Through the lens of a feature/product lifecycle, what are the critical points of collaboration between product marketing and product management? And what are the lines that distinguish who owns which part?

When looking at the product lifecycle, I typically refer to a framework like Product School’s 7 Phases of Product Development:• Phase 1 – Discovery• Phase 2 – Define• Phase 3 – Design• Phase 4 – Implementation• Phase 5 – Marketing• Phase 6 – Training• Phase 7 - LaunchThe critical points for collaboration occur in phases 5 – 7 described above. In these stages, the PM and PMM work together on messaging & positioning, value proposition, train the sales teams, and build a go-to-market that will ...Read More

The critical points of collaboration between product marketing and product management are, using the example of a product launch - which is probably the most common interaction, are as follows: Doing product strategy development and ideation - PMM should at least be in the room for the basic hypotheses around "let's go solve these problems for these customers which we can do better than these competitors for these reasons" - this is critical context and The next point of collaboration is when th ...Read More

Ideally, PMM comes in during the product roadmap process. One area where I've seen PMM historically drive value is through market and competitive insights. Especially at Gong, given our product, Product Managers have access to customer insights but oftentimes don't have visibility into opportunities outside of the customer base.  When it comes to the product lifecycle, PMM should proactively come in very early on. For the same reasons as above, PMM brings a complementary perspective to the decis ...Read More

1. Intial product definition - Owned by Product, PMM consults. Help the team to assess: Are we building something that meets the basic requirements of the market? Where do we fall alongside competitors? Are we creating a delightful experience that will keep users coming back?  2. Messaging/Value Prop development- Owned by PMM, Product consults. How can we talk about this product so that it drives comprehension and affinity? Throughout both product and marketing touchpoints, how might we create c ...Read More

This is such a good question because honestly, the PM/PMM dance can get messy - especially when you're in the thick of a launch and everyone's stressed. I've been in those meetings where both sides are like "wait, I thought you were doing that part?" Let me break down how this typically works across the lifecycle: Discovery & Ideation PM owns: Problem definition, technical feasibility, user research PMM owns: Market opportunity sizing, competitive landscape, customer segmentation Collaborate ...Read More