AMA: LogDNA Director of Product Marketing, Alissa Lydon on Competitive Positioning

Two words: customer stories! Product Marketers need to make sure that everyone is united in telling the same story about our product and its value. I always think of it like internal selling. And just like in the field, one of the most compelling ways to convince people is to use customer proof points to validate your position. Whenever I am enabling teams on positioning, I try to incorporate a customer story that revoleves around a few key points: * What challenges was the customer trying to solve? * Why did they choose our solution over competitors? * What quantifiable benefits have they seen after using our product? That last bit is the most important. When you can use numbers to help validate product positioning, you give people something to get behind. It can be a talking point for sales, or the basis of a great marketing campaign. Let the customers and data tell the story, and alignment will follow.

When I am looking for messaging and positioning validation from outside the org, I find that people engage more with a story than with a static framework. And as far as stories go, everyone much prefers pictures to reading dense Powerpoint slides! To that end, putting together a solid "marketecture" is a great place to start. This allows you to paint the picture of not just your product, features and functions, but you can also start assigning value and differentiated messaging to each of them. I find this especially helpful with current users/customers. They know the technical details (i.e. architecture) of your product, but might have a different opinion on the value. Showing them that overlay in a visual is a great way to start a conversation, and get some really rich insights. While Product Marketing should own the messaging/positioning framework, its success hould be measured by everyone in the marketing org (again, this is all a team sport!). A successful messaging strategy affects every stage of the funnel - from awareness to advocacy and beyond. Therefore, I believe there are plenty of opportunities to measure its success. For me, the real question I want to answer is, "Am I enabling everyone on my team on this message, and do they feel empowered to deliver it in market?" That requires close collaboration with various stakeholders, deciding on shared objectives and results, and committing to continual improvement.

I am hoping that some of my other answers have made this clear, but in case they haven't - market research, just like everything else in Product Marketing, is a team sport. The more you can show the value of this kind of research (i.e. how it will help sales win more deals), the easier it will be to recruit sales to join that team. From there, you can find a process or cadence that works for everyone to ensure that you are getting the engagement you need without stepping on any toes. But there is an even better solution to this - you can get sales to do some market and competitive research for you! When I build competitive intel materials (e.g. battlecards), I like to schedule a working session with our customer facing teams. We start with a working draft of all of the information we have gathered so far, and then give sales, success, support etc. the opportunity to collaborate, contribute, and give feedback. This lets everyone feel like they are part of the process, but more importantly enables them on the framework we are using for thinking about our competitors and the market. From there, encourage those teams to continue to share what they hear, either in a shared Slack channel, or even on battlecards themselves. This ensures the content stays fresh, and that you have a truly cross functional research program!

At its most basic, messaging is about answering 3 key prompts: * What is the problem facing the market today? * What solution (generally) will help solve this problem? * What does your product do to help solve it? To me, competitive falls squarely underneath that third bullet point. It's one thing to list the entire list of features for your product, but the real exercise in messaging is to find the differentiating features (i.e. what makes your product different from "the other guys"). Therefore, it's important to map your key capabilities with the competition to understand where that white space is, because that is where your messaging focus should live.

I think with anything you do in Product Marketing, you first have to understand what your goals are to avoid being completely consumed by the task at hand. This includes understanding who your audience is, how the information will be used, and most importantly how you will measure success. The same goes with market research. Doing that little bit of prep work and reflection beforehand can really help focus your efforts so you're getting the most out of it. When I am approaching market and competitive research throughout the GTM process, another question I ask early on is, "Who else has an opinion about this?" Product Marketing is the best job because it is cross functional by nature, so don't lose that spirit when tasked with market analysis. Interview stakeholders from sales, marketing, product, and more. Test out your positioning with trusted peers across your organization for feedback (I always tell them that they are "keeping me honest"). Don't put the weight of market research on your shoulders alone. There are plenty of others who can help carry the load, and your program will be better for it in the long run!

Market and competitive analysis can sometimes feel overwhelming. With so many sources to keep track of, and new competitors popping up all the time, it can be a full time job! To avoid feeling overwhlemed, it's important to prioritize the competitors and channels that are the msot relevant to your messaging and GTM strategy. What competitors are your sales team coming up against the most? What industry publications does your leadership team (especially product) look to for insights and inspiration? Use those as a starting point, and expand your scope from there. But the real power of consistent competitive intel comes from the ability to recruit everyone to contribute, and creating a repo of shared knowledge. Too often, PMM feels the pressure to collect and share all of the market and competitive intel. But sales people hear information about competitors all the time. Product Managers do their own research when building justification to build new products. Find ways to centralize that information, such as in shared Slack channel or documentation, so that everyone can benefit.