The Top 100 Product Marketing Mentors To Learn From And Work For - 2024
Overview
The way we acquire job knowledge has changed. We learn more from each other than we do at school. The Product Marketing Mentor List shows you the top 100 product marketing practitioners to learn from to develop your career. All of these leaders have contributed content that Sharebird users find helpful.
Methodology
Sharebird's algorithm ranks contributors based on how helpful our users perceive their product marketing - related content to be. We do not handpick people. To be considered for this list, mentors need to be current product marketing practitioners and in a leadership role. We look at the following factors with Sharebird content: views, saves, and followers. We then apply a proprietary algorithm to calculate content credibility and helpfulness. Views show us content relevancy, saves show us content quality, and followers show us content credibility.
Sharebird does not accept payment to be included on this list, which allows us to maintain objectivity and independence. We update this list every year. For any questions about this list, please contact [email protected].
About Sharebird
Sharebird is where leading executives answer your questions. Get easily digestible tips and insights from leaders at the fastest-growing companies, so that you can solve your hardest work challenges and reach your career potential.
In Alphabetical Order by Company:
Eileen Buenviaje Reyes
1Password VP, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: YOU are the strongest advocate for your own career growth. But it requires that you maintain a level of humility and self-awareness, while knowing how to navigate your unique internal dynamics. Be confident in your strengths, own your development areas, and never be afraid to give or ask for feedback, a stretch project, a bonus, or a promotion. The path to growth is one you pave for yourself.
Jeremy Wood
Adobe Head of Product Marketing (APAC)
Career Path Tip: I always prioritise three things when I'm looking at new career opportunities and after compromising on a few over the years I've discovered that these are non negotiable keys to personal and professional happiness for me. Very much in order, they are:
1) People..it always starts (and ends) with the people: Are they great people to be around? Will you learn from them? Do you respect them?
2) The industry and/or the product opportunity: Does the product or solution excite you? Is it innovative? Is it groundbreaking within the industry etc..If you aren't excited about the product or the industry at the best of times, think of the disinterest when the going gets tough!
3) And last (but not least) the actual role: Is it a step forward? Is it a net new and challenging role or just filling the last person's shoes? Does it genuinely excite you?
If you don't get tingles by each and every one of the above..I would wait until an opportunity comes along that does!
Katharine Gregorio
Adobe Sr Director of Product Marketing, Creative Cloud
Career Path Tip: Be competitor aware, but customer obsessed. Nobody anywhere wakes up and says they want to buy your product, ever. They wake up and say they need to do xyz, which your product may or may not be able to do better, faster or easier than their current approach or solution. By becoming the expert on your user's real needs and sharing these with your cross functional peers, you will be able to drive the business forward against any goal.
Mary Sheehan
Adobe Head of Lightroom Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: One of my favorite questions is- "what have you learned lately?" because I have found the most successful people are always curious about the world. Whether it's adding another tool to the toolkit in your current role or learning an entirely new skill (like beekeeping!), constant learning puts you in a creative, growth mindset.
Apurva Davé
Aembit CMO
Career Path Tip: The more time product marketing can spend with customers, the better you'll be in almost every aspect of your job. Make sure everyone on your team is getting the right exposure.
Amey Kanade
Amazon Product Marketing at Fire TV (Smart TVs)
Career Path Tip: The Product Marketing role is perhaps the most ambiguous role within an organization. In my experience, I have seen the definition of a PMM role vary significantly across orgs/companies. But then I think you can use this ambiguity to your own benefit. Proactively try to define your own role, take risks, experiment, put yourself in uncomfortable situations. If you have a technical background, spend more time with your creative team. If you are a creative person, go attend sprint meetings with your engineers. That is the beauty of Product Marketing, it is both an inward and outward facing role. This will make you understand your business better than anybody else in the organization and will help you in the long run
Jason Perocho
Amperity SVP, Head of Marketing
Career Path Tip: Remember: product marketers market products, but sell ideas. Don't forget to use your positioning and messaging superpowers to traverse the wide range of pains, lingo, and KPIs to help each stakeholder understand your vision and buy into your plans.
Kevin Garcia
Anthropic Product Marketing Leader
Career Path Tip: Always be learning from customers. Don't just focus on learning their role or how they use your product. Get to know them, how they learn, and how they think. You'll be surprised at the kind of marketing you can do when you know—and care—about your audience.
