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The Impact of PLG on the PMM Career with Jeff Hardison, Head of PMM at Calendly
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From startup companies to being at a large scale organization, Jeff has been
doing product marketing work since before it was even defined as PMM. In this
interview you’ll hear his point of view on the emergence of self serve and how
it’s impacted the role of product marketing. He shares how the ...more
Product Marketing • Follow Jeff
How do you approach your work geared toward individual users (B2C) vs. your B2B/enterprise customers?
Head of Product Marketing at Calendly
Because product marketing is such a collaborative function -- we're like
diplomats and glue between product-engineering-design, marketing, customer
success, and sales (if you have it) -- I try to open up my "empathy reserves"
for the various departments I'm going to work with.
If it's B2C, I thi...more
Product Marketing • Follow Jeff
As a product marketer, what tactics do you use to impact product roadmap?
Head of Product Marketing at Calendly
I just say, "I really think this feature idea is really cool!"
Just kidding.
One of my go-to tactics is compiling customer feedback about a problem or
feature idea from several customers. Create a Notion document, outline the
problem, and list several quotes from customers about said problem....more
Product Marketing • Follow Jeff
Earlier this year. I had an interview which I think went well but after the assignment. I did not move forward to the next round. I would like to how you would handle this assignment. To be better prepared in similar situations. here the quest?
Head of Product Marketing at Calendly
I’d have to see your assignment response to make recommendations! And I probably
shouldn’t print my recommendations here publicly, as this company probably wants
to keep the assignment confidential. Feel free to befriend me on LinkedIn
[https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeff-hardison-2367531/], and I'l...more
Messaging • Follow Jeff
How do you drive alignment across the exec team on messaging
Head of Product Marketing at Calendly
I feel fortunate that I’ve led positioning/messaging workshops since I graduated
college because I worked for an agency that mandated them for every project we
worked on for tech clients.
Getting an exec team to agree on a document outlining positioning and messaging
isn't the hard part in my o...more
Product Marketing • Follow Jeff
Our product team has a difficult time sticking to timelines. This makes launches pretty difficult to manage without creating large lapses in communication. Any strategies to manage this?
Head of Product Marketing at Calendly
It's very common -- particularly in modern software companies -- for product
teams to move timelines based on engineering constraints, customer feedback in
the beta-testing process, and more. All product marketers wrestle with this
situation. So, realize you're not alone!
I recommend explaining ...more
Product Marketing • Follow Jeff
How have your product marketing teams traditionally worked with your demand generation / growth marketing team?
Head of Product Marketing at Calendly
First, I try real hard to let go of my ego and temporarily forget about the past
(e.g., how I worked with demand gen in another company). Every company’s
marketing department is structured differently, and it’s important to quickly
adapt.
Then, I try to be human and have a conversation with each...more
If you have to improve the adoption rate of a SaaS product, where would you start? Like what are the first things you would check/do?
Head of Product Marketing at Calendly
Oh, man, big question! It really depends on the product and company. But if I
have to generalize...
First, I’d try to get crystal clear on what we mean by adoption rate. Is that
net-new free signups? Is that activation of those signups? Let’s say it’s it’s
activation of those signups for discuss...more
Product Marketing • Follow Jeff
How much of your growth marketing tactics based around acquisition, and how much are they based around retention?
Head of Product Marketing at Calendly
Each quarter, our team is generally proposing helping with KPIs around:
- acquisition of new users
- activating those new users
- expanding or upgrading users (using their credit card to buy something more)
- retaining those users month over month, and year over year
- talking to sales abou...more
Product Marketing • Follow Jeff
How do you define product marketing differently in a product-led growth company vs. a traditional company with a normal sales and marketing funnel?
Head of Product Marketing at Calendly
This is one of my favorite topics, and I write more extensively about
product-led marketing versus sales-led marketing on the Product-Led Growth
Collective site:
https://www.productled.org/blog/marketers-prepare-product-led-growth
[https://www.productled.org/blog/marketers-prepare-product-led-gro...more