How should product marketing split feature adoption KPIs with the product team (for B2B self-serve SaaS)

In an ideal world product and product marketing should be embedded in one another’s efforts from start to finish (see my other response on “customer needs” and getting PMM further upstream). In this world product marketing has played an active role in helping set the vision for the feature, doing research to support its validation/market opportunity, and coordinating the launch priority (e.g. is this a “nice to have” vs. a tentpole launch). In such a scenario it can often be appropriate for prod ...Read More

Why split? Make feature adoption a shared metric between PMM and PM teams. This is an important metric for both teams. I would use this metric pre-launch to really understand the target market segment, to set the baseline, and to define post-launch target. Post-launch, evaluate how the needle moves on this metric. If you are doing this in your company for the first time, this could start interesting conversations. Depending on the root cause analysis, PM and PMM will own different metrics to mov ...Read More

PMMs should be responsible for KPIs that bring users and customers to the product and through onboarding and activation. Are the materials provided to educate a user leading to activation? Is the onboarding experience good? Are experiments leading to intended results? Once the user has activated, PMs should be responsible for owning long-term adoption of specific feature areas. At some point, sending more emails to remind users that certain features exist just won't cut it. If the feature isn't ...Read More

This is where collaboration is key! Here's how I'd approach it: Why share KPIs with the product team in the first place? Sharing KPIs creates a closed-loop feedback system where product marketing insights directly inform product development and vice versa. Both teams are working towards the same goals. When both teams are responsible for achieving shared KPIs, it increases accountability and encourages a sense of ownership.What is the right frame of reference to think through KPIs? Focus on KPIs ...Read More

In any SaaS business, “adoption” is a company-wide priority. If customers aren’t happy and using the product, you’re just putting your sales/marketing investments into a leaky bucket. So it makes sense that Marketing -- and PMM specifically -- would monitor adoption closely, and even set KPIs in this area. While I see Product as primarily responsible for tracking the usability of the features they build in a detailed way (i.e. did moving the button make a difference/did a given change resolve br ...Read More

First off, is feature adoption the right KPI? In my opinion, focusing on feature adoption could be too narrow of a metric and doesn't shed light on what the end-user is experiencing. End users don't find value in features; they find value in getting their job to be done, done, and more effectively or efficiently than they did it before. At a basic level, product is responsible for building a feature that solves a job to be done effectively and efficiently. Product marketing is responsible for en ...Read More

To the contrary, I always like to share and align on KPIs with the product team. Bonus points is you can also align that with key partners in other functions as well, like growth marketing. The more you can stay aligned from the top, the more naturally everything else will fall when it comes to prioritization and resourcing of projects. Now, some KPIs will vary widely based on the lifecycle of the product and the context of your company. Here are some examples to get your wheels turning: For new ...Read More

I've generally seen that the most successful product <> PMM partnerships are based on shared goals, not split goals. Here's what that usually looks like.  Both teams should agree on a feature adoption target based on similar features and the scale of the launch. Feature adoption (usually measured 30 days post-launch) is influenced by both launch effectiveness (PMM) and how compelling & easy-to-use the feature is (Product).  From the PMM side, adoption success is a reflection of how com ...Read More

Though I think of PMM as being quite different from traditional marketing, I often focus my PMM teams on a relatively standard marketing funnel. Splitting feature adoption KPIs between product marketing and the product team for a B2B self-serve SaaS requires collaboration and alignment on goals. Here's a suggested approach: I think about it in two vectors:  input metrics / leading indicators <-- these most often align closely with a product team  output metrics / lagging indicators <-- the ...Read More

The ideal scenario is that product and product marketing have shared adoption KPIs because this creates greater investment and accountability from both groups. If that’s not the case, product will tend to focus on post-login KPIs such as MAUs and DAUs. Marketing will focus on pre-login KPIs such as site visits, email engagement rates etc. Overall, it’s best if both teams focus on the NPS as that’s a clear indicator of how satisfied customers are with the product and if they will recommend it to ...Read More

So I am actually not sure this should be split, the best companies I have ever worked at Product Management and Product Marketing shared these numbers and it was our goal as a team to impact these. Now not every company looks at it this way, some just want to know the impact YOU as a single person or team are impacting. So I usually talk about owning registration numbers, second week retention numbers and have the product teams focused on the MAU and DAU numbers from there out and work with them ...Read More

Oooo this really depends on so many factors! Is your organization focused more on product-led or sales-led growth? Do you have a Growth Product division? etc.. IMO, yes. Product, Growth, and Product Marketing teams should all co-own adoption KPIs, especially for large tier 1 features. Here's why: if you have no say over how a feature is implemented, why are you then solely responsible for adoption? I see that as a recipe for disaster where Product teams create whatever they want and aren't respo ...Read More