Eric Keating
Appcues VP Marketing
Career Path Tip: Take off your marketing skin and try to channel your inner human. Is this how a normal non-marketing person would say it to their ride share driver or Trader Joe's bagger?
Jane Reynolds
Archer Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: I've found that being flexible, and open to differing opinions and shifting roadmaps, is essential in any product marketing role—and any role, for that matter. Flexibility leads to creativity which is ultimately the most rewarding for me, and it allows for a chance to form real relationships with your peers that can last your entire career.
Eric Bensley
Asana Head of Global Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Product marketing is not something anyone learns in school. Strong mentors are the only sustainable way to build and maintain your product marketing skill set. Invest early and often in relationships that make you a better PMM. And don't forget to pay it forward!
Ashley Faus
Atlassian Head of Lifecycle Marketing, Portfolio
Career Path Tip: Stay curious about your audience. Strategies and tools change all the time in marketing, but the ability to fall in love with your audience and their problems is a foundational skill for your entire career.
Ben Rawnsley-Johnson
Atlassian Head of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Life is short, don’t waste a second working on things that don’t matter. Your job in Product Marketing is not to do “all the things.” Your job is the build a business that matters. Prioritize accordingly. Remember, Product Marketing optimizes for alignment. The impact you deliver will be directly correlated to your ability to partner with the field, product and marketing to build a bridge between your product and its buyer.
Claire Drumond
Atlassian Sr. Director, Head of Product Marketing, Jira and Jira suite
Career Path Tip: If you put the customer's perspective first, you'll never fail as a product marketer. Use customer empathy to shape your strategy, messaging, vision & even to lead your teams -- if you do that, the rest will follow.
Daniel Kuperman
Atlassian Head of Core Product Marketing & GTM, ITSM Solutions
Career Path Tip: In our very busy schedules, it is easy to get sucked in by all the meetings and projects, personal commitments, and family needs. Make sure to block time on your calendar for your own personal growth. This could be 1 or more hours per week that you dedicate to self-improvement. Read a book, watch a video, talk to a mentor, or just sit in quiet meditation. Whatever you do, is important to have some "me time" every week. Do it often and it becomes a habit that will help you grow personally and professionally.
John Kinmonth
Atlassian Head of Product Marketing, Agile + DevOps Growth
Career Path Tip: Be kind to yourself. Even the best product marketers rarely hit the mark on the first try, and the best skill you can develop is to bring a growth mindset to any role you take or team you lead. Make your bets based on data, and if you don't hit the desired outcome—awesome. You've learned something valuable that will uplevel the business.
Candice Sparks
Attentive Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: A manager recently asked me "What skill sets do you need to develop to take my job?" Take time for self-reflection and be consistent in evaluating your strengths and areas for learning. Set goals for yourself and share those out with your peers. You don't need to wait for a promotion to start doing the job you want.
Greg Gsell
Attentive VP, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Your product has to pick something to focus on. Find whatever edge you can and make it seem like the biggest deal in the world. You can also talk about the sum of the parts as the narrative. You can also talk about the sum of the parts as the narrative.
Sahil Sethi
BetterUp Former Senior Vice President, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: You can learn anything!! Growth in PMM comes from leaning into new challenges. Over the course of your PMM career, you will work on messaging and storytelling, sales enablement, product launches, customer insights, roadmap influence, campaigns and what not. But no PMM starts out being great at all of these disciplines. If you ever feel daunted by the road ahead, just remind yourself - you can learn anything!! A growth mindset to learning new skills will help you tremendously in your PMM journey
Kelly Kipkalov
BILL Sr Director, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Don't despair if you don't see a lot of entry level PMM roles, and instead just try and land a marketing role in a company where you care about the product. There will be plenty of time for you to transition into a PMM role when opportunities come up, and there's no downside to starting on a different team. Your early career marketing experience will set you up well for PMM whenever the opportunity arises.
Anna Wiggins
Bluevine Sr. Director of Product Marketing, Content, Customer Research
Career Path Tip: Invest in understanding how your business works and which levers drive revenue. This will empower you to be an active contributor to strategic decisions, make you more impactful in getting engineering or budget resources, and help you prioritize what's important while still delivering on the best customer experience.
Jeff Hardison
Calendly Head of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Many product marketers focus on the marketing aspect of their career early on. As you progress, you have an opportunity to contribute more to the product side by influencing the roadmap. To get there, spend more time interviewing customers, compiling quotes from social media, and studying support tickets — and share what you learn with your company. People will appreciate it more than you imagine.
