10 Thoughts for a New Product Manager

A Product Manager is responsible for the overall success of the product, driving the product strategy and managing the product release launches.

A product manager at one company is different from a product manager at another company.  Are they a Product Manager or a Product Marketing Manager?  Is the Product Manager also the Product Owner?  Is the company doing agile development? Are they part of the Marketing Team or they part of the Engineering Team.  Or neither?  It can be overwhelming.

I’ve been a product manager at a few companies and wanted to share some thoughts of wisdom to new Product Managers.  Here I go:

1.  Communication is key to being successful.  Play it safe by over communicating. Over document.  Take notes at meetings and include many folks on the emails about the meeting.  You can’t keep it all in your head.  You don’t want an upset someone to come up to you after a launch and tell you that they should have been notified. Make sure that it is clear on who does what in the company about the product you are managing.
2. The product is being built for the client’s happiness.  Keep that in mind always.  It is not for your delight, the programmer’s ego or the investors pocketbook.  When you make a change to the product, think about how it will affect clients.  Think like the end user.  Ask them for their opinion.  Go out and talk to them.  Find out what makes them happy.  Act as the voice of the customer in your company.
3. Develop a great relationship with others in the company (quality assurance, tech publications, developers, sales, support, pre-sales support, etc.) that do affect or can affect the product.  Be friends with everyone.  Help them when they need real help (but see thought #5).  You never know when you will need a favor from them.  Understand your audience.  Don’t be too techy with members of the Sales Team.  And the engineers want to be involved.  Including the look and marketing of the product.
4. Control the terminology.  Don’t let others change the product terminology.  Sometimes others will simplify the wording while others make it to hard to understand.  The Product Manager must be the terminology police and stop others from using incorrect terminology.  If necessary, have a glossary that is accessible explaining the terminology so that everyone is on the same page.
5. Learn how to say no.  Not everything you will be asked to do makes sense or should be done.  Say no nicely and explain why.  Make sure your boss is in agreement on the no answer.  Not everything said to you needs to be actionable.  Everything has a cost.  Make sure you find out the why for the request before acting on it.
6. If you have educated everyone that you need to know everything happening with the product, you will be sucked into every meeting including those with customers and presentations to prospects.  Be ready for it.  Don’t complain about it.  And of course this leads to the issue of item #7.
7. You will need to work long hours.  Since you will need to be in a lot of meetings, you will be receiving a ton of emails that you need to review and reply back.  Communication takes time so you will need to work a lot of hours.  Be efficient and make quick decisions.  Remember to take care of yourself.  Exercise and eat right.  Pace yourself.  Try to be as happy as you can in this 7×24 responsible position.  Work on your work life balance and make sure you go to your family events.  But you will need to sneak time at night and on weekends to stay on top of your job.
8. Be a good writer.  You will need to communicate with your writing skills whether it be a key messaging document, status emails, web content or a news release.  So the better you write and the faster you write the better.  Block out your most productive time of day to focus on writing.  Try not to get distracted by interruptions such as emails during this productive writing time.  Also remember that to be a good writer you need to be a good reader as well.
9. Learn from others.  Being a new product manager hopefully means that you have others in the company that has been doing it longer.  Take them out to coffee and pick their brains.  If one is available, attend meetings held by the local Product Manager group.  There is a great deal of information available online.   Pragmatic Marketing has a great deal of resources at: http://pragmaticmarketing.com/.  Always be learning and reading.
10. You are the glue for the product and the person that makes sure that everything that is necessary for product success is in place.  Don’t be too focused in any one area.  Don’t always hang with the engineers.

Hope that this helps any new Product Managers out there.  You have an important job.  It is not an easy job.  You have a lot of responsibility but little power over others.  You will get good at spinning many plates and communicating with others.  I would love to hear your thoughts for a new Product Manager.

 

 

Organization Videos – Show Time Part 1

This post is part 1 of a 2 part blog post series on the value of videos for an organization (a law firm, company or non-profit) and how to create these videos effectively and efficiently. The two post series will discuss the following:

• Reasons for your organization to have videos
• Different types of videos and their purpose
• How to select a video vendor
• How to make the videos more effective

So why do videos?

