AMA: The New York Times Executive Director, Head of Product Marketing, Monty Wolper on Messaging

Feedback loops across various sources allow PMMs to learn what works, what doesn’t, and where we need to improve our message so it “hits home.” Continue leveraging the aforementioned qualitative and quantitative methods for message testing as channels for ongoing feedback collection as well. I’d recommend supplementing the learnings gathered through these channels with sentiment monitoring across social media, review sites and press coverage. Another often underutilized resource is the customer- ...Read More

Lead with the why. Your messaging framework should be rooted in the positioning statement, which speaks to the problem you’re trying to solve, who you’re solving it for, how you’re solving it, and why you’re uniquely positioned to do so. Once you’re clear on that, you can summarize  it in customer friendly language. What’s the most important thing you want customers to take away from your message? This is your key message, around which the rest of the framework can be built. Your key message sho ...Read More

Message testing should take place during strategy development, and again when going to market. You can leverage qualitative methods to gather open ended feedback on messaging directions, and quantitative methods to make statistically significant decisions between your options. I often start with a qualitative approach, conducting interviews or focus groups to understand what sort of messaging appeals to my target audience. What I’m assessing at this stage is clarity, value, relevance, appeal, di ...Read More

Positioning and messaging are different, but tightly intertwined. There hasn’t been a time where I’ve done one without the other. Positioning statements are an internal framework used to identify what’s unique about a product. As the name suggests, this informs how a product is positioned and therefore perceived. Messaging is the words used to convey that unique value to customers. It's the  mechanism by which the positioning statement comes to life in a compelling way. It’s important to start b ...Read More

The simple answer is never, but let’s talk about what this means in practical terms. The cadence at which you revisit your messaging varies case by case. How quickly is your product evolving? How crowded is the space in which you operate? Are competitors closing the gap between their product and yours, undermining your claims of differentiation? Has there been a dip in campaign results? Is your messaging getting tired? Any meaningful changes to your product strategy, portfolio makeup, market lan ...Read More