Where should Product Marketing live inside an organization?
A long debated hot topic, should product marketing belong in product or marketing or somewhere else?
This is a topic near and dear to my heart because I went through this battle several years ago on where product marketing should reside. It had currently resided in marketing for years, but suddenly we had a new Chief Product Officer and he wanted it under him.
For the record, it matters on what type of business you have as to where PMMs (product marketing managers) live. If you are PLG (product led growth), they should absolutely live under product. Marketing doesn’t matter to that company anyway. They believe they built it and people will come. In fact, this role could even live under the CEO in this case. However, if it’s SLG (sales led growth) it should absolutely live under marketing. After all, sales needs that hand-off, competitive intel, and key messaging to help them sell.
But, if your product has a hybrid SLG/PLG model, well then this is where the battle begins.
Product Marketing in Hybrid GTM Motions
In a hybrid GTM motion it can be contentious on where product marketing lives simply because both sides need a resource.
On the Product side of things, they need someone to distill down complicated features and train the marketers on how to talk about it. They need someone to help the knowledge base write copy. They need help with writing onboarding emails and in-product messaging.
On the Marketing side, we need someone to help us with messaging, not just key messaging, but our value prop, why we’re unique, help with website copy, enable sales with battle cards and one-pagers, and be up to date on the competition at all times. Most importantly, as the market evolves, so does your messaging and product marketing is about leveraging the right language and copy to get people to convert.
So where should they report into?
IMHO, even if it is hybrid, as a function it should still reside within marketing with a dotted line to product and here’s why: you can market and sell a shitty product. That’s what good sales and marketing people do. But it takes a lot more than words to make a product function better.
The Conundrum: When you have only 1 Product Marketing Headcount
This kind of sucks and it happens a lot in SaaS startups. SaaS startups have to be scrappy which means marketing folks wearing multiple hats. The problem is, with a hybrid GTM, you really need at least two PMMs. With only one headcount you have to make tradeoffs with keeping everyone happy on all sides.
Unfortunately, when a PMM is pulled in both directions the tradeoffs often impact the teams they do not report into because everyone wants to make their boss happy. If the headcount reports into marketing, then your website is your #1 focus because it’s your biggest asset and one in which sales can send prospects to for information during their outreach. Next, I’d prioritize sales collateral or competitive intelligence (battle cards/tear sheets) depending on the state of your business.
Messaging Frameworks
The thing is if a Product Marketer has done their job well then other folks on the marketing team should be able to jump in and help out with content creation across the organization, especially in startups. It all starts with a messaging framework. In the past, here are some that I’ve used.
Message Framework 1
Message Framework 2
Lastly, I put up a poll on LinkedIn recently and it seems the majority of folks still think that for the most part, product marketing should reside under marketing. Some folks cited seeing big issues of overlap and “who owns what” when product marketing, field marketing, performance marketing live in different places. Another said, it depends on the definition of “product” and that as long as the business allows for interdepartmental collaboration and everyone is on the same page, where a product lives shouldn’t really matter. Another said it’s dependent on the org structure.
Where do you think it should live? Let me know in the comments.
