AMA: Spotify Head of Product Marketing, Fan Monetization, Alex Wagner Lavian on Consumer Product Marketing

I can relate to this one, I actually started off my career in PMM at a B2B company. This experience was invaluable and where I learned the core competencies of PMM – the importance of product positioning, messaging, influencing the product roadmap, and being an advocate for the customer. Just being on a PMM team taught me so much about the function and how to deliver impact to both the business and the customer. A few tips that helped me transition over to B2C: 1) Build expertise in skills that can be transferable to any industry or customer. The B2B company I worked at is a subscription based product and I became fascinated by this model learning the ins & outs about subscriptions — pricing and packing, best practices with driving growth and retention, and the metrics that matter. This experience helped me land a role at a consumer based company leading PMM for B2C subscriptions. This was a great way to ease the transition into B2C and leverage the expertise I built in my previous role. 2) In B2B roles you tend to work very closely with sales vs B2C you are directly working with Product to influence and shape the customer experience. The more you can build strong relationships with Product the more equipped you will be to influence the product roadmap and be successful in a B2C role.

As I mentioned above there are so many applicable skills across B2B and B2C — just learning the PMM craft is key regardless of the company/audience. There are several applicable qualities that a B2B marketer can bring to consumer PMM including the following: messaging & positioning, relationship building & XFN influence, data-driven decision making, and market/competitive research. While B2B PMMs often have direct access to customers via sales PMMs in consumer roles are required to play more of an active role in gathering customer insights. Consumer PMMs will be responsible for developing a research roadmap and synthesizing insights to shape product and go-to-market strategies. Additionally, In a consumer role the audience size increases significantly putting more importance the creative brief. Its critical to build a pointed brief that is insights led and speaks to a user tension to inspire compelling creative that will break through. Your channel plan will also look quite different, skewing more digital and social media heavy. A best practice is to map out a customer journey to ensure you are engaging the customer at key touchpoints and building a creative and effective channel plan.

Across PMM there is a shared core set of skills and competencies. The fundamentals are very much the same — it's about knowing the customer, finding the defining insight, and transforming that into product strategies and go-to-market plans. While the fundamentals are very transferable, execution can look quite different. For example, you’ll work more closely with product and research teams vs sales, the channels and strategies to reach your customers will be more digital and span the entire funnel, and you’ll likely be goaled on product adoption at scale. 

Yes the skill sets are very transferable from B2B to B2C! As mentioned above the fundamentals are very much the same its the execution that can look quite different. B2B and B2C are both are incredible experiences so when I'm evaluating candidates I'm looking for a product marketer that is customer obsessed, results and data driven, and comfortable leading complex go-to-market strategies. 

As a first PMM hire it's important to prioritize needs and deliverables based on the overall goals and objectives of the company. Do “discovery” similar to how you would approach a product launch – get up to speed on the business, the competitive landscape, the customer, and the product. This will help you understand the biggest opportunity areas and align your efforts with the company’s goals to maximize impact. In addition to listening & learning from your stakeholders its also important to educate your partners on the role of PMM, PMM’s superpowers, and the metrics you are accountable for. This will provide your peers with context on how to partner with you and give you a chance to share back the projects you’ll be prioritizing and gather feedback on that plan to ensure you are working on the most impactful things.

PMMs are storytellers so just as you would approach a marketing narrative, tell your personal story in a crisp and compelling way. Prior to the interview, reflect on a few projects you want to highlight that showcase the breadth of PMM competencies and be prepared to weave those stories into your answers. Some examples include: a complex go-to-market strategy you drove, a time you influenced the product roadmap, a challenging customer problem you solved. In addition to preparing your story it's important to experience the product to put yourself in the customer's shoes. This will provide you with the knowledge to speak to product pain points and offer suggestions on ways to enhance the product or the marketing to improve adoption.