Jenna Crane

I'd recommend having on hand: * Your story. Be prepared to give a brief walkthrough of your background and experience. I always like to see when someone has a strong narrative about their career — why they made each move, the highlights of their experience and what they learned, and what they're looking for next. * An example of a product launch or major project you led that you were particularly proud of. Be prepared to talk about the process of putting it together, any difficulties you faced and how you overcame them, and what the impact was (with actual metrics like revenue, product adoption, or awareness / engagment lift if you can!). * Examples of how you've worked with each of the functions represented on the interview panel. If you're speaking with a PM, a sales director, and a performance marketer, for example, prep stories about how you've worked with product, sales, and performance marketing. * A few companies that you think are doing product marketing well. The first time I got asked this question in an interview, I didn't have an answer prepared, and it was super tough to think of a few on the spot. You may not get asked this question, but you'll be grateful to have an answer in your back pocket if you do. * Questions for each of the panelists. Even if they're basic ones like 'how do you envision the person in this role will work with your team?' or 'what are the characteristics of people who are really successful at this company?' you don't want to be left without any questions for the interviewer. 

My favorite question is "What would be your positioning statement for yourself as a product marketer?" I love that question because it shows me how comfortable they are with the basics of positioning, and it tells me a lot about the aspects of product marketing that they care most about. For example, they may highlight their strength in messaging and positioning, or their customer-centricity, or their ability to partner with teams across the company. It's also another opportunity to see how they communciate complex concepts in a clear, concise, and compelling way. I've heard a lot of great responses, and there is no right answer. But I always come away with a deeper understanding of how they view their strengths, as well as the type of work they like to do.

Cross-functional work is Product Marketing's middle name! PMM <> Sales * Key deliverables: Pitch decks, enablement assets (internal resources like battlecards and personas, external resources like one-pagers and case studies), and trainings * Key goals: Improve win rates, improve competitive win rates, increase ASP, shorten sales cycles, improve demo request to demo held rates, generate pipeline, improve sales team confidence PMM <> CS * Key deliverables: Same as sales, but with an existing customer upgrade / health / cross-sell / retention angle. Add in enablement on new features and important changes (like pricing), and resources like maturity models or crawl/walk/run decks. * Key goals: Average customer health score, net retention or churn rates, NPS, CS-driven expansion, lifetime value [though be careful about signing up for these, as seen in one of my other answers!] PMM <> Marketing * Key deliverables: Messaging and positioning, launch moments and/or campaigns, website pages, case studies, personas and customer insights, demo and/or explainer videos, competitive intelligence, and more * Key goals: Website traffic, share of voice, engagement metrics for external moments like launches or campaigns, website conversion rate / bounce rate, and (whenever possible) revenue-focused metrics like leads/demo requests, MQLs, opportunities/pipeline, and self-serve ARR PMM <> Product * Key deliverables: Product positioning, roadmap feedback, market/customer research, competitive intelligence, launches, GTM strategy for new products, support with onboarding experiences and product-led growth/virality * Key goals: Feature adoption, adoption and/or revenue generated from new product lines, self-serve revenue, NPS, net retention rate, specific virality metrics

1. They didn't prepare. It's really hard to justify moving a candidate forward if they don't know basic details about our company, their answers lack details and depth, and/or they don't have questions for the interviewer. 2. They are too long-winded or rambling, and/or their answers are mostly jargon. Of course we want to hear candidates reference terms we use in our day-to-day work. But if all their answers are more buzzwords than substance, or if they struggle to communicate in a concise and clear way, we have to pass. So much of product marketing success is about effective communication — with customers and prospects, as well as people across the company — so I give this a lot of weight. 3. They can't effectively connect with cross-functional partners on the panel. We make sure our panels have key partners from the cross-functional teams they'd work closely with. Sometimes we see candidates struggle to build rapport or have productive conversations with those interviewers, which can indicate they may not have enough experience working with those teams. (It also doesn't make those key stakeholders super excited to partner with that person.) Less common but even more concerning: we sometimes see people who, in trying to talk about their experience working with that function, inadvertently disparage that function. (For example, throwing their current product team under the bus is always concerning, but especially when talking to a PM.) That's a big red flag.

Courses, certifications, and books can definitely help transition into product marketing, but the best way to learn is by doing. I would see if there are side projects you can take on with the PMM team, in addition to self-driven learning. For courses and certifications: * I typically recommend the PMA. They have a variety of programs depending on how broad or narrow you want to go, and how much time you have. * I've also had great experience with General Assembly; depending on your location they may have relevant product marketing courses to choose from. * There's also Pragmatic Institute, but I haven't heard any feedback there. And my 3 must-read product marketing books are: * Obviously Awesome, by April Dunford * Positioning, by Al Ries and Jack Trout * Playing to Win, by A.G. Lafley and Roger L. Martin Good luck! 

