As a fractional marketing executive, I’ve had the privilege of working with numerous B2B technology companies. Through these experiences, I’ve witnessed the transformative power of effective product marketing on a business. Often misunderstood or under-utilized, product marketing is a strategic bridge between your product, sales, and other marketing functions, such as demand generation or external communications. It’s a key driver of market success and revenue growth. This article aims to demystify the role of product marketing and underscore its value, particularly for CEOs and CROs who may not fully grasp its potential.
So, what is Product Marketing all about?
Strategic Positioning and Messaging
Product marketing involves determining how your product aligns with the market through deeply understanding customer pain points and needs, the competitive landscape, and distinctive features. This knowledge shapes your messaging across all marketing materials and communications. Additionally, Product Marketing is tasked with crafting compelling messaging that resonates with target audiences and guaranteeing that outbound programs and communications are in sync with these pivotal messages.
Orchestrating the Go-to-Market Plan
Downstream, product marketing designs and implements go-to-market strategies, incorporating the 4Ps of marketing. This also involves coordinating product launches and aligning teams for successful market entry. It’s a challenging task, often spanning multiple internal teams and external partners with multiple tracks and activities.
Why is Product Marketing so important?
Product Marketing drives revenue. Product Marketing is crucial in effectively empowering sales teams to boost revenue by articulating value propositions. This function, called Sales enablement, involves equipping sales with training, tools, and support. Additionally, Product Marketing aids BDR teams by crafting resources like call scripts and sales assets.
Product Marketing builds market awareness. Product Marketing enhances awareness and drives demand via focused marketing campaigns in close collaboration with demand-generation teams. Working with industry analysts and developing thought leadership, Product Marketing helps position the company and its products in its target market.
Product Marketing aligns product capabilities with market needs. Product Marketing is the customer’s advocate, offering vital market and audience insights that shape product design and development. Collaborating with Product Management to align product evolution with customer requirements and market trends enables greater product adoption.
Key Deliverables of Product Marketing
Market Research: Product Marketing gains market insights by analyzing trends, customer segments, and competition in depth. It also shapes market research by engaging with analysts through briefings and consistent updates.
Buyer Personas: Product marketing involves creating detailed profiles of target customers to customize marketing and sales strategies. Successful marketing campaigns can be defined by mapping the various personas in the buying process along with their preferred channels.
Sales Enablement Tools: By crafting collateral like case studies, product datasheets, FAQs, and sales training materials, Product Marketing aids sales teams in comprehending and effectively selling the product. Analyzing and leveraging the outcomes of customers wins and losses is also instrumental in outlining the Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) and formulating precise Account Based Marketing strategies.
Launch Plans: Product marketers craft detailed plans outlining the steps to launch new products or features to the market. They serve as the orchestrators of execution across various departments.
KPIs for Product Marketing
Product Marketing encompasses a wide scope, leading to various key performance indicators (KPIs) for measuring success. Certain KPIs will hold more significance depending on your company’s growth stage, market maturity, and product. This enables effective monitoring of your go-to-market strategy’s progress.
Here are a few examples of KPIs that might be relevant.
Pipeline building and influence:
- The relevance of leads generated from product marketing campaigns.
- The quality of MQLs (Marketing Qualified Leads), leading to a growth in SQLs (Sales Qualified Leads) numbers.
- The impact of product marketing materials on moving leads through the sales pipeline.
- Improve sales funnel fluidity, conversion rates, and win/loss ratios.
Sales Enablement: Asset utilization by sales, shortening deals cycle, and contract value growth.
Revenue and margins:
- Revenue growth through new business sales and upsell/cross-sell strategies.
- Capability to enhance perceived value and pricing, thereby boosting profit margins.
Market Share Growth: The increase in market share attributed to new or existing products.
Analysts reports: Shaping market perceptions and building product visibility.
Customer Acquisition Costs: Monitoring how product marketing efforts affect the overall cost of acquiring a new customer.
Product Adoption Rates:
- The speed and volume at which new products or features are adopted by the market.
- Churn rate reduction.
What does it take to be a good Product Marketer?
Like a Product Manager, a Product Marketing Manager requires robust interpersonal skills to effectively influence various departments within the company. Specifically, the following skills are crucial:
- Product Marketing Managers require strong leadership skills to effectively drive and align the efforts of various teams towards achieving their objectives.
- With multiple work streams to orchestrate, Product Marketing Managers require exceptional organizational abilities, greatly enhancing their effectiveness through the use of project management tools and AI productivity solutions.
- Effective collaboration and communication skills are vital for working harmoniously with internal and external stakeholders, such as technical teams, sales teams, clients, and analysts.
- Effective storytelling is key for Product Marketing Managers to craft positioning and messaging strategies that truly connect with the market.
- With numerous responsibilities and stakeholders to engage with, Product Marketing Managers must maintain a sharp focus on their objectives.
- Product Marketing Managers who exhibit a willingness to learn about technical subjects and possess robust analytical abilities are more likely to thrive in their roles.
Conclusion
Product marketing is not just about making your product look attractive; it’s about strategic positioning and deep market understanding that facilitates effective selling and competitive differentiation. For CEOs and CROs of B2B technology companies, investing in a strong product marketing function is not an option but a necessity in today’s complex and rapidly evolving marketplace. Whether you want to refine your existing offerings or launch new products, product marketing provides the insights and tools necessary to succeed.
What experience do you have with Product Marketing? If you need assistance building a team or re-evaluating your strategy, please comment below or contact me directly!
Further reading
https://www.coursera.org/articles/product-marketing-manager
https://www.productmarketingalliance.com/becoming-an-expert-the-product-marketing-career-path/
https://www.productmarketingalliance.com/a-guide-to-measuring-product-marketing-success/