When coming up with positioning and messaging as part of GTM plan, which key stakeholders/teams (in addition to product and sales) should weigh in?

Looks like this question got the most upvotes so let me start with it and try and give as much context as I can.

At Google we had the following heuristic for marketing which was: 

1.) Know the user
2.) Know the magic
3.) Connect the two

It informed our marketing overall, but especially our positioning and messaging. You asked about both and I would actually separate the two.

For positioning it's always a good idea to start with the product and engineering teams. They are typically the closest to the vision of the product--who it's for/what it does/how does it do it i.e. the "magic". I often use the metaphor that if the product is a movie, PM and Eng will typically cook up the plot, while it's product marketing's job to deliver the narrative. 

Sales is also a good stakeholder for positioning. They'll help you narrow down the "user" details, especially in enterprise where they spend more time with customers than anyone else in the organization. So it really behooves you to spend as much time with sales as you can. Done right, product marketing is sale's best friend. 

So at big companies, prod, eng and sales are typically good places to start for positioning while at smaller companies, like startups, you may want to involve the founder and leadership team early as they have most of the datapoints. But I'd keep the stakeholder list pretty tight overall when it comes to positioning otherwise you'll tend to swirl and it's really important to nail positioning first, because messaging is the by product. 

Per the Google heuristic above, positioning covers the user and the magic. Connecting the two is where messaging comes in, and that's where you should open up the aperture when it comes to stakeholder management IMO. This is where Demand Gen, Field, AR, PR or even support stakeholders comes in.

The reason is simple. As the product marketer, people will and should treat you as the SME when it comes to the product positioning but will likely want to help shape what messaging looks like at the last mile, whether that's on the web, email copy, print ads, events and activations, or when talking to the press and analysts. After all, they own those channels, are directly responsible for their performance and know what typically plays well and performs--or not. The worst thing you can do is go against the grain and be precious about a turn of phrase or a cool tagline. 

At Salesforce, we had a campaign where with partners where we thought we could riff of the expression "being on cloud nine". Well that worked well in NORAM, but didn't make sense in other markets where the expression was meaningless when translated. 

So when it comes to positoning, be ruthless and direct about who has input as you don't want to swirl on that or compromise. But for messaging, take the inputs, and to paraphrase Bruce Lee "be like water". While you shouldn't let the substance change, you want your message to resonate. 

Getting feedback from stakeholders is valuable to capture insights and feedback from customer-facing teams and to foster healthy internal partnerships. That said, positioning and messaging by consensus is one of the biggest mistakes a product marketer can make. To avoid this, set clear expectations by defining roles and responsibilities upfront. I suggest using a simple DACI framework and asking everyone to agree with their respective roles when you kick off the exercise. DACI stands for Driver, Approver, Contributor, and Informed. This post by Thaisa Fernandes provides a good overview of DACI and a Google Docs template. While roles vary at every company, an example of a positioning and messaging DACI could be something like:

• Driver - Product Marketing
• Approver - CMO
• Contributors - Product, Sales, Research, Customer Support, Marketing Channel Owners
• Informed - Brand, Copywriting

In addition to product sales, I typically like to vet things out with SEs - they are the ones demonstrating the products and weave stories as they do so - so having them alinged in the key benefits, messaging and positioning is key. Additionally CSG - customer success. They are the ones who have great insight into what's working and not working for customers. And lastly, Corporate Marketing - who ultimately own the brand - so top level messaging needs to align well. 

Customer Success or Customer Marketing teams are your secret weapon when thinking about Positioning & Messaging frameworks and GTM strategy. Retention is a key metric for the business, so who better than Customer Success Managers or Customer Marketing leaders to represent the voice of the customer in your marketing narrative? They have seen the good, the bad and the ugly and have a more in-depth perspective with what resonates with customers, where customers get frustrated or struggle, and why customers love your brand/product.

Any client-facing teams I believe should provide feedback on your messaging/positioning. For example, your client strategy/customer success teams get a ton of feedback from your customers who are actually using your product and have a great perspective on what resonates with your prospects and customer base.

Secondly, a part of sales, but a key subset of your sales team are sales engineers. Sales engineers have a natural way of telling a great demo story and are boots on the ground hearing directly from prospects on what they're looking for, what key competitors have, why they're switching from their incumbent solution, etc. Partnering closely with the lead sales engineer on my product is a must for me!

Finally, your marketing team. They have an invaluable perspective on how your messaging/positioning for specific products works with your overall corporate narrative. They should be a key decision maker when it comes to how you are positioning your products to the market and how you're differentiating.

Below are the key stakeholders and goals I have during my stakeholder interviews for positioning and messaging:

• Focus Groups

  • [Prospective Buyer Focus Group] Dive down deep into pains, problems, and expected benefits

  • [Customer Advisory Board] Dive down deep into pains, problems, and expected benefits

• Product Managers:

  • Identify what pains the new features/products is designed to solve

  • Understand how this provides a differentiated experience

  • Understand the value we want to deliver

• BDR/SDR

  • Understand what high-level messages are and are not working in their outreach

• AE

  • Understand what value customers are looking for

  • Understand our prospect's pains and priorities

  • Learn what messages are working and not

  • Understand what gaps we messaging gaps we currently have

  • Identify accounts and opportunities to go after with new product/feature

• Solution Engineers / Consultants

  • Understand the big problems customers are solving for

  • Understand how they're positioning the product

  • Understand the nuances between the personas we sell to

• Business Development / Partners

  • Understand what insights they have in building a new business

  • Understand how partners are messaging it

  • Get honest insights of how to position the product as part of a bigger solution

• Demand Generation

  • Understand what's performing well in the market

  • Identify accounts and opportunities to go after with new messaging

  • Understand any perceived gaps

• Customer Success

  • Understand the delta between what was promised and what we actually delivered

  • Understand the ultimate value we have actually delivered