Absolutely writing samples! I always ask for those. (As you can tell from my other answers, communication is something I care deeply about!) Case studies, landing pages, pitch decks / other enablement assets, and messaging frameworks can also be great additions to a portfolio. Just make sure you can speak to the process of building those, because it's impossible to know just from looking at them how much was built by the candidate vs. a collaborator. What really makes a candidate stand out, I've found, is a short 'about me' deck. I've seen some great decks that include: * Work samples (including some commentary about the process of developing that work) * Some thoughts about their approach to product marketing * A slide or two about their career and the highlights of their experience * Bonus: Something that tells me a little bit about who they are as a person outside of work (hobbies, things they're passionate about, etc.) Not only is this full of great insight into the candidate, but it's also a great example of how they position themselves. It's essentially a sales enablement asset, which should hopefully translate into how well they can do that for our company and products. 

I find that it depends on the scale of what I’m messaging. If it’s for a small project (a landing page, a video, etc.) I like to go with: * Key message * 3 supporting value propositions, with taglines and descriptions * Supporting points for each of those value props — whether those are unique differentiators, supporting features, and/or reasons to believe/proof points I like to use the following table structure: https://www.dropbox.com/s/x1catf2yn6zh451/Screen%20Shot%202021-07-14%20at%209.59.54%20PM.png?dl=0 If it’s for something slightly larger — a launch or a campaign, for example — I add on to the above with: * Overall - Target headlines - Key message per target persona, and/or guidance for how to adapt the messaging to serve different audiences * For each value prop: - Key benefits / value delivered - Key use cases - Success metrics — what are the key outcomes someone can expect to see? (e.g. higher customer lifetime value) And if it’s for an entire product line or company, I typically compile messaging frameworks for 3 different stages of the customer journey: * Awareness: Why should customers should evaluate your type of solution? This doesn’t mention your company or product at all, and is designed to inform really top-of-funnel activities or conversations. For example, the messaging framework for Klaviyo’s SMS product talks about why text message marketing is so valuable, and why companies should consider it, but never mentions Klaviyo. * Consideration: Why should your company earn a place in the consideration set? This pays off the awareness messaging above it, explaining how your company/product delivers on the value propositions established in the awareness-level messaging. In the Klaviyo example, the 3 awareness-level value props are ‘deliver a better customer experience,’ ‘double your ROI’ and ‘build direct relationships with your customers.' The consideration-level messaging uses those same value props, but talks about how Klaviyo delivers on them — knowing that those are the criteria that people will use to build their consideration set. It’s like you're giving the prospect permission to say "ok, this company checks those boxes, I’ll learn more." * Decision: Once you’re in the consideration set, this is where you set yourself apart from competitors and define the purchase decision criteria. This messaging should live at the intersection in the Venn Diagram of: what customers value, what your product/company does uniquely well, and what is competitively differentiated. This is usually the most extensive framework I build out, because it shapes the majority of what goes out into market: website language, sales assets, paid ads, etc.

Make sure you talk about the process! That includes: * What was the existing state when you started (i.e. messaging didn't exist, it did exist but it was falling flat / was outdated, etc.)? * How did you go about developing the messaging (i.e. what inputs did you use)? * How did you test and/or validate it with customers / prospects? * How did you socialize it and get buy-in internally? How did you roll it out? * How was it received in the market? (Can be anecdotal if needed, but of course ideal to have actual quantified impact) * What was the most difficult aspect of it, and how did you overcome it? (For example, the market was super crowded and differentiation was hard to come by, internal stakeholders had lots of strong and divergent opinions, etc.) The actual messaging output itself is important, but I also care deeply about how you got there, because that's what gives me confidence that you can do it again successfully. 

Prep and practice! Prep your answers beforehand, have them on hand for reference if you need them. Practice by getting in more reps. Talking about yourself and your experience gets easier every time, and you get more insight into the types of questions that come up (so you can improve your prep). 

I explain it across 4 core responsibilities: Experts on our customers, products, and markets We find the right insights and turn them into strategy, and make the insights easily consumable for the rest of the org Marketing owners for product We partner with product teams to make our products successful — driving awareness, acquisition, adoption and expansion for our product lines Integrators We sit at the intersection of most teams, working with each of them to break down silos and get to better results Customer advocates We work with internal teams to design and deliver great customer experiences that make them feel understood, empowered, and valued