AMA: Roofstock Director of Product Marketing, Mary Jane Han on Influencing the Product Roadmap

February 2, 2021 @ 10:00AM PT

How can I start making a change in my organization to influence the roadmap based on consumer insights?

I am at a company where Product builds the roadmap without many insights from Marketing or research.

Mary Jane Han

Roofstock Former Product Marketing Director • 5y

I’d first ask what’s driving this – does the company/leadership not believe in customer insights, is there a lack of prioritization to do this or is it simply inertia of how the company operates today? Your approach may vary depending on the answer but here are some thoughts to consider. Make it a habit. PMMs should be as close to the customer as possible and distill those insights for their teams on an ongoing basis. This can be done thru feedback loops (sales and customer support, user intervi ...Read More

886 Views

2 requests
How do you work with the sales and success teams, in conjunction with the product team, on the roadmap? What pieces of the puzzle do you own, versus your sales and success team?

Mary Jane Han

Roofstock Former Product Marketing Director • 5y

A PMM’s success is largely due to how tightly they partner with sales and product. A successful product marketer champions and owns customer voice. Your role is to synthesize all the insights across research and customer feedback to inform sales strategy and product roadmap. You also drive the go-to-market for new product launches which includes defining the target audience, positioning, messaging and the marketing campaign. Target audience, positioning and value props should be defined early in ...Read More

1,412 Views

1 request
Have you found a good framework to communicate your product roadmap to customers?

We're trying to strike a balance of communicating high priority initiatives without getting caught up in exactly timelines.

Mary Jane Han

Roofstock Former Product Marketing Director • 5y

Timelines can move around a bit so unless your team is really good at hitting them or there's important implications to a milestone that must be hit, it's good to keep timeframes slightly vague or not communicating them until you have strong conviction on when it will be ready. That being said, I’d think about a framework for communication from the perspective of your customers and how significant it is to them. For FYI/No Action Needed, I’d consider integrating message with other content or in ...Read More

671 Views

2 requests
What criteria is evaluated before determining if a request or idea is submitted to product? When it is submitted, what is the prioritization process?

Mary Jane Han

Roofstock Former Product Marketing Director • 5y

Before putting together any idea, know what the overall business priorities are and what specific goals and KPI’s the company aims to deliver. The stronger you tie your idea to those outcomes, the more likely they will be prioritized. Every company has a different process for prioritizing, but this is generally what they will weigh: Business impact. First, quantify the size of the opportunity. Companies want to dedicate resources to ideas with the highest impact. Make sure you define the probl ...Read More

1,398 Views

3 requests
What kind of PMM organizational structure is ideal for ensuring that PMMs are set up for success (in this case, to influence the Product roadmap)?

For eg: Should PMMs be aligned with PMs (we have a 3:1 mapping), or should PMMs be aligned with the market/buyer persona or something else?

Mary Jane Han

Roofstock Former Product Marketing Director • 5y

I've seen product marketing fall either under Marketing or Product with dotted lines to specific businesses they support. There are pros and cons to either structures but generally, aligning under the product org will allow you to be more tightly aligned and have greater influence on the product roadmap.

1,358 Views

1 request
Our product team ships feature updates incrementally, how would you decide the scope of each of the feature changes? Do you market each of the feature updates as when they come out, or group them together? Thank you!

Mary Jane Han

Roofstock Former Product Marketing Director • 5y

I would put yourself in the shoes of your customers and decide whether the feature update matters to them (or not). You can consider different channels/formats that better highlight the more significant ones and others where you keep customers informed but might be more trivial. Sometimes, no update is fine too if there’s no material impact. People do appreciate it when companies don’t inundate them with every little update. If all the features ladder up to a broader theme, you can consider gr ...Read More

1,250 Views

1 request

AMA: Roofstock Director of Product Marketing, Mary Jane Han on Influencing the Product Roadmap

View AMA Answers

How can I start making a change in my organization to influence the roadmap based on consumer insights?

How do you work with the sales and success teams, in conjunction with the product team, on the roadmap? What pieces of the puzzle do you own, versus your sales and success team?

Have you found a good framework to communicate your product roadmap to customers?

What criteria is evaluated before determining if a request or idea is submitted to product? When it is submitted, what is the prioritization process?

What kind of PMM organizational structure is ideal for ensuring that PMMs are set up for success (in this case, to influence the Product roadmap)?

Our product team ships feature updates incrementally, how would you decide the scope of each of the feature changes? Do you market each of the feature updates as when they come out, or group them together? Thank you!