Indy Sen
Canva Ecosystem Marketing Leader
Career Path Tip: We've entered 2024 the same way we did 2023: with organizations continuing to do more with less, startups deciding which markets/audiences to focus on, and marketers looking to navigate a challenging business environment. Focus and specialization will be your friend, whether you're working your job or looking for one. The best marketing comes from teasing out the value props, having fun with them, and nailing what makes you unique. What goes for the product goes for the product marketer. So take stock of what you're good at, what you enjoy doing, and what you are uniquely suited for, and run with it. You got this, and our community's got you.
Grace Kuo
Chan Zuckerberg Initiative Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Don't wait for others to take initiative - I've learned a great PMM can be one that identifies a business gap or opportunity and helps to put things in motion.
Elizabeth Grossenbacher
Cisco Product Marketing Leader
Career Path Tip: Relationships with PMM peers and mentors will take you further in your career than logos and accolades. Share your dreams with these people, and bounce ideas off each other. You'll become a stronger PMM... and I promise it makes the journey a lot more fun!
Julien Sauvage
Clari VP, Brand, Content and Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Early in your career, go for the rocketship. Moving fast is the best way to learn fast, I'd say. Best way to learn all the facets of GTM, get your hands dirty, influence key strategic initiatives, show impact, etc. - that'll follow you for the rest of your career!
Lauren Craigie
Cortex Head of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: There’s a lot of debate right now about specialists vs generalists. The argument states that specialists (GTM, compete, content, customer, etc) wouldn’t have access to the full lifecycle of PMM activities. But that assumes specialists take a leg of the road to GTM, rather than just a different route. Content specialists should drive product strategy based on company narrative. Compete specialists should create content that helps the team win. Specialists don’t need to have a different workflow, just a different lens.
Amanda Groves
Crossbeam Senior Director Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Trade the career treadmill for the open trail. Lean into experiences over titles and diversified opportunities over linear learning. Don’t be afraid to try new things, fail fast, and learn faster. It may feel uncomfortable at first but that’s what growth is all about.
Jesse Lopez
Dandy Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Become the bridge between Marketing, Product, and GTM teams, ensuring internal stakeholders and external audiences understand what you offer, how your product works, and most importantly, why your customers should choose your solution over others. Be a keen listener who not only hears feedback but also understands the motivations and concerns of your colleagues and customers.
Ruth Juni
Demandbase Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Keep the customer in mind so that you write more about the benefits with features as the key support points. It's far too easy to write using the product features as the message and this is often the mistake of B2B companies. People care whether or not your product solves their problem so it's important to start with the benefit.
Alissa Lydon
Dovetail Product Marketing Lead
Career Path Tip: The best product marketers I have worked with were successful not necessarily because they had the most product or domain expertise. Rather, they were the best because they could effectively lead through influence. Your success as a product marketer is linked to the success of your partners in product, sales, customer success, marketing, and more. Be sure to nurture those relationships, align your goals with theirs, and consistently deliver value to create relationships that positively impact the business, as well as your personal brand.
Ryan Smith
Eightfold VP, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Be confident. Be Kind. Work hard and stay humble. Embrace discomfort -- it means you're learning and growing.
Aneri Shah
Ethos Head of Marketing, B2B
Career Path Tip: Fill the white space: Look for opportunities and gaps within (or outside!) the product area you work on, and think about how you can fill them. Is there something that nobody else is doing that would enhance the success of your product? Many of your most fulfilling projects may not come from the direct scope of a PMM, but will challenge you, add value to the team, and help you build your skill set.
Maureen Sitterson
Etsy Senior Director, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Never underestimate the power of a project no one wants to take on, or a seemingly insurmountable challenge in your career- those are career defining moments. If you overcome or improve the thing everyone thought impossible, you often experience explosive growth.
Yify Zhang
Eventbrite Global Head of Marketplace Marketing
Career Path Tip: As a product marketer, it's important to stay adaptable and flex your scope based on the organization's unique strengths and weaknesses. The first 1-2 months on a job is a great time to identify the unique gaps of an organization, pick one that you have a strength in (and are interested in solving), and build a crisp perspective (with a written deliverable that can be shared without voiceover) that positions you as a thought leader on that topic. You'll find yourself invited into conversations much more quickly, and make an impact more directly.
