Archive for February, 2012
The Stages of Awareness
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Product marketing managers are often asked to create or increase the awareness of a product in the market. The belief is that awareness equates to leads.
Buyers are complex beings and go through stages of awareness as I’ve outlined below. An awareness of these stages (pun intended) helps to understand why the trade show you did last month didn’t result in a gazillion leads.
No Recognition
The buyer has no idea that your company or product is an answer to their problems. You are wearing the Cloak of Invisibility.
Aided Recognition
Provided with clues, buyers can recall your company or product, and that it might be an answer to their problems. You still have work to do.
Unaided Recognition
Buyers recognize your company or product without help. They understand it’s an answer to a problem they are experiencing. The door is open to dialog.
Preference
Given multiple choices of vendors/products, buyers will prefer to buy your product as an answer to their problems. You are the ‘go to’ vendor. Congratulations.
Loyalty
Buyers will consistently choose your company or product over others, even when they have had a less than ideal experience. This is nirvana.
Rejection
Rejection is the opposite of Loyalty. Buyers will go out of their way to avoid your product. For whatever reason, real or otherwise, they think your product sucks. You need to fix this perception.
What Product Marketing Managers Really Do
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What salespeople think I do when they get what they want
I am a tireless team player providing everything they need to be successful.
What salespeople think I do when they don’t get what they want
I am the devil who finds every opportunity to impede the progress of a sale.
What product managers think I do
Everything they don’t want do and it changes on a whim.
What my boss thinks I do
He’s not really sure, but tells me I’m doing a great job.
What my family and friends think I do
Travel in first class to exotic locations, waited on hand and foot.
What I think I do
I am a god-like, marketing genius deftly addressing every challenge with laughter and song.
What I really do
I take care to balance the urgent with the important, and try to get through the week in one piece.
The 2011 Annual Product Management and Marketing Survey Results are in!
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Every year for the last decade, Pragmatic Marketing has run a survey of the product management and marketing community in order to assemble a profile of common industry practices, team sizes, responsibilities, and compensation. This year, I administered the survey, and we got some very interesting data! Over 1800 of your peers participated, and for the first time explored some new areas around soft skills and compensation. I hope that you find the results as interesting as we did.
First, you can download the complete report in all of it’s PDF glory from our website. Here are some nuggets to whet your appetite:
- 52% of respondents report directly to the CEO/COO or a Product Management VP. Product Management is becoming its own department in the majority of companies.
- There are only 0.48 Product Owners per Product Manager. This tells us that Product Managers are being asked to take on both roles – a recipe for potential disaster.
- Over 80% of respondents indicated that they spend at least half a day per week (or more) in meetings with Engineering (such as daily standups). Whereas only 30% indicated they spend at least half a day per week visiting sites without Sales. Where is the time to be in the market?
- On the softer skills of product management, over 45% rated their ability to challenge and negotiate with executives to be a weakness, an opportunity for improvement.
- The average compensation is $98,068 plus a $13,501 annual bonus.
If you participated in this year’s survey – thank you! Also, a special thanks to Steve Johnson for his valued assistance and guidance in assembling this year’s results.
If you have additional questions, drop them in the comments below and I will attempt to answer them.
Guide to Agile Practices
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from Guide to Agile Practices.
Let’s see. I take the red line to Rosslyn and then connect to the yellow line to Nutley station.
John the Misunderstood Product Marketing Manager
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In a previous post I introduced you to John, the product marketing manager. John is very busy and has his share of frustration. Most of John’s frustration is because his role is misunderstood. Product managers think he should do one thing. Marcom another. Sales yet another.
How did John get here?
For many technology companies the job title of product marketing manager is a fairly recent addition. The job was introduced to fill a void between product management, sales, and marcom. It happens when product managers are so consumed with product development issues, they don’t have the bandwidth to work with sales or marcom. The resulting problem is a sales force that is not prepared to sell and marketing that misses the mark.
Why is John frustrated?
He is frustrated because the line between what John should do and what the product manager should do is fuzzy. One time he gets scolded because he did something the product manager felt was her responsibility. Another time he gets scolded because he didn’t do something assuming the product manager is responsible. Finger pointing is not a solution.
What is John’s role?
There are activities in the Pragmatic Marketing Framework that are about using products and there are activities that are about buying products. One way of clarifying responsibilities is to have product managers accountable for activities related to using products, and have product marketing managers accountable for activities related to buying products. Another way of looking at it is product marketing managers are experts on buyers and how they buy, and product managers are experts on products and how they solve problems.
Are you clear about your role as a product marketing manager?
Are you defining the role or waiting for someone to do it for you?
