look for areas of overlap or ambiguity that can lead to potential conflict. Present those areas to the leaders and either discuss steps to clarify it or come prepared with a proposal and let them chime in. The goal is to co-develop a R&R matrix that uses a RACI or RAPID model to clarify what each team owns vs supports or informs. If you’re unclear on what to propose, you can start by looking at industry definitions of the role of UX Design and Marketing. Some companies may determine that Marketing (e.g., Brand) determines the color palette, fonts, illustration, and photography style and owns customer insights and research while UX Design owns the development of the visual design system (buttons, tokens, accessibility) based on those brand guidelines and focusing on customer experience and owning UX research and insights. Please note that companies may still decide to frame core responsibilities differently, in this case, try to empathize and understand why that is and come to a common ground where both teams feel they can influence and deliver on their stakeholder’s expectations.

I don’t use a particular checklist however I always like to build a stakeholder matrix. This is a framework that allows me to keep track of all stakeholders, their role in the project, their responsibilities, and the frequency of communication I need to maintain. I start by identifying all directly and indirectly involved stakeholders. List everyone who has influence on important decisions that can impact your team, project, or funding. Then map them based on the R&R framework used at your company (RACI VS RAPID), this means, which stakeholders belong under Responsible VS Informed, which are internal VS external, and which are part of the project team vs upper management. Once you have mapped all stakeholders, I would then determine the type of communication they need (detailed project update VS high-level milestones), frequency (weekly VS monthly) and channel (email VS newsflash VS meeting). Finally, I would set reminders on my calendar to ensure I am setting aside adequate time to prepare for the comms update, and I am regularly communicating to each stakeholder.

First, invest time into learning the product. Great PMMs understand that the best marketing comes from true product knowledge. They understand the competitive landscape, the product's advantages, and weaknesses. This information is essential to establish credibility with your product team. Then, lean in to being the Voice-of-Customer. Product managers love being customer-centric products and they value customer insights above everything. Lean into research and/or sales feedback to help Product managers guide their roadmap. Next, get to know your Product and Tech partners. Set up frequent chats and learn about their product roadmaps, how they prioritize projects, and how they like to communicate and collaborate. Embrace and befriend data, not just customer feedback. Learn about product usage, the features that most resonate and why. How many active customers there are vs downloads vs sessions. Become knowledgeable on product metrics, business metrics and customer engagement and behavior and you will have earned respect and credibility by your product peers. Finally, include key product and tech partners as part of your launch council, where they can contribute with ideas, feedback to the launch strategy, marketing plan and even assets. This will make them feel like they are co-creating with you and that you have the best interests of the product launch success. Remember to empathize with them, product partners are measured on the success of a particular product, measured by adoption, usage, revenue contribution and customer LTV and it’s easy to blame marketing for a lackluster product launch. Communicating that you understand and you will co-own product OKRs or success metrics, will help ensure both teams are aligned and supportive of one another.

Marketing has we know it, has existed since the late 1800's with the invention of the first mail product catalogue. Tiffany's Blue Book was the first mail-order catalogue in the United States that really set the standard for product-driven marketing. During this time, Marketing was both product, brand, and acquisition all in one function. The catalogue would feature products, a value proposition, price, small narrative and supported the overall brand positioning. This relationship between Product Marketing and Brand still holds true today. Think of the strong brand perception that Apple holds, now think of why that is…it comes down to how Apple products are perceived and positioned such as having high quality, easy to use, durable, private, and secure. This means great products, coupled with strong product marketing will drive, and hold the brand perception together. To me, both are interlinked, if Brand is the roof of the house, Product Marketing is the pillar(s) that keep the roof intact and elevated for everyone to see. Nonetheless, with the invention of the internet and mobile phones, marketing has evolved more in the last 20 years then its previous 200 years combined. This evolution transformed Marketing organizations centered around generic marketing manager roles to a hyper-specialized team of marketers (Product Marketing, Brand, Performance, CRM, PR etc.). As a result, Marketing organizations grew complex and in size and org. structures were built to ensure there’s distinct leaders for each Marketing function. This means, certain organizations may consider Product Marketing as a stand-alone function (mostly common with Tech, Product-centric businesses) while other organizations (with fewer products or services) may decide to group Product Marketing under Brand or even Product Management. So, it really comes down to each unique organizational need. From a synergy stand-point, there’s a lot to be gained from grouping Product Marketing and Brand under one team, where brand defines the values and relationships it wants to build with customers and product marketing ensures there’s products and services that can live up to those expectations and support that vision.

