AMA: New Relic Former SVP, Product and Solutions Marketing, Jon Rooney on Messaging

I assume by segments you mean industry/vertical and/or company size (SMB vs large enterprise, for example) - in that case I’d consider running methodical research work (see the other question answer on 4 recommended approaches) in different tracks aligned to each of the 3 segments, ensuring there’s a common umbrella message and thread through it all so it doesn’t sound like 3 different companies. Anchor in each segment and bring the message about your brand to each segment rather than the other ...Read More

Some years ago, I was running a PMM team at Splunk when we introduced a new product that was a persona-driven solution for IT built on top of the core platform - it even featured machine learning capabilities before AIOps was a thing (Gartner was calling it ITOA at the time). To date, we had had a ton of success with IT practitioners and buyers but we saw an opportunity to move up the value stack and deliver something more purpose-built. When we drafted the value prop hypothesis and initial mess ...Read More

Selling to developers can be difficult, often because they have a ton of say over the decision but not explicitly the budget, but marketing to developers is simpler than people think. Quickly and concretely explain what your product does and how it works/fits in with other stacks (as much as developers love to claim that they're immune to marketing/branding - just look at the stickers on their laptops. C'mon - that's brand loyalty/affinity on par with pre-teen pop music fans) then get them into ...Read More

I’ll (mercifully) go away from tech here: My go-to example is Thomas Moser, which makes really high-end, handmade furniture in Maine, has limited distribution and sells their designs at a decidedly premium price point. Years ago, before owning even a single chair was remotely in my budget, I came across one of their catalogs and thought “super cool, but I can get a chair for $20 at IKEA.” Then friends registered for a set of chairs for their wedding and, having chipped in for a portion, I was ad ...Read More

I don’t count internal debate/discussion or “inside the building” opinions to be testing per se, so I assume you mean external validation. In the realm of enterprise software (which is where I’m coming from), I’ve found 4 ways (best run in parallel then rationalized) to test messaging once you have some initial draft/hypothesis messaging to test: Hopefully your company has some sort of beta/early access program to validate new capabilities and products - usually managed by product. What customer ...Read More

Everyone having a natural gift for messaging is an amazing coincidence, indeed :) Per "ways of testing question", the best approach is backing your messaging with methodical research that shows validation by customers, prospects and industry analysts/influencers. You still need to do your homework about competitive messaging and gather feedback internally from sales / field folks in particular. But formulate hypothesis / draft messaging (and gather internal feedback for that) then do your resear ...Read More

Consistency is super critical and the modern agile/”move fast and break stuff” ethos does nothing but make that effort feel Sisyphean at times. If you’re in tech (particularly in an engineering-driven culture), you will fight this battle every day since, as the saying goes, everyone wants to build but no one wants to maintain. Two keys to staying ahead are 1) have as few core messages as possible and repeat them over and over again and 2) be vigilant about policing their usage in places over whi ...Read More

If by technical value, you mean “what does this thing actually do?” - a lot. Most technical categories are super crowded (and if they’re not crowded, they’re nascent and not well-understood), so being precise on “we’re different in that we solve these problems in these ways” is super important so that those details aren’t left entirely for SE’s in a discovery meeting with a prospect. If you have a highly technical product offering chances are you also have highly technical users/decision makers ...Read More

You need to consider competition before you even start your messaging. For me, messaging should build off of positioning and a strong positioning statement should encapsulate differentiated product strategy, including how this thing we’re offering is better than other stuff that’s out there. That’s how you keep your messaging from sounding vague and generic and ensure your company has a point of view on a space and problem set. I’ve seen a bit of a trend recently where PMs, especially, don’t wan ...Read More