AMA: Attentive Group Product Marketing Manager, Holly Watson on Stakeholder Management

Product Marketing org structures can vary by organization. Previously at Attentive, our PMM organization is comprised of the following teams: Product Marketing Core (focused on our product offering, more to come here), Sales Enablement & Competitve, Technical Writers, and Training. Our PMM Core team is split by our products with a 2-3 PMMs managing a single product offering usually comprised of several features. Collectively we all report into a VP of PMM who reports into our CPO. Yes, Atten ...Read More

Thanks for asking - love this question.  I'll walk through some insights gained from our most common and often strongest partners for PMM.  Insights from Sales: Strong sellers know how to sell. They understand the customer, know how to craft a compelling "buy now" story. Spending time with these top performers has helped to overhaul pitch decks and lean into emerging trends. More specifically, top sellers are having big picture conversations with C-Suite executives who look to vendors not only t ...Read More

Product Marketing sits in a highly cross-functional area of the organization. The relationships with Product, Sales, and Marketing are crucial to foster and ensure you get right. This is not an easy tasks and it is never really done. Establish recurring syncs and opportunities to align on big projects, objectives, and goals. Encourage each PMM on the team to nurture 1:1 relationships with their colleagues in these departments. We can often fall into the habit of large group calls or big team mee ...Read More

I've seen a few different forums and templates work. Here are a few ideas: Field input: I've seen some team use a JIRA ticketing system for this. It's a great way for CS or AEs to capture customer and prospect feedback and write it down. The teams are able to see a board where other ideas have been submitted and if they like the idea or have heard of the same idea in the field they essentially can "up vote" it. Product and Field teams come to an understanding that ideas are reviewed before every ...Read More

Yes, great question. This relationship can be so valuable to both the PM and PMM, but also to the rest of the organization. For this relationship, I encourage each team to spend time understanding each others roles and responsibilities as well as having a discussion to align on what responsibilities will be owned by PMs vs. owned by PMMs. Ownership too can often be a word that is scrutinized, so for clarity owners are who leadership or other stakeholder are pointed to for questions, updates, and ...Read More

As often as possible. Launches are exciting for all departments - so questions and input can definitely start increasing the closer you get to GA, launch date. To help with this, create opportunities to communicate your launch plan to each team. Tailor the message to your audience as Sales will have interests around pricing, packaging, target audience, dates; while CS will have questions about customer environment changes, reporting impacts, and shifts to rules/established workflows. Outside of ...Read More

The relationship between PMMs and Sales Enablement can be powerful to ensure the field is getting and staying up to date with the product, the market, and the competition. Product Marketers do a great job crafting stories that drive product adoption and awareness. This information is curated through strong partnerships with the Product organization and Competitive/Market Insights team. If your organization does not have a CI team, that's ok - that means your PMM is a powerful treasure trove of m ...Read More

Internal alignment takes time. Here are a few recommendations for getting started and fostering strong relationships for the long term. First - it's important to recognize and write down who your stakeholders are. For Product Marketing this is often Sales, Marketing, Product as primary stakeholders with Implementation, Solution Consultants, Customer Success, and Support playing crucial roles as well. Second - work with each of these groups to understand their world. What KPIs, goals, metrics kee ...Read More

Great question! This is a common scenario for growing organizations. As a smaller PMM team, you'll have to work to set project priorities. This is not an easy tasks, but what helps is being transparent and communicative with your teams across Product, Sales, Marketing and others.  For growing organizations, work with your Sales Department to understand their biggest pain points and align on where you as a PMM can best support. Prioritize the feedback and the work you're able to take on vs what y ...Read More