Sharon Markowitz

Positioning is a brief description of a product or service that your company offers, how it meets the target audience, the respective category and how it's different from the competition. This is typically an internal document. Messaging relates to how you will communicate the main value proposition and key benefits to the target audience. When thinking of partnerships, this should be a joint-message to the target audience. It's always best to test messaging qualitatively and quantitatively with target customers to optimize prior to introducing it to the market.

As the founder of YourCareerWings, a career coaching business, and a former marketing leader in edtech at Intuit and Pragmatic Institute, I'm deeply invested in this question. I've always believed in the power of continuous learning, especially in today's ever-changing professional landscape. Did you know that the average graduate today will likely explore up to 15 different career paths in their lifetime? It's a staggering statistic that underscores the importance of adaptability and exploration. This advice isn't just pertinent to product marketing; it applies across all fields of interest. Let's look into some specifics to help you get started: 1. Conduct informational interviews One of the best ways to understand a profession is to talk to those who are living it. From recent grads to seasoned professionals, everyone's insights can be invaluable. Leverage your network—whether it's through community groups, social platforms like LinkedIn, or your university's career center—to connect with professionals in the field. You may discover that you prefer to work at a startup versus an established company, act as a generalist or be more aligned to product versus sales. You will learn so much, and I'm excited for you! This exercise not only broadens your understanding but also strengthens your market research skills. 2. Build real-world experience There's no substitute for hands-on experience. Here are a few considerations: -Solve real-world problems that a company is facing today in class and apply product marketing principles. -Seek internships, both during and after your studies, in related fields, at for profit or non for profit institutions. -Engage in competitions at your school or across institutions. -Take leadership roles in school chapters and apply product marketing strategies. 3. Explore relevant certifications Certifications can complement your academic background and work experience. During informational interviews, inquire about certifications that align with your interests. For instance, Pragmatic Institute offers certifications for product managers and product marketers, while numerous online platforms offer additional marketing courses to bridge skill gaps.

A product marketing manager skill set is foundational for being a partner marketing manager, whether at a junior or senior level. The key areas that make an exceptional partner marketing manager include the ability to: 1. build strong relationships 2. influence stakeholders who may not be direct reports, and 3. embrace the value of partnerships to extend the reach of a company with current and prospective customers. Before addressing the points above in more detail, the nomenclature mentioned in some of the questions needs clarification. The title “partner product marketing manager” is not common. In today’s market, a professional either assumes the role of a product marketer or a partner marketer. The product marketer may have responsibilities that include partnerships, and can vary widely depending on the company and organizational structure. Similarly, a partner marketer’s responsibilities may also vary. Build strong relationships: This starts at the company you work with, and then extends to the partner company. Key stakeholders often include product, integrated marketing, product marketing, data science, business development and/or sales. Typically, the relationship with business development and sales is of great importance as they will be the colleagues you often work with in collaboration with the partner company. Influence stakeholders: You have no control over what the partner company does. Granted, there may be a contract in place, still, with so many priorities between your company and a partner company, the ability to build strong relationships, then influence stakeholders at your company and externally is critical for developing a go-to-market plan and ultimately partnership success. Embrace the value of the partnership. There is no "I" in TEAM and similarly, when you are working with a partner company, its not all about "your" company. There has to be value in the partnership and shared interests. A few considerations of why companies partner include new customer reach & distribution, technology advancement (partner vs. build vs. buy), and incremental revenue.

KPIS for a partner marketer vary based on the maturity of the partnership as well as what the team is solving for in creating the partnership. Also, sometimes the company and the partner are focused on different KPIs. KPIs may include sales, customer growth (new segment, greater penetration), retention, awareness and usage. At an established fintech company, the focus was on awareness and usage as it was a large app marketplace, and the fintech company decided to build a specific tech stack and partner for extending the software to solve customer needs to relevant verticals. It was more important at the time to ensure that customers had what they needed in one place when using the platform. At a tech startup targeting small businesses, we realized that customers were stalling in their success on the platform, and formed strategic partnerships with key players and established MQLs as the primary KPI. Specific programs were developed, however, the partner wasn't getting enough leads. We switched the KPI to leads simply to determine the right profile of the customer that was right for the program. Hence, testing and flexibility is key to ensure you are measuring what matters most. At an established tech company focused on making teamwork better, the company was focused on driving awareness and usage for integrations, while the partner, a major player in cloud computing, was focused on driving leads. While the primary KPI for each were as mentioned, the company I worked at added a secondary KPI of driving leads.

Product marketing managers should have a foundational understanding of AI technology and its potential impact on their roles and functions. So many products today have an AI component, or are prioritizing messaging around an AI component that its critical to understand given the inherent nature of product or partnership marketing is cross-functional. Several years ago, I worked for a major social network, and we were launching a new product to support heads of talent and recruiters in finding the right talent faster. At that time, the use of terms like AI were not as common so I worked with UX designers, engineers and customers to optimize the feature launch and the benefit messaging. Today, that has already changed! There are many ways to get experience, from at your company, to taking online courses, to simply using ChatGPT and more. I favor "hands-on" experience whether you are employed or not, there are many ways to get practical experience and application.