Dave Steer
GitLab Vice President of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Listening is a product marketer's superpower. By investing time in active listening - to customers, to teammates, to the market - you will grow your capacity for customer empathy, your leadership skills, and your track record in effectively taking products to market.
Sherry Wu
Gong Senior Director, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: When faced with a career choice, I ask myself two things: 1) What new experience could I learn here? 2) If I fast forward one year, what can I say I've accomplished?.
When there's something unknown, that's a signal that there's a learning opportunity; you can accelerate your career when you run towards learning opportunities. It's also important to have something to show at the end of the day; leaders are always looking for folks who can provide confidence that, "Whatever is needed, I can handle it, and handle it well." If you can fearlessly embrace ambiguity with an ownership mindset, you will go far in your career.
Madeline Ng
Google Global Head of Marketing, Google Maps Platform
Career Path Tip: Plan for serendipity. Your next job or inspiration may come from an unexpected place! Spend 15 minutes a week reaching back out to your network or learning something new and you'll build more chances for discovering your next move.
Martin Raygoza
Google Marketing Head for YouTube Shorts Mexico & Spanish LATAM
Career Path Tip: In my opinion, a successful product marketing lead should embody two essential qualities: an insatiable appetite for continuous learning and a commitment to a collaborative mindset. Cultivate a collaborative and open culture within your team where everyone feels comfortable sharing their insights, learnings, and ideas. This way, you can collectively shape and define the next steps of your strategy.
Vishal Naik
Google Product Marketing Lead
Career Path Tip: Ultimately, your career growth is in your own hands. Of course it helps when you have a great manager, but the ball is really in your court, so take on the responsibility to own your brand. Find the opportunities where you can help your team. Be the person your stakeholders can rely on. Think about how your work and your product map into the business’s key priorities. And focus your competitive energy on being better than you were yesterday.
Axel Kirstetter
Guidewire Software VP Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: In first few days of a new job 1. Listen-in or read customer issues. This is the best way to learn about a product. 2. Join Sales on pitches. Best way to understand in-market positioning and messaging. 3. listen in to S/BDR calls, review their emails. Ideal for competitive and sales asset knowledge acquisition.
Leah Brite
Gusto Head of Product Marketing, Employers
Career Path Tip: Invest in relationships. Harness your PMM empathy skills to understand your cross-functional partners and their goals, create alignment, and launch impactful work on behalf of the customers you serve.
Nate Franklin
Hex Head of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: I believe that a major difference between successful PMMs and those who struggle is their relationship with the Sales org. Here are some ideas that can help you build trust with sales: 1) Help win a deal. 2) Be responsive and available. 3) Understand a challenge sales is facing and ship a solution. 4) Become an expert. 5) Stand your ground.
Nisha Goklaney
HubSpot Senior Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Establish a strong relationship with your peers in sales and product (in fact make them your best friends) and have an ongoing habit of meeting w/customers. This will help you look through the lens of your most important stakeholders and approach every project with a view of 'what's in it for them' (WIIFM). This will also enable you to focus on the most important initiatives to drive maximum business impact. Finally, always measure impact in terms of hard metrics (ARR lift, % of Product adoption, # of reps enabled etc.)
Sean Lauer
Instruqt VP of Marketing
Career Path Tip: Figure out what you’re good at versus what you’re passionate about. It’s much easier to figure out a company or industry that interest you. It’s much harder to figure out the skills that comprise your personal competitive advantage, which will ultimately drive your career success.
Surachita Bose
Iterable Senior Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Thriving as a product marketer is not just about the skills; it's about the mindset. Ace product marketers understand that the market, customer needs and competitor play is ever-evolving, and to thrive, one must become a perpetual student of the market. Embrace this and navigate the ambiguity with poise and always remember that it is okay to not have all the answers. Adopt a mindset of adaptability and continuous learning -- this is the muscle that fuels your career.
Mandy Schafer
Mastercard Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Recently our SVP of Product said to me, "Our teams could not function without PMM". Let that sink in. Too often we end up being a catch all, do everything and feel exhausted. Without PMM, sales can't sell, marketing can't build demand gen, Product and Engineering can't articulate what they built etc. Our skills are valuable, but it doesn't mean we need to do it all. Focus on one PMM skill set and power that up to show off how valuable you are to the organization.
Alex Lobert
Meta Product Marketing Lead, Facebook for Business & Commerce
Career Path Tip: Experiment to find what you enjoy and what you want to invest in. Try new projects, roles, and companies. Career success is often a function of longevity and motivation and if you don’t like what you do, you probably won’t stick it out.