For B2B organizations, PMMs need to prioritize two types of relationships, clients, and customers. Clients are the stakeholders that will use benefit from the work PMMs develop (e.g., marketing assets, narrative, positioning). Customers are the stakeholders that will use the product PMMs are launching or managing (e.g., end users, payers, or beneficiaries). In B2B orgs, clients are your sales team or BD teams. The vast majority of B2B companies rely on having a sales team to drive customer acquisition. Clearly communicating that Sales are your clients is a great first step towards building trust. But actions speak louder than words, to truly gain trust, the best place to start is through a deep understanding of their role, their day-to-day tasks and interactions with customers. I always recommend at least 2x per year to go on a 2-3 day sales shadowing trip. This means, you identify key sales managers (ideally the ones that have experience and perform at a high level), ask them if you can observe them for a few days to understand how to best help them achieve their goals. Treat them as you would customers, develop a journey map with needs, wants, decisions, communication channels and pain-points that take place pre, during and after interactions with customers. Take notice of what works well and where there are opportunities to help. Come back with a report that offers some proposed actions and next steps, ask them for feedback and then action on them quickly. Keep them updated on progress towards the resolution of those actions. Finally, identify a few very influential sales representatives (those that are respected by other sales colleagues) to be part of your PMM launch council, where members offer candid feedback on your launch strategy, plan and assets. Do this and not only will you have earned their trust but have built allies that will stand by your work, even when others may appear to criticize it.

This is a great question, at times we’re quick to talk about successes but very few share examples of failures. We all failed at some point and we probably learned the most from it. No matter how good of a leader you are, there will always be stakeholders that can be difficult to interact with or at times may even become hostile. It’s important to identify these stakeholders early on because they could disrupt or even bring an end to your product launch, GTM plan or project. Here’s a failure example that happened to me when I first became a PMM team lead. I once worked with a finance stakeholder that frequently expressed skepticism and questioned the metrics presented by Product Marketing. I had just recently joined the company to lead PMM. After witnessing a couple interactions, I took it upon myself to develop a bi-weekly KPI dashboard with the PMM team and asked each PMM to use it going forward. The dashboard was well received by all stakeholders, yet one month later at a project review meeting, the same finance stakeholder was pushing back on approving the budget for a specific initiative of one of the PMMs on my team, citing lack of credible data to substantiate the business case. I engaged in a debate with that stakeholder in defense of my direct report. That debate didn’t produce meaningful results and we ended up not achieving the intended outcome, which was to get budget approval and most importantly, get everyone inspired by the initiative. After that meeting, I decided to schedule a lunch outside the office (to allow for a more comfortable and candid conversation to take place). I learned that the finance colleague was not trying to discredit PMM as a function but instead had a history with a specific Product Marketer on my team, that frequently overestimated budget and KPIs. We decided to come up with a plan where we would work together on a template for budget forecasts with frequent reviews, we did it for the entire PMM team to avoid singling out the specific PMM on my team he had a history with. Months later, that colleague not only was supportive of our PMM initiative but gave a positive peer-feedback review to the PMM he had a negative history with. The key lessons for me here were: once you identify a specific difficult stakeholder, don’t make any assumptions, don’t jump to solutions, instead take the time to connect with the stakeholder, have a candid conversation and most importantly lead with empathy, try to understand where that stakeholder is coming from and if possible, work on a solution jointly. Whether you’re new to your role or are trying to elevate your current function, stakeholder management is one of the most important soft skills of successful PMMs and future leaders. Here’s a strategy I follow to ensure you’re managing stakeholders effectively: Identify key stakeholders. List everyone who has influence on important decisions that can impact your team, project, or funding. Don’t just list internal people, also include 3rd party partners (agencies, vendors, partner-brands) and end-users who will benefit from your work and have influencing power (big clients, thought leaders, influencers). Categorize key stakeholders. Your time is limited and let’s face it not everyone will share the same set of common beliefs. Because you can’t spend all your time trying to satisfy everyone, it’s helpful to group stakeholders based on their influence in the success of your project and how much vested interest they have. Tier 1 stakeholders are those that are the most impacted by your project and have a strong vested interest in its success (e.g., Product, Sales, Customers). Tier 2 stakeholders those that are important for the smooth running of your product launch, such as project support teams (e.g., CRM, Performance, Customer Service). Listen and empathize. When presenting your project to each stakeholder, take the time to listen carefully to everyone’s point of views, concerns, or objections. Don’t be quick to judge, don’t have your guards up and filters on, instead just listen and take notes of all the comments. If something is unclear, seems negative or confusing, ask for clarification either during the meeting or offline. Schedule individual 1-1 conversations with those stakeholders that came across as obstructive or difficult. The goal for that 1-1 conversation is to understand their reasoning, the context, the history or background for the concerns or comments raised. Show empathy, try putting yourself on their shoes without judgement, reach out to their side and ask if they have a proposed solution or would like to partner on one. Offer to come back with an answer or solution to mitigate their concerns. Be responsive and communicate. Once you've talked to all concerned and relevant stakeholders' and determined which actions to prioritize, make sure to take the time to respond on what actions you will take. Be firm yet collaborative with those stakeholders whose feedback or comments you don’t agree with, give a clear and logical explanation as to why you don’t agree with and keep them updated on the progress of the project as you would with other stakeholders you agree with. Lastly, be okay with the fact that you can’t please everyone and remember that success comes from doing what’s right for your customers even if it means politely disagreeing with internal stakeholders.