Marketing partnerships may not be the right nomenclature. If a company has an app on an App Store or App Marketplace with thousands of apps, these are not considered "marketing partnerships". Think of your favorite app on your phone, there are many apps on the phone you can select, but they are not all "marketing partnerships". As a partner marketer it’s best to provide a partner go-to-market playbook to those companies that have an app on the App Store or App Marketplace with ways they can drive awareness and usage of their app. This may include aspects such as a best practice marketplace listing, ways to offer customer support, specific and relevant go-to-market tactics, such as blogs, emails, case studies, social media, community forums and more. It's important for each app that is on the App Store or App Marketplace to showcase its own commitment and ability to drive significant awareness and usage of the app within the ecosystem, and then there may be additional opportunities to consider with the said app

Congrats! This is exciting. Here are some tips for developing your GTM strategy for a new partner channel: Research 1. Talk with your sales colleagues to learn what they’ve done to date, and if they have industry experience with this specific partner channel 2. Leverage your network, like LinkedIn, to learn how to GTM with that channel 3. Understand with your sales colleague if it's appropriate to have an exploratory call with a contact at the partner channel (i.e. the business development, sales, or marketing lead) to better understand 1) if there is a playbook and 2) what works best 4. Engage a third party to do 1:1 interviews so you can learn more about the channel partner and business model 5. Attend an event that the channel partner has so you can see first-hand how other companies may showcase their efforts, and have conversations with non-competitive companies Develop your GTM strategy 1. Based on your learnings, test any messaging with customers, incorporate the tactics that likely work best and embrace the concept of testing to learn to iterate for success 2. Consider reviewing success at the quarter level as appropriate so you can learn what worked, what didn't to effectively move forward. Good luck!

Ways to continuously optimize the partner process may include: 1. Review GTM plans against targets both leveraging quantitative and qualitative data to determine what worked and what can be improved 2. Embrace testing as an approach for GTM, where the company and the partner can test, learn, iterate and scale or pivot. 3. Always be learning, and reaching out to other partner marketers outside your company and industry to apply best practices. How to test and scale or pivot? I am a big fan of The Lean Startup methodology by Eric Ries. Here is a video clip of a conversation on setting up the concept of an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) or as I like to say, MDP (Minimum Delightful Product) between Founder Scott Cook of Intuit and Founder of Lean Startup Eric Ries. When working for an established tech company focused on improving teamwork, one of the strategic partners I worked with was in cloud computing. The partner was hesitant to go outside their standard partner playbook for GTM motions. I suggested that we could test a GTM tactic that focused on explaining the integration to drive new leads, in a very short turnaround time, and commitment to share metrics. The willingness of the partner to be open to this, and the success of this, led to an invite-only event for the company, and a future long term contract.

In my experience across consumer goods and retail industries before transitioning to SaaS, market research played a pivotal role in crafting successful go-to-market (GTM) strategies. The nature of consumer goods and retail, where margins are often lower, requires marketers to function as general managers, necessitating thorough research efforts before product launches or marketing campaigns. I share this as there are multiple methods to conduct research as I've been able to apply those in SaaS. Effective market research, irrespective of the industry, begins with a comprehensive understanding of two key elements: (1) the objective and (2) the target audience. It's essential to align on these foundational components before selecting any specific methodology, such as surveys. It's common for cross-functional stakeholders, including marketing teams, to default to familiar tactics like surveys without considering alternative approaches. This presents a valuable opportunity to educate the team internally about market research, showcase your leadership, and then, determine the right approach to get results.

This is a great question, and those I’ve worked with, know that I will get on my soapbox any day as ultimately we are in business because of our customers. When I worked at Intuit, I loved that if you encountered founder Scott Cook at the office, he would stop and ask if you had any customer insights to share. It wasn’t if you were a marketer, it was that it was part of the DNA of the company, and what I feel makes a company that is now 30+ years old continue to innovate with sustainable growth. Customer feedback and gathering insights is everyone’s role. However, I recognize, that not all cultures foster that, and you have an amazing leadership opportunity to set the tone. I would use the analogy, of crawl, walk, and run, as change doesn’t happen overnight. Think about the impact you can have with insights, as it: * Plays a role in influencing the product roadmap * Informs relevant messaging for GTM campaigns * Provides feedback that is invaluable to teams that are regularly interfacing with customers, from sales to customer service, on how to improve and add more value It's important to identify who is best in partnership with product marketers to track the impact of VOC-driven initiatives on key metrics such as customer satisfaction, retention, and revenue. I hope this provides some ideas of how you can infuse your customer-centricity with the rest of the organization by partnering, educating, and showcasing the impact of insights to action to drive results!