Chad Kimner
Meta Product Marketing Director, AR/VR
Career Path Tip: The most successful PMMs I know think like business owners, but know how to tone that down in politically challenging, cross-functional environments. Sometimes our challenge is to develop strong convictions and communicate them gently.
Kavya Nath
Meta Product Marketing, Reality Labs
Career Path Tip: Product marketers navigate the spectrum from creative storytellers to analytical go-to-market strategists. Recognize your strengths, pinpoint areas for growth with self-awareness, and seek collaboration and learning opportunities from your peers and leaders in other areas of the business. Embrace discomfort; it's the catalyst for unlocking your full potential in this multifaceted career.
Michele Nieberding 🚀
MetaRouter Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Try it all early on! From owning product launches to diving into deep competitive intelligence projects to crafting messaging docs from scratch. It's the "crash course" that unveils your strengths and weaknesses, kind of like a personal roadmap. This will help you become a well-rounded product marketer, the Swiss Army knife in your professional toolkit. This will make you indispensable, because of your ability to understand, identify, and fill the unique needs of any organization, navigating the landscape with impact and strategy. Early exploration leads to seasoned expertise, and in the dynamic world of product marketing, versatility is your greatest asset.
Alina Fu
Microsoft Director, Copilot for Microsoft 365
Career Path Tip: Having intellectual curiosity is how you expand your skills and knowledge. When you know what you're passionate about, lean into those new opportunities and leverage your experience in different ways. Asking genuine questions because of what piques your interests will provide both personal and professional development.
Kristen Kanka
Morningstar Head of Marketing, Enterprise Solutions
Career Path Tip: To be effective in their role, product marketers must be highly collaborative, lead and influence people who don’t report to them, and engage a wide group of stakeholders – especially for large go-to-market moments.
Pallavi Vanacharla
New Relic VP, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Looking back, I find that 3 things have enabled my career growth –– a) deeply understanding the customer and solving for their needs with all sincerity, b) obsessing over my learning and perfecting my craft every single day, and c) being fortunate enough to be recognized by leaders who sponsored my growth. You can’t control C, but if you focus on A and B, then C is inevitable.
John Hurley
Notion Head of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: PMM is hard (and awesome) because we are a hub, not a spoke that often controls the final outputs. We’re not growth marketers, or demand gen manager, or brand marketers. However we do influence, inform, manifest, and/or articulate growth strategies and campaigns.
LaShaun Williams
Observable VP, Marketing
Career Path Tip: Say yes to and actively seek opportunities above your experience level; it's the only way to level up. Discomfort drives growth. Comfort early on breeds complacency and stagnation.
Gina Leranth
Paycor Senior Director, Customer and Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: The strongest voice to help identify and prioritize where marketing can make the most significant impact is that of the customer.
Jackie Palmer
Pendo.io VP Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Product Marketing is like an octopus, with 8 (or more!) legs reaching out across the organization. The most important thing you can do to grow within your organization is build relationships cross-functionally. Whether you start with a monthly coffee or a weekly check in, building relationships will help you grow both professionally but also personally!
Hien Phan
Pinecone Head of Product Marketing, Partner, and Customer Marketing
Career Path Tip: Focus on strategy and what problem you're solving for your customer first before tactics. If you do that, the positioning, message, and launch tactics will come to you easily.
Charlene Wang
Qualia VP of Marketing
Career Path Tip: Always be learning! To be a great product marketer, there's so much to learn and relearn over time, from messaging and positioning to enablement, leadership, and more. The best product marketers are always seeking new knowledge and insights. Don't shy away from asking for feedback, both positive and constructive. We're all growing in some dimension, and that also makes the journey more fun.
Sarah Din
Quickbase VP of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Your authenticity is your strongest asset. Cultivating genuine connections with people across your company isn't just about collaboration or even networking—it's about learning and growing through diverse perspectives. The most successful PMMs don't just understand their products; they understand the people behind them. By being true to yourself and valuing others for who they are, you create a foundation of trust that not only enriches your career journey but also leads to your best work. Always be yourself; the right people will resonate with your authenticity.
Nami Sung
Ramp VP of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Take off your marketing skin and try to channel your inner human. Is this how a normal non-marketing person would say it to their ride share driver or Trader Joe's bagger?
