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Kevin Au

AMA: Bill.com Senior Director, Product Marketing, Kevin Au on Stakeholder Management

February 23, 2021 @ 10:00AM PT

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  1. How has your product marketing team traditionally worked with demand generation / growth marketing?

    At our company, demand gen is a much bigger function than product marketing so they drive all of the campaigns with our input, but I came from an organization where we lead the campaign strategy a bit more since we had more numbers. Anyone have a good solid process they use with their demand gen team?

    Kevin Au
    Kevin Au

    Vice President Of Product Management • 5y

    At Bill.com, we work extremely close to our growth marketing teams. They are a critical partner as we launch and scale-up our growth. Both groups have their strengths. For the PMM, we have the deep knowledge about the customer needs to clearly articulate the value prop that will resonate most with this segment. For the growth marketers, they have the expertise on how to reach this segment and what is the best way to do so. It is a 50/50 partnership with co-owned KPIs and regardless of who "owns" ...Read More

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  2. How do you approach getting approval for messaging from internal stakeholders like Product, Sales, and Customer Success?

    What format do you present the messaging for review by internal stakeholders?

    Kevin Au
    Kevin Au

    Vice President Of Product Management • 5y

    I develop a 1-slide messaging framework to clearly articulate the key messages. It has a few key items:

    1) Key pain point / challenge you're looking to solve

    2) Target segment(s)

    3) Single minded proposition (SMP)

    4) Reasons to believe to support your SMP

    5) How is this differentiated from other competitors in the market

    I then shop it around with my key stakeholders (via 1:1 or in the regular team working meetings).

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  3. What are the most important relationships to get right as a Product Marketing Manager?

    Kevin Au
    Kevin Au

    Vice President Of Product Management • 5y

    A PMM has one of the most cross-functional roles in most organizations and developing those strong relationships with key stakeholders is critical. While there are many relationships you have to develop, I believe the top three most important relationships to cultivate and get right are: 1) Product Manager/UX designer - One of the keys to a successful product launch is to ensure you're providing the right product experience. By having a strong relationship with your PM and UX designer will allow ...Read More

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  4. Tips for managing stakeholder input: are there any templates or best practices for when to gather input and how to incorporate (i.e. whose feedback to incorporate vs. ignore, etc.), especially as it relates to a timeline?

    Kevin Au
    Kevin Au

    Vice President Of Product Management • 5y

    Throughout the project, you'll be getting feedback from multiple stakeholders (both internal and external). Everyone wants to be heard and having an open door policy is helpful. However, not all feedback is created equal so you want to identify which feedback sources are the primary and which are secondary. And it does vary as you proceed in the various stages of the product development and GTM. For example, in the early product development phase, I rely heavily on the customer feedback through ...Read More

    573 Views
    2 requests

  5. What's your advice on improving a historically tense relationship between functions?

    Kevin Au
    Kevin Au

    Vice President Of Product Management • 5y

    Product Marketing is one of those roles that can be very different from each organization. I find the most successful way to develop a strong relationship is to show value from the start and align on your mutual goals / objectives. If there are certain functions where you have a tense relationship, i'd suggest to first understand why there is this less collaborative relationship. Is it based on some historical context (prior launch)? Is it due to a difference in role expectations? Once you've id ...Read More

    517 Views
    1 request

  6. What is the best cadence for gathering stakeholder feedback in preparation for a launch?

    Kevin Au
    Kevin Au

    Vice President Of Product Management • 5y

    It varies as you proceed in the various stages of the product development and GTM. For example, in the early product development phase, It is more ad-hoc where I rely heavily on the customer feedback through our customer interviews / focus groups / surveys to ensure our team clearly understands the customers' needs. I gather feedback with the core team that is in those same customer research sessions to help synthesize what we're hearing from the customer. Then as I prepare for the pilot and lau ...Read More

    574 Views
    1 request