Product Marketing as a Career
Description of the Job
Each position will differ a bit based on the company itself, but fundamentally product marketers are responsible for three main things:
- Creating and telling the story of their products which is known as “positioning”
- Defining who the buyers are for your product and helping sales effectively sell to these buyers
- Create and execute product-centric marketing plans
While an overall marketing team focuses on broader goals, product marketers must consider the steps buyers will take to purchase their product and plan their marketing strategies accordingly.
Fast Facts
- Number of hours per weekGenerally 40-50 hours, but could be 50-60
- Average starting pay$71k Nationally, $80k in the Bay Area
- Amount of travel requiredLittle to none (0-30%)
Roles & Responsibilities
- Gain an in-depth understanding of your buyers by focusing on who they are, how they buy, and why they buy
- Familiarize yourself with competitors and be aware of how they are relatively positioned to your company
- Collaborate with the product management and marketing teams to develop product positioning and messaging that will resonate with target buyers
- Assess the effectiveness of current product marketing strategies and recommend changes if needed
- Plan the launches of net-new products and releases of existing products, and manage the cross-functional implementation of the plan.
Skills Needed
- Domain/Industry Expertise: Knowledge of your industry, market, or product area is important to helping to strategically market your company’s products
- Storytelling: As a product marketer, you need to be able to create clear messages that attract target customers
- Analytical Thinking: One needs to understand how to use metrics and customer data to direct strategic decision making
- Relationship-Building: Being able to build relationships across departments and functions is instrumental to success in this position
- Communication Skills: Whether verbal or written, clear and concise communication is needed for product launches, presenting plans, and working cross-functionally
- Proficiency with Technology: A product marketer will regularly need to use CRM tools like Slack & Salesforce as well as Microsoft Office Tools like Excel
Steps to Enter The Field
- A bachelor’s degree is required for a career in product marketing. Some common majors for this career include Marketing, Business Administration, Information Systems, or a related field.
- Whether through internships or other positions, demonstrating experience with product marketing concepts can help one enter the field. For example, selling t-shirts for a campus fundraiser would fall under this description.
- Prior to interviews, it is important to do quality research on the company you are interviewing for in order to gain an in-depth understanding of the company and its products.
- Getting certain certifications through Pragmatic Marketing and Product Marketing Alliance can help open up doors into the product marketing field.
- Personal projects can be another excellent way to stand out in an application process. Creating a website from scratch, managing a team, or developing an app can show problem-solving and other product-management-related skills.
Landscape of the Field & Companies in the Field
- The top companies include large tech companies, such as Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google, Microsoft, Adobe, Salesforce, LinkedIn, Cisco, and more.
- Other top companies according to Product Marketing Alliance include Gitlab, Salesforce, and Zendesk
- Glassdoor also provides a comprehensive list of the top companies currently hiring for product marketing. On Glassdoor’s website, you can also use location filters to find companies that are in your area.
External Resources to Learn More & Develop Skills
- Udemy - Product Marketing: Udemy has a nice selection of product marketing online courses that focus on a variety of topics you will encounter in this field
- Coursera - Product Marketing: Coursera also has many courses that teach skills valuable to develop for a product marketing position
- Top B2B Product Marketers: This link provides a list of the top 50 business-to-business product marketers to follow and learn from.
- Product Marketing Alliance: Product Marketing Alliance’s website has many great resources focused on helping product marketers learn, network, and more!
- Figma: A vector graphics editor and prototyping tool that makes it easy to design interfaces. It is a great tool to use for side projects, which can help you get a role as a product marketer
Related Careers
- Product Manager, Account Executive, Marketing Analyst, Sales Representative, Marketing Development Representative, Marketing Consultant
Informational Interviews
Arjun Desai
Company Name: LinkedIn
Title: Product Marketing Manager
Years of Experience: 9
Biography
Arjun Desai is a Product Marketing Manager at LinkedIn. He graduated from University of Texas at Austin with a Bachelor of Business Administration in Marketing. Prior to LinkedIn, Arjun was a Product Marketing Campaign Manager at Sabre, Marketing Associate at Apple, and a Product Marketing Manager at AdRoll. Arjun joined LinkedIn as Associate Product Marketing Manager, then was promoted to a Product Marketing Manager after 2 years.