Aliza Edelstein
Route VP of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: There are many facets of product marketing—messaging & positioning, GTM strategy, driving growth metrics, telling the customer story. You can be a senior individual contributor or a people leader. You choose your own adventure. Identify where where you get your energy, what motivates you, and where you want to go. A mentor can’t tell you what you want, but a mentor can help you become who you want to be.
Aurelia Solomon
Salesforce Senior Director, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Always ask yourself, and others, why? Why are we doing this? What problem does it solve for the customer? What value does it create? Why is this initiative a priority over initiatives b,c, and d? How does this align to our company goals? Challenging your own (and others') thinking and decisions helps ensure you remain focused on the right priorities/work to be done for your customers and your business.
Jodi Innerfield
Salesforce Senior Director, Product Marketing Launch Strategy & Emerging Products
Career Path Tip: No career is a straight line. As a product marketer, you may not have always been a PMM. You might not always be a PMM in the future. Know that every experience you've had to this point in your career uniquely positions you in some way, and figure out a way to identify those skills and strengths that are uniquely yours. Some of the best PMMs I know come from outside marketing. Embrace that difference as a strength, not a weakness.
Rekha Srivatsan
Salesforce Vice President Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Nothing sticks in your head than a good story. It's not just for the content you create, but also for the brand you are. Always connect your experience from one role to another to help you grow. And remember opportunities don't happen, you create them.
Srini Nirmalgandhi
Salesforce Head of Product Marketing for Heroku
Career Path Tip: Embrace the dynamic nature of your career journey by being versatile and staying open to the possibility of exploring different industries and functional areas. Instead of fixating on a linear trajectory, consider each shift an opportunity for personal and professional growth. Sometimes, the most unexpected detours lead to the most enriching destinations.
Holly Xiao
Salesloft Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: While comfort is easy, true growth in any role comes from seeking discomfort. Challenge yourself with projects and tasks that feel uncomfortable. It's in these that you'll find growth and readiness for future roles.
Jack Wei
Sendbird Head of Marketing
Career Path Tip: People over profit. The top reason someone loves or leaves a job? Their manager. It’s also unsurprisingly a major factor in career progression. Stick with people who have your back, and over time you’ll go further vs. prioritizing for pay, product/company popularity, or market size.
Andy Yen
ServiceNow Global Partner Marketing Director
Career Path Tip: As good as you are at building positioning, content, and enablement programs; at the end of the day any marketing role is going to be measured by your influence and your results . It's up to you as a marketer to showcase your work and communicate the impact you have. Invest the time to build cross-functional relationships across your organization, with customers, partners, and industry experts.
Don Fuss
ServiceNow Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: You own your career path. While factors outside of your control will influence some of the steps in your career you have the ability to craft a course of direction. And that direction does not always have to be linear. Product Marketing is one of the most interesting, demanding, influential and collaborative functions within an organization. But take the opportunity to get outside of your comfort zone and learn new skills, take on new projects, apply for positions that will expand your capabilities, and enjoy the new experiences.
Courtney Craig
Shopify Senior Team Lead, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Spend a few weeks a year in a customer support function at any company you go to. It’ll be painful, but there’s no better way to understand the product. Also, find and remember YOUR definition of success and stay true to that - not anyone else’s.
Marisa Currie-Rose
Shopify Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Product Marketing is an incredibly dynamic role that covers a wide range of responsibilities. It is important to embrace continuous learning and maintain a curious mindset. Actively seek opportunities to learn from others, whether it's attending industry conferences, learning from your colleagues, or from relevant courses. Always ask questions and pay attention to the details.
Robin Fontaine
Shopify Senior Product Marketing Lead
Career Path Tip: Know your customer (like, really!). Talking directly with your customers in 1:1 conversations is the best way to truly understand their world, and take great leaps forward in how effective your marketing can be. Make this a regular part of each week and you'll see results in your immediate goals and projects, and longer term growth in your career.
Alex Gutow
Snowflake Senior Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Product marketing is a lot easier (and more fun) if you're actually excited about the product(s) you're working on. That excitement will come through in your work, and will make your sales enablement, customer meetings, and other presentations all the more impactful. Part of developing that excitement means really becoming the expert on your product. Don't be afraid to dive in and get technical. Having a deep understanding of your area will make you a more powerful product marketer and will help you better identify opportunities that align with the areas you're most excited by.
