AMA: Instruqt VP of Marketing, Sean Lauer on Building a Product Marketing Team

When managing a PMM team that covers multiple products or is matrixed, high-level or aggregate metrics are key. While more granular data may be needed to drive specific metrics, you need to measure the team at a higher level to measure overall team health. By looking at team-level metrics, leaders can get valuable insights into how their PMM team is doing. Here are some examples: * Team NPS (by internal stakeholder groups) * Adoption of new features * Product usage (DAU or MAU) * Customer retention * Lead gen and/or conversion rates * Sales revenue and growth Then measure at the team level and drill down to understand drivers. A mix of high-level and granular metrics gives you a complete view of the PMM team’s performance so you can see the impact of your strategies and initiatives across the business while also zooming in on areas that need attention and optimization. By using these metrics PMM teams can align to company goals, drive real outcomes and continuously add to the company’s success. When showing the impact of a PMM team through these metrics there are a few approaches: * Regular reporting through a single source of truth or dashboard (i.e. Google Sheet, Slides, Notion doc, etc.) * Case studies and success stories to make it more concrete * Customer research and reporting to quantify the impact beyond the metrics * Education to explain how PMM impacts the customer journey and company direction

The KPIs will differ between PMM and other teams, depending on the stakeholders involved: * Product and PMM collaboration success can be measured by: * Product feature adoption * DAUs/MAUs * Customer NPS or CSAT * Sales and PMM collaboration success can be measured by: * Leads generated * Lead conversion (i.e. MQL to SQL) * Sales cycle * Win/loss rates * New business revenue * Customer Success and PMM collaboration success can be measured by: * Revenue retention * Churn rate * DAUs/MAUs * Product feature adoption * Expansion revenue No single metric can fully measure PMM’s impact. However, a combination of the above KPIs can get you close. Since the responsibilities of a PMM team can differ from one company to another, selecting the right metrics is critical for demonstrating the team's impact.

When managing a PMM team that covers multiple products or is matrixed, high-level or aggregate metrics are key. While more granular data may be needed to drive specific metrics, you need to measure the team at a higher level to measure overall team health. By looking at team-level metrics, leaders can get valuable insights into how their PMM team is doing. Here are some examples: * Team NPS (by internal stakeholder groups) * Adoption of new features * Product usage (DAU or MAU) * Customer retention * Lead gen and/or conversion rates * Sales revenue and growth Then measure at the team level and drill down to understand drivers. A mix of high-level and granular metrics gives you a complete view of the PMM team’s performance so you can see the impact of your strategies and initiatives across the business while also zooming in on areas that need attention and optimization. By using these metrics PMM teams can align to company goals, drive real outcomes and continuously add to the company’s success.

A lot of people will sum up the role of PMM as "the voice of the customer." However, this explanation falls short of clearly defining swim lanes and also crosses into other areas like customer marketing, content marketing, research, etc. In my opinion, the simplest way to describe the PMM role is "the voice of the product." Here's why: * As the voice of the product, you need to be focused on both the inbound and outbound sides of PMM * As the voice of the product, you need to be the connective tissue amongst all teams that touch the product or sell the product * As the voice of the product, your role is more clearly defined when working with other marketing stakeholders—PMM drives or is the approver of work related to the voice of the product

For me, a full-stack product marketer is someone who is proficient in both inbound and outbound PMM. You can work with key stakeholders like sales, customer success, product, marketing peers, and even the executive leadership team (PMM is, after all, directly tied to strategy). You’re a Swiss Army Knife when it comes to being the voice of the product and can solve problems no matter what is thrown your way. In most cases, you’ll flex different skill sets up and down depending on the product itself, the company’s maturity, and the strengths and weaknesses of the key stakeholders.

As a new PMM in a rapidly expanding business, it's important to prioritize the following: 1. Build the foundation: Lay the groundwork by conducting thorough market and customer research. This is the key to refining the positioning of the product and crafting compelling messaging that resonates with the target audience. 2. Focus on "one-to-many" deliverables: Leverage your skills to create scalable marketing programs and strategies that can effectively reach and engage with various stakeholders simultaneously as the business expands. 3. Ruthlessly prioritize: Recognize the importance of prioritizing tasks. It's unrealistic to tackle everything at once. By prioritizing, you can ensure that the most critical initiatives are given the attention they deserve. 4. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good: In this rapid-growth scenario, you don't have the luxury of time. Quick and dirty solutions will often suffice. It's important to set expectations with your manager and key stakeholders, but you'll often realize that good is good enough.

It's important to note that the answer to this question will vary from company to company. First, you should have a good understanding of the current situation in order to identify the most pressing needs. Where are the biggest fires? Where can your effort make the biggest impact? It's also crucial to be aware of your own strengths and weaknesses. I strongly believe in hiring to complement your weaknesses. You don't have to excel at everything. Instead, hire someone who can take on tasks and free up your time to focus on areas where you are stronger. Consider this new hire as your deputy or partner. In a rapidly growing SaaS startup, spending a lot of time training a new hire may not be feasible. Bring on someone who has prior experience and is capable of solving problems. Similarly, focus on hiring someone motivated by the "messiness" of a fast-growing startup.

When setting up a PMM team consider: * Who is the product for and is it a single use case or multiple audience’s * Do you need deep technical knowledge to understand and market the product * The product management team structure * The sales team (or lack thereof) * The current and future marketing functions in the company * What drives the product growth, is it sales, marketing, the product itself or a combination of these, Product-Led Growth (PLG) or Sales-Led Growth (SLG)