What's your framework to prioritizing needs / deliverables when establishing product marketing?

At Zapier I approached this by starting with a mission statement to describe why our team exists and the work we aim to uniquely do for the company: “PMM exists to maximize Zapier’s market opportunities by (1) clarifying where we win and (2) driving GTM strategy for product success.” I then defined responsibilities that align to (1) like TAM, market segmentation, personas, positioning, competitive analysis, etc. and separately to (2) like working with Product validate market opportunities, desig ...Read More

I'm still trying to master this one, but here is what I do. Create your PMM Charter With the input of your boss and other leaders in the company, you'll first want to define what PMM looks like at your org. This helps set the guardrails for what product marketing is repsonsible for at your org and what your main objectives are. This will take into consideration what the top priorities are for company leadership.   Set out on a priority finding mission In your first month or so, you have the oppo ...Read More

As mentioned before, product marketing is one of the most cross-functional roles of any in most companies. And as such, you’ll be getting requests for projects and deliverables from every angle. The first thing I try to understand is: what responsibilities fall under me vs. another team (ie: is there a separate pricing team? Enablement team? Market research team?) Once my purview is clear, I put together a Product Marketing Charter (my PMM mission, PMM pillars, responsibilities under each pillar ...Read More

I'm going to talk about my experience at really early stage companies, at this point, everyone is doing everything, so the priority is to create some strcuture to help every get aligned on the same goals. When I’ve been the first Product Marketer, or only one establishing the PMM function the first thing I do is meet with sales, product and the rest of marketing to identify the gaps. Generally is there's that piece missing between Product and marketing/sales to message what has been built, and s ...Read More

First, I listen. It's important to understand in depth why these needs/deliverables are being asked of Product Marketing. What is the underlying problem? How can Product Marketing solve this?  Then, I assess company goals and revenue by product. The Product Marketing function is meant to support the company goals and I find that using this as a guidepost for prioritization is key. Assessing revenue by product helps as another factor in prioritization, but isn't the only factor as some companies ...Read More

Only a few weeks into my current role, I’m living this one in real-time! For myself, I’ve created the following approach: Listen → Set Expectations → Execute → Close the Loop. For prioritizing needs/deliverables, I spend as much time as possible listening and understanding what is most pressing for the business immediately (and then mid and longer term). The key here is to determine where the business needs product marketing the most. When you’re the first PMM, it can be incredibly natural for e ...Read More

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 t ...Read More

As stated above, PMM wears so many hats it's important to recognize what is needed at any stage of a company. When first coming into an organization as the first PMM I think the most important thing to do is establish what does and doesn't exist. I think this is the right order of things that should happen first but if you come into an organization and feel that some of these things are already in a good place you can skip to the next step. That being said, when you are new to a company you have ...Read More

I generally use a modified version of the Eisenhower Matrix (I just learned the name). On the spectrum of "not urgent to urgent" and "not important to important," you should prioritize the deliverables/needs that are both urgent and important. When you're the first product marketer, it's easy to fall into the trap of just prioritizing the urgent needs without evaluating the relative importance.  When you're building out a new function, spend time meeting with the teams you'll be working with to ...Read More

As a first (and oftentimes only) product marketer at a company, prioritization is the mother of all skills. The framework I would apply is a natural extension of the 30/60/90 day plan outlined above. Prioritization can only come once there is a decent amount of work done to understand the current state and needs of the business, and your fellow cross-functional counterparts. That said, there are some tangible and practical ways to approach prioritization.  1. Build out your team (functional) cha ...Read More

Chances are you will inherit a number of projects in queue Day 1. Do your best to deliver on those projects to drive results out of the gate. This will instantly help you build credibility with colleagues. That said, start thinking about a learning agenda for each of your org's big areas. At Chime we have built LAs for banking, credit, liquidity and insurance. The PMMs on my team work lock step with PM, UX, etc. to translate Chime's goals into a series of powerful initiatives twice a year. From ...Read More

Every company and every growth stage is different so the evaluative framework you utilize needs some flexibility. I recommend that your framework is developed in tandem with your partner stakeholders early on and is communicated often. A reliable framework includes a clear organizing principal, inputs, outputs/ impact, measurements, and timelines. As a first product marketer, I'd also advocate including a line item for dependencies and cross functional asks. Once you start building momentum in a ...Read More

I start with my phases of success for a PMM in my first 100 days here. Through this process I create my priorities and ensure I have executive alignment on them. I always get feedback from my leadership team. I find that people often want the same thing but are saying it differently – identify this when it happens to bring alignment back on your priorities. Before any cross-functional meeting to get alignment or approval, make sure you’ve already shown your ideas to one or more people to get the ...Read More

In the last couple of companies, what I've done is create a slide that shows the academic definition and jobs to be done in product marketing: research, positioning/messaging, etc. Then, I host meetings with stakeholders, and show them the slide, ask them what they have experience with product marketing handling, what they liked, didn't like, and so on. Then, I ask them what they need help with going forward in our company. That input helps inform how I prioritize the team. It's important to hav ...Read More

As the first PMM hire, you will need to do your research before you can prioritize needs. Here's a three-step plan that should guide you to success: Talk to stakeholders: As a PMM, you are the connective tissue between product, marketing, and sales. Get to know these stakeholders. Understand their goals and their needs. Crunch the numbers: Understand historical revenue and user growth deeply. Sometimes, what people tell you is different from what the numbers tell you. Get as much data as you can ...Read More

Here's what I like to do when establishing (or reestablishing) the PMM function Conduct a listening tour with cross functional stakeholders Ask them the following types of questions1. What are your top priorities? 2. What's working well with PMM (if a team exists?) 3. What are opportunities or gaps ? 4. Where do you think PMM could make the biggest impact today? Establish your PMM charter or mission Based on what you learn, establish and educate the company on the role of Product Marketing and t ...Read More

As a PMM, I believe one of the most important things is showing business impact…so Pipeline and Revenue. And, typically because of how PMM is staffed, understanding how to build leverage/scale yourself. So when getting established, earn trust through showing impact to revenue. Webinars that help target high value use cases and build top of funnel and key collateral such as customer stories that help accelerate deal cycles. All of this will help inform your leverage/high scale work such as positi ...Read More

Part of starting a new role and establishing a new function is adding value. They hired you with specific needs in mind, but you should develop your own with a 30/60/90 day of getting deeper in the company. Do what they hired you for which involves listening and understanding the various teams and priorities. Develop an opinion on what's needed. I'd suggest that at a company without product marketing there are three consistent problems: The website messaging is unclear Sales people each have dev ...Read More

I don't have a set framework as such, but this is the approach I'd take: Meet with stakeholders across the business to understand what's working, where the gaps are that PMM might be able to fill, and ask what they think is the highest priority. Ask lots of questions to understand what the underlying need/problem is, as the 'solution' people ask for might not always be the best way to solve the problem or might be better solved by another team. This is also a great opportunity to start educating ...Read More