Product Marketing - Technical Product Marketing

Selling to developers can be difficult, often because they have a ton of say over the decision but not explicitly the budget, but marketing to developers is simpler than people think. Quickly and concretely explain what your product does and how it works/fits in with other stacks (as much as deve......Read More

1181 Views

What companies have product marketing that you really admire, either overall or particular elements?

11 Answers

Robin Pam

Stripe Product Marketing Lead • August 30

Apple is the gold standard in my book. They have a strong point of view and aesthetic, and every product has a story, launch, and campaign behind it. Square has emulated this model as well, and their website shines as a result. In the SaaS category, Zendesk and Mailchimp are some of my favori......Read More

2748 Views

What are the best ways to accurately convey what you do to technical buyers on your website? Many technical buyers complain that vendor websites just use buzzwords and don't make it easy to understand how the technology works.

3 Answers

Ivan Dwyer

Okta Product Marketing • February 18

Great question… this is easy to over index on either side – too much buzzword bingo or too deep in the weeds. Personally, I like to follow a narrative from top to bottom – anchor to “the what”, hook with “the why”, and win over with “the how”. But each section in that narrative has to be punchy......Read More

818 Views

What level of hard/technical skills should someone aim to develop to thrive in product marketing?

4 Answers

Ivan Dwyer

Okta Product Marketing • February 18

I’m a huge proponent of Jobs To Be Done, both for building products and for marketing products – in product marketing, though, you don’t necessarily have to be able to do the job of your audience, but you most definitely have to get it. I often joke that I’m just a good enough programmer to know......Read More

1539 Views

What's a typical career path for a Technical Product Marketer?

2 Answers

James Fang

mParticle Vice President of Product Marketing • December 7

Technical Product Marketers have a variety of career paths. Should they choose to stay in the PMM org, some more organizations offer management roles for Technical Product Marketing teams, which at some point roll up into broader product marketing leadership roles. Some choose to pick up more of ......Read More

683 Views

For a highly technical product offering, how much messaging emphasis should be placed on technical value versus overall business value that your solution provides?

5 Answers

Jon Rooney

Unity Vice President Product Marketing • March 13

If by technical value, you mean “what does this thing actually do?” - a lot. Most technical categories are super crowded (and if they’re not crowded, they’re nascent and not well-understood), so being precise on “we’re different in that we solve these problems in these ways” is super important so......Read More

741 Views

What KPIs would you look at to evaluate the success of a technical PMM program?

2 Answers

Ivan Dwyer

Okta Product Marketing • February 18

Great question that's very top of mind! The broader GTM organization will own the growth targets, while the broader Product organization will own the adoption targets. I believe where tech PMM can make the most impact on both sides of the house is with velocity targets. On the GTM side, that's......Read More

985 Views

What differentiates a technical Product Marketer vs nontechnical/traditional Product Marketers?

2 Answers

Ivan Dwyer

Okta Product Marketing • February 18

Good question – it can depend on a few things. In many companies, you’ll have to wear both hats... I know I sure have. As Product Marketing teams grow, where it starts to break out into dedicated roles is at the target persona level – your more traditional PMM may focus more on the executive ......Read More

1090 Views

For a heavily dev-centric product, how do you approach the balance between classic content/SEO, product marketing, and sales enablement - and how do you find the right channels to reach out to developers vs. commercial audiences?

What are some considerations when setting up a Product Marketing discipline to keep the focus on the product value for developers, without sacrificing expectations from the commercial teams?

2 Answers

Ivan Dwyer

Okta Product Marketing • February 18

Great question, I get in arguments about this all the time! Heh. You ask the question the right way - it’s about balance. Starting with my least favorite topic – SEO! The benefits of SEO isn’t lost on me, but for technical products, authenticity trumps all IMHO. I always cringe when I come acros......Read More

570 Views

Do you have a CTO, CIO or developer persona profile that you can share?

Looking for slides or document that spells out what particular personas like or don't like as well where they congregate (what media they read, what groups they follow, etc)

2 Answers

Ivan Dwyer

Okta Product Marketing • February 18

I have a fairly extensive persona methodology which I wrote about here (https://www.workinproduct.com/blog/elements-of-a-positioning-system-part-2-customer-personas). Rather than get prescriptive with an explicit example here, I’ll share something I run i nto a lot that I think gets it wrong – b......Read More

1300 Views