Grant Shirk

Time for some radical transparency.  I'm in the midst of this right now. Tomorrow is my 30-day milestone at Cisco Meraki. It's been an awesome first four weeks, and I'm really looking forward to what's next. (Shameless pitch - we're hiring, too!) The size of the company and team adds a layer of complexity here, but in general, this is your best chance to really focus on learning your customer, product, and market here. It's hard to go back and do this again, especially in growth mode, so don't t ...Read More

Pulling this one up. It's outside the realm of KPIs and measurement, but I think it's really critical. And I have a few strong opinions here.  If I can summarize this back, as part of your interview process, you were given an assignment to build an overall strategic plan to take a flagship product to market, do it under extreme time and emotional pressure, and summarize it all in a few hundred words.  To put it bluntly, this is a terrible way to assess someone's skills, is antithetical to what w ...Read More

This is a great one! It's also something few people do well in an interview setting. It's a bit challenging to do verbally, but if you think it through in advance, you can be prepared when the opportunity presents itself. The first thing - the success of your positioning in an interview setting is best shown through anecdotes and specific details. Just like in real life, it's very hard to say "my positioning increased our pipeline by 15%." That's a complex calculus, and not easily justifiable. I ...Read More

I'm a little biased here, but I don't believe that there are courses or certifications that are a prerequisite or requirement to jumping into product marketing. If you haven't done any marketing before, or worked alongside a good marketing team, Pragmatic Marketing by the Pragmatic Institute is a solid framework for twisting your head around what marketing is really about.  But the best way to learn is on the job. If you have a PMM function at your current company, get to know them. Ask about wh ...Read More

There are a number of templates available online. My first recommendation is to confirm your CMO's expecation - it's rare for a CMO to *not* have a favorite format for this.  However, if they are truly asking you to build something up from scratch, there are a few basic elements you need: Target audience. Who you are trying to reach. This is both persona (multiple) and firmographic Problem and solution. What the customer's core problem is, and how your product/solution addresses it, uniquely Pos ...Read More

This is a fun one. An aphorism we could coin here is that "Competitive battlecards are just like datasheets. Every salesperson desperately wants a new one, but nobody ever uses them."  The challenge is that most competitive intel and content is boring, too detailed to use in the moment, hard to find, and usually out of date. What that means is that great competitive intel is a content marketing problem at heart. It has to be relevant, it has to be interesting, and it has to be easy to consume. T ...Read More

The pressure's on for this one. Feels like this is the kind of topic first chapters in business books are devoted to.  A successful GTM is hard to describe in detail. Every business, customer, product, team, and marketplace are different and the right path through can vary widely. And the details shift as the market matures; competitors enter, different problems take priority, macroeconomic uncertainty can loom. But, there are some characteristics of success you can look towards to judge if you' ...Read More

This is what makes PMM so fun. And also a little chaotic. You're frequently context-shifting between strategic investments (a 12- to 18-month horizon), quarterly operational work (those "big rocks" and Tier 1 launches), and the daily/weekly/monthly execution below the scenes. And then a competitor (or new entrant) does something you have to react to. Engage competitive skillsets! I've found the best way to manage through this is through a few tools: Clearly establish what your high-impact priori ...Read More

Okay, this is a fun one, so I'm going to start here. As a former UI designer (at Pixo and Tellme Networks**), this is probably the most fun you'll have in product marketing. You're bringing together three functions that thrive on different kinds of creativity. Words, emotion, and structural design all coming together.  Other than "strap in and see what happens," there are a few things you can do to escalate the fun and the output of this dynamic mix: Don't start cold. For a group to really gel, ...Read More

There are two questions here, and I'll address both. One answer is much shorter than the other. How do we collaborate across industry and core PMM? Constantly. At Meraki, we do have an Audiences team focused on both industry and a few specific LOB personas. The give and take is pretty regular. We collaborate on content, messaging, and thought leadership to make sure we're helping attract and meet customers on their terms.  That's the short answer. Your second question about being the first verti ...Read More