Advertise on podcast: Thrills and Chills: Establishing Product Marketing

In this week’s season finale, we are featuring Priyanka who leads PMM at Qualia. Qualia is a company whose mission is to transform and improve real estate transactions. Real estate is a new industry for Priyanka, so tune in to hear how to learn a new space and make a jump into a new domain. You’ll also hear how to think about growing the function beyond 0 to 1 and building not just a team, but a product that lasts. It’s likely that your team will change - you’re bound to lose and gain people who you consider key players. At the end of the day though, your product will likely survive your team. So, how do you approach this and build a product that solves real life problems? Connect with Priyanka on LinkedIn.Join Priyanka on Sharebird. Questions covered in this interview: What is it like to own product marketing? What do you look for in a company/team/role? How did you evaluate the risk of a new role? What are some of the challenges early on? What about now? What are some of the thrills (highs) and chills (lows) of your product marketing career?

Kevin leads the product marketing function at Retool, an early stage startup and platform for developers to build internal tools. In this interview he and JD discuss growing your personal career and how to identify areas that both challenge and energize you. They discuss what it’s like to be a hands-on builder and learn by doing, how to accelerate your career and the company’s narrative while being both the strategist and executer. Connect with Kevin on LinkedIn.Join Kevin on Sharebird. Questions covered in this interview: What is it like to own product marketing? What do you look for in a company/team/role? How did you evaluate the risk of a new role? What are some of the challenges early on? What about now? What are some of the thrills (highs) and chills (lows) of your product marketing career?

Wondering what it’s like to join series A startup and establish the PMM function? Blake is the very first product marketer at Process Street, a workflow management tool. In this interview JD and Blake discuss his journey from content marketing to product and what it’s been like strategically building something completely from scratch and being product marketer #1. They also discuss how to amplify your work, keep up with the pace of the organization, and how to loop in peers and mentors when evaluating your new opportunity or move. Also, they're hiring! Connect with Blake on LinkedIn and Twitter.Join Blake on Sharebird. Questions covered in this interview: What is it like to own product marketing? What do you look for in a company/team/role? How did you evaluate the risk of a new role? What are some of the challenges early on? What about now? What are some of the thrills (highs) and chills (lows) of your product marketing career?

One thing that product marketers have in common is that scrappy “get shit done” mentality. In this interview Jack and JD talk about how being a part of a growing company has led to career growth and promotion for Jack. They also dive into the challenges and growing pains of seeing a company grow and scale, hiring frameworks, interview tips, and how brand building is made possible through category creation. You’ll also hear how data and analytics aid to inform decisions and the many highs and lows of Jack’s journey in PMM. Connect with Jack on LinkedIn.Join Jack on Sharebird. Questions covered in this interview: What is it like to own product marketing? What do you look for in a company/team/role? How did you evaluate the risk of a new role? What are some of the challenges early on? What about now? What are some of the thrills (highs) and chills (lows) of your product marketing career?

Apart from being a certified first degree black belt in taekwondo, William is a seasoned product marketer who is taking the good he’s learned from former roles at Twilio and GitLab and channeling that into building out the PMM function at Osano, a data privacy platform. In this interview he and JD discuss what it was like to be a part of two different companies that went public, how to create and build a 30/60/90 day plan that encompasses both quick wins and long term strategy, and the benefits of being transparent and making your work accessible to all. Connect with William on LinkedIn.Join William on Sharebird. Questions covered in this interview: What is it like to own product marketing? What do you look for in a company/team/role? How did you evaluate the risk of a new role? What are some of the challenges early on? What about now? What are some of the thrills (highs) and chills (lows) of your product marketing career?

Randi is in year two of leading PMM at Fundbox, a company whose mission is to help small businesses manage outstanding receivables and get paid on time. Randi and JD discuss her passion for being a part of companies that are moving from adolescence to maturity, how she has built and scaled her PMM team, managed cross functional relationships, gained headcount, allocated each individual, and showcased a spirit of entrepreneurship. Connect with Randi on LinkedIn.Join Randi on Sharebird. Questions covered in this interview: What is it like to own product marketing? What do you look for in a company/team/role? How did you evaluate the risk of a new role? What are some of the challenges early on? What about now? What are some of the thrills (highs) and chills (lows) of your product marketing career?