• Not all people are paper readers.  People do not read as much.  Many are now watchers and love short, entertaining, informative and authentic videos.
• Videos are an important piece in your branding.  Use them to improve your brand.
• YouTube has a huge audience. And not just folks in the under-21 age group. Don’t ignore this marketing channel and the number of people that love video.  If your organization does not have a YouTube channel, create one now.
• The power of receiving your information through someone’s mouth, or moving pictures, is incredible. A video done by an organization should feel like a conversation to the intended audience.  A video is more personal then reading a PDF fact sheet.  There is more connection.  You can feel the passion.  The video should not be CEO speak and it should encompass the messages and branding of the organization.  Let them know what you do.  Make them understand. A video can tell the story better than any piece of paper.

So what are the different types of videos that are effective for organizations?

1. Client testimonial videos – Prospects gain trust in your organization when they see that others have tried your product/service and are willing to put themselves on video saying great things about your organization.  End users say it better and are more trusting than if a vendor says it.
2. Product videos – Usually these are screen capture videos (using something like Camtasia to create) and a person walking thru a demo of a product.  An effective tactic is to do one of these about the 10 ten benefits of the product.  Usually a person  knowledgeable in the product with a great voice is doing the demonstration.
3. Organization introduction video – These are usually a short video (I would say no more than 2 and a half minutes in length) that can be shown at conferences and on the organization’s website describing what the organization does.  It needs to convey the   organization’s branding, tag line and messaging.  This video should show energy and passion as well as be engaging and entertaining.
4. Fun animation videos – Some organizations know who to do fun videos, often using animation, that entertain individuals so that they want to learn more about the company, products and services.  Sometimes these can be cartoons and done in a series to keep engagement going.
5. Booth videos – Some organizations exhibit at trade shows and have booths where a video can be running trying to get people to stop by.  These videos should be in a loop and not more than 5 minutes in length.  The video should show what you do, what you are giving away and what you are presenting on.  Also it should have consistent branding and messaging with the other marketing materials in the booth.
6. Internal videos or videos that do not have a sales intent – Examples of these types of videos include why working at organization is awesome, explaining organization culture and explaining the community service activities of organization.

The next part of this blog series on organization videos will discuss how to select a video vendor to work with and some tips to make the videos more effective.  Here is link to that post.  In this post the reasons for videos was covered along with some of the different types of videos.  Feel free to comment back on your video experiences.

Photo credit: StockSnap.io (58)

Start Your Product/Service Launch with a Key Messaging Document

When a product or service is launched by your organization (whether it be a law firm, non-profit or B2B technology company) you need to have consistent messaging.  This is accomplished by having a Key Messaging Document (KMD) which is done by the marketing product manager or individual that understands the purpose of the product.  Sometimes if there is disagreement on messaging or messaging wording then having a meeting to discuss is helpful.  Once you have a KMD completed and approved, the press release can be written as well as the FAQ and presentation for sales training.  The KMD should be no more than a page and a half but preferably one page.

The KMD should contain the following information:

• Official product name as well as the internal product name if there is one
• Marketing champion(s) which is the person or persons responsible for the KMD
• Mention what is being announced
• Dates including announce date and release date if different from announce date
• Approvers of KMD which should be the boss of the marketing champion and others from different areas of the company so that the messaging is agreed to by a variety of people
• Proposed news release title which should be descriptive and catchy
• Key messages to convey as well as a question and answer to question for this message
• Compelling value to clients such as faster, cheaper, greener, easier, etc.
  
• Competitive positioning
• Target audience of messaging such as partner sales reps, industry analysts, press, lawyers and end users
• Supporting external quotations such as a from a client or partner
• Related event(s) and their date(s) such as a trade show that the announcement will be made

There should be no more than 5 key messages. And they should be short, 1 to 2 sentences maximum.  Make sure the messages are benefits and not features.  Remember that a benefit usually revolves around saving time, saving money or increasing satisfaction (such as happier employees).

An example of a message, question and answer is:
M: Gain time savings of your staff with the easy to use <product feature>
Q: Do you spend too much time investigating when <enter problem> occurs?
A: If so, the <product name> by <your company> saves time due to its <product feature>.

Try to get the KMD completed at least a month before the product or service launch so that other documents such as news release, website content, presentations and launch FAQ can be completed. Having a clear concisely worded KMD will make the launch more effective.  This important document will be used often during the launch. A KMD will also assist everyone being on the same page.  I would love to hear your thoughts on how you get everyone on the same messaging page.