AMA: Epic Games Senior Director of Marketing, Stacie Colendich on Product Marketing vs Product Management

In super simple terms - know what you're talking about. The biggest learning I've had as an individual contributor PMM and a leader of product marketers is that your job is cross-functional and it requires a base level of knowledge across many functions, and you can't fake it. Know the product - this doesn't mean you know every in and out of every use case, but it does mean that you have used the product before, and continue to put "hands on keyboard". You should spend time going through the sig ...Read More

A lot! Especially at medium to large companies, there's functional expertise for a reason. I wouldn't expect product marketing to own any of the following: Product management - prioritizing features, writing requirements, managing engineering timelines. There is going to be overlap where PMM may inform a roadmap with customer needs or competitive intelligence, but the rest is not in scope. Demand gen / performance marketing - running paid acquisition, managing ad spend, optimizing conversion fun ...Read More

I've led product marketing teams that sit in product management, in marketing, in sales / BD. I think the main difference is which team you work the most closely with. For example, if structured into product, you tend to spend a lot more time on the features and functionality with PMs, and you have to push yourself to be an outside-in, customer-first thinker. Ultimately, product marketing is really a cross-functional role, and you have to work across all parts of the business to be successful. F ...Read More