Sarah, who previously was a security marketer at Google is now over a year into her role of leading the product marketing team at Vanta. Vanta help businesses get SOC 2, HIPAA, or ISO 27001 compliant. Over 1500 companies use Vanta to automate their security monitoring and prepare for security audits.  In this interview Sarah and JD discuss what it’s like to make the switch from a large well-known company to a smaller series A startup and what positioning and messaging looks like for her and her team currently as they have been diligently educating customers about their services.  Tune in to hear her story and how her team is helping startups achieve Google grade security and market a traditionally non-sexy product. They’ve found humorous and effective ways to make their product more appealing and close the high anxiety, low knowledge gap in automated compliance security.  Connect with Sarah on LinkedIn.Join Sarah on Sharebird. Questions covered in this interview: What is it like to own product marketing? What do you look for in a company/team/role? How did you evaluate the risk of a new role? What are some of the challenges early on? What about now? What are some of the thrills (highs) and chills (lows) of your product marketing career?

“I like to say it’s problem marketing, not product marketing..” - Aditya Vempaty  Aditya is the VP of Marketing at NexHealth, a company who is evolutionizing the world of dentistry and medical offices to enable growth of practices and ensure that entrepreneurs are maximizing their ROI.  Aditya is a pro at category creation and influencing people at a large scale.  In this interview he shares his experience finding innovative solutions in new spaces where there is a clear need for a revolution.  This interview is all about why product marketers are actually problem marketers and what it means to find the problem first and focus on the product second.  Connect with Aditya on LinkedIn.Join Aditya on Sharebird. Questions covered in this interview: What is it like to own product marketing? What do you look for in a company/team/role? How did you evaluate the risk of a new role? What are some of the challenges early on? What about now? What are some of the thrills (highs) and chills (lows) of your product marketing career?

If you’ve been working remotely for any amount of time, chances are you’ve heard of Loom and are one of 14 million plus users. The vision of Loom is to empower effective communication wherever work happens by utilizing video messaging.  From the outside looking in, you would never believe that only a few people make up the company’s entire marketing team. In this week’s interview we hear from Julia Szatar who leads the product marketing function. Join in as we discuss her journey from PR to acquiring a PMM title, how her and her team approach pricing and packaging, and tips on how to unlock executive buy-in to grow your time and hire! This is a great story of how a start-up became a unicorn company and the role that PMM played in that achievement. Connect with Julia on LinkedIn.Join Julia on Sharebird. Questions covered in this interview: What is it like to own product marketing? What do you look for in a company/team/role? How did you evaluate the risk of a new role? What are some of the challenges early on? What about now? What are some of the thrills (highs) and chills (lows) of your product marketing career?

April leads product marketing at HackerOne, a company who hacks companies for good. Their mission is to help reduce cyber crime, protect privacy, and restore trust in the digital society. She hasn’t always worked in cyber security so she shares advice on how to jump into a new market or segment and prove domain expertise. No matter what the organization, establishing the PMM function always means asking a lot of questions, showing an eagerness to learn, and collecting input to prioritize what areas to begin working on, but how does one do this in an unfamiliar space? If you’re looking for interview advice, how to establish credibility in a new segment, core skill sets to lean on to help you ramp up, and scaling your PMM team - this interview is for you! Connect with April on LinkedIn. Join April on Sharebird. Questions covered in this interview: What is it like to own product marketing, comms and content? What do you look for in a company/team/role? How did you evaluate the risk of a new role? What are some of the challenges early on? What about now? What are some of the thrills (highs) and chills (lows) of your product marketing career?

Season 3 is coming soon! Join the conversation as JD meets up with two fellow Sharebird hosts - Mary Sheehan and Jeffrey Vocell. Mary, who leads PMM at Adobe, is the host of Women in PMM where she interviews women who run product marketing at some of the fastest growing technology companies in the world. The mission of the show is to instill confidence in women who are looking for tangible frameworks and takeaways in their current roles or looking to break into the PMM role. Jeffrey, Director of PMM at Iterable, is the host of The Product Marketing Experts, where he interviews guests who have done AMA sessions on various topics including messaging, market research, developing your PMM career, product launches, sales enablement, stakeholder management, and influencing the product roadmap. Connect with JD, Mary, and Jeffrey on LinkedIn - we love hearing from you! 

To round out the season, Brianne is here to share what it’s like leading Product Marketing at an established company. Nextdoor is far past its Series A, leaving the head PMM with the task of not only establishing missing functions, but also correcting existing functions that don’t hit the mark. It’s been both a rewarding and challenging journey for Brianne, involving growing her team from 2 to 8, reorganizing swimming lanes, and shaping go-to-market efforts during a pandemic. Tune into this episode to hear about all the thrills and chills of her journey.