Raman Sharma
Sourcegraph Chief Marketing Officer
Career Path Tip: PMMs should almost be embedded into their counterpart Product/Engineering teams. The intent is for PMMs to constantly stay in touch with the Product team to understand the what, why, and when of the customer value being delivered. Having this mindset and being an active participant in decision-making builds empathy within PMMs for the realities of Product delivery and empathy within partner teams for the downstream dependency pressures that PMMs feel for Product GTM.
Josephine Ruiz-Healy
Spotify Associate Director, Head of Product Marketing at Spotify for Artists
Career Path Tip: Dedicate some time each week to working backwards from successful outcomes and looking around corners. The ability to develop this skill as an individual contributor will serve you well as you start managing more products and larger teams. While an individual contributor might work backwards from a successful product launch to define sequencing and anticipate blockers, a more senior product marketer might work backwards from adoption goals to identify the most pressing organizational gaps.
Amy Loh
Square Head of Product Marketing, Square Staff
Career Path Tip: Run towards hard problems - those will be the most rewarding career experiences. Don't take "no" for an answer - always look towards alternate paths to solving a problem, especially if it's a worthwhile problem to solve!
Kevin Zentmeyer
Square Head of Product Marketing, Square Point of Sale
Career Path Tip: Many product marketers' unique strengths stem from their background before joining the profession. If you worked in finance, you may be better at pricing or forecasting vs sales enablement if you came from a customer-facing function. It's important to recognize your strengths within this broad discipline, especially early in your PMM career, so that you know what you bring to the table and how to complement your teammates' skill sets.
Mike Greenberg
SurveyMonkey Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: The relationships and trust you build will be one of your biggest career assets, directly impacting the influence you’re able to achieve. Take the time to deeply understand your internal customers’ needs just as well as the external ones. Make yourself visible, and focus on delivering real strategic value and resources that make your partners’ lives easier. The network you build will not only become your champions, but a great source of perspective and expertise you’ll be able to call on when you need it.
Morgan (Molnar) Lehmann
SurveyMonkey Senior Director, Head of Product & Solutions Marketing
Career Path Tip: The grass isn’t always greener. Some people have the instinct to jump ship every time there is a bump in the road. But one thing I’ve learned in my career is that change is inevitable. It’s how companies grow and adapt and, ultimately, thrive. No company is immune to reorgs and layoffs. If you believe in your product and your leadership, your relationship with your manager and team is solid, and you enjoy the work you do, ride it out. You will likely emerge with more career opportunities internally: fresh projects, people management opportunities, and expanded scope. Your career will grow as the company grows.
Priya Gill
SurveyMonkey Head of Global Marketing
Career Path Tip: In my career, I've found that people who really accelerate in their PMM careers at a fast pace understand the importance of PIE (performance, image, exposure) early on and that it primarily needs to be self-driven. It's that winning combination of high performance, strong personal brand and exposure to your work at the senior level that really helps set you apart from your peers. Good managers can help you get there, but they can’t do it all for you.
Scott Monroe
SurveyMonkey Director, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: When considering your next career move in product marketing, keep these three things in mind:
- Choose the right team over the best title
- Choose a manager who values you the most over one that only pays you the most
- Choose product-market fit over product hype
Monty Wolper
The New York Times Executive Director, Head of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: A fulfilling career doesn't have to be linear. Quite the opposite! Take it from someone who's held positions across marketing, customer insights, business strategy, and product: you'll be much better at building empathy with your cross-functional partners if you've walked in their shoes and understand their motivations — it's not so different than being your own customer.
Christine Sotelo-Dag
ThoughtSpot Senior Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Embrace the Uncomfortable. In Product Marketing, stepping outside your comfort zone is where innovation thrives. Don't shy away from ideas that might seem unconventional or uncharted. The most impactful strategies often emerge from the willingness to explore the unknown. Challenge yourself to experiment with new and untested approaches—this is where you'll discover untapped potential and set yourself apart in a crowded landscape.
Lindsey Weinig
Twilio Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Since Product Marketers interact across many teams, it is valuable to build a diverse network of trusted mentors. Identify peers and leaders you respect and admire and nurture trusting relationships. Tap into your network for regular feedback, advice on the challenges and opportunities you face, and to gain perspective from their experiences.
Jon Rooney
Unity Vice President Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Make it a regular habit to use the product you market, even if it's just a little bit every week. Hands-on product familiarity and competency will improve your core deliverables (messaging, positioning, sales enablement, etc) as well as build credibility in the eyes of partners across the business.
Sarah Scharf
Vanta VP of Product and Corporate Marketing
Career Path Tip: Tell ’Em What You’re Going To Tell ’Em; Next, Tell ’Em; Next, Tell ’Em What You Told ’Em" is fine advice for college essays, but terrible for persuasive communication. Resist the urge to prove your expertise by talking at people - try to persuade them by really connecting with their minds.
Hila Segal
WalkMe Vice President, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Be a lifelong learner:In the environment in which we operate as product marketers, change is the only constant. Make a conscious commitment to continuous improvement and keeping pace with new ways to do our job. The playbooks that worked well for us a decade, half a decade, or even just two years ago may no longer be relevant. Therefore, ensure that you are super comfortable with embracing the process of learning new skills and reinventing yourself repeatedly. This adaptability is key to thriving in our ever-evolving landscape.
Meghan Keaney Anderson
Watershed VP of Marketing - Product Marketing & Communications
Career Path Tip: When people think about product marketing, they often focus on product launch campaigns. That's certainly an important piece of the strategy, but I'd encourage product marketers to get skilled at sizing up segments, doing market testing, and informing first year revenue projections for a new product long before it's even fully built. Helping to inform the early decisions of a product's direction will give any future marketing strategy much better odds.
Elise Beck
Wistia Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: The most challenging times of your career are often the most rewarding. When you're faced with a big, hairy problem or challenge, take a moment to reflect on the smaller pieces that led you to this point. Recognizing and overcoming those little hurdles early on can be the key to sidestepping them in the future.
Katie Gerard
Workhuman Head of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Credibility is your most important currency as a product marketer. Become an expert in the market, the product, and your customers - and watch it open doors for you within your organization.
Jennifer Kay Corridon
Yelp Product Marketing Expert & Mentor
Career Path Tip: Be a consistent champion for your customers- take an expansive view to understand how their needs, habits, and perceptions change over time. When working with cross functional teams, no matter how high pressure the situation, go back to playground principles- treat others how you want to be treated and don't throw sand in the sandbox.
Candace Marshall
Zendesk Senior Director, Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Approach your career like a great product launch plan: reflect and set clear goals, strategically select projects and roles that will help you build your skill set, and surround yourself with great mentors who can guide you along the way.
Lauren Hakim
Zendesk Group Product Marketing Manager
Career Path Tip: A key component of success in product marketing is embracing change and ambiguity. The landscape is constantly evolving, and it's our role to not only adapt, but also foresee and shape that change. Stay agile and you'll thrive.
Mozhdeh Rastegar-Panah
Zendesk Senior Director Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Keep a customer obsessed mantra - if you stay close to the customer, your input and perspective will carry more weight and value.. and will never lead you in a wrong direction.
Polomi Batra
Zendesk Director of Product Marketing
Career Path Tip: Don't shy away from testing and experimenting. Whether it's A/B testing different messaging, trying out new channels, or exploring innovative approaches to product launches, being open to experimentation can uncover hidden opportunities and refine your skills for optimal impact. Embrace the learning journey.
Brianne Shally
Marketing Consultant
Career Path Tip: Here's my advice based on Dr. Seuss: Oh, the places you'll go... You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go. Own your career and dream BIG! Be intentional in investing in your own learning, development, and goals. This Playbook includes: setting goals and sharing them with others, scheduling quarterly career development chats with your manager, asking for feedback including sending a quarterly feedback survey to cross functional teammates, and developing a dream BIG action plan.
Madison Leonard
Marketing & GTM Consultant
Career Path Tip: There are 3 things that make up a successful product marketing career: 1) develop trust across the organization, 2) have strong ownership over business metrics that move the needle, and 3) invest in your segmented GTM strategy more than anything else. Follow these simple rules, and you'll be lightyears ahead of other PMMs.
Mike Berger
Ex-VP, Product Marketing @ ClickUp, SurveyMonkey, Gainsight, Marketo
Career Path Tip: If you’re a PMM reading this, I’d advise you to carve out some dedicated time each month to step back and think strategically about whether or not you’re focused on things that are truly going to move the needle. How much of what you are doing can be tied to the company’s most important goals and initiatives, and how tightly? Literally, block out time on your calendar each month for this, then try to ensure that a significant percentage of your time is aligned to these goals and initiatives. Making a habit of this is a great way of ensuring you’ll make an outsized impact on the business and accelerate your career growth in the process.