Product Management is a critical function during tough economic times.  Many organizations when they start staffing unfortunately don’t bring in product management until marketing communications is already in place.  When organizations build their teams, the first marketing person they should hire is one with a solid product management background.  Start with product management and add product marketing and marketing communications later.  

This blog was inspired by Rocket Watcher’s blog post call “Product Marketing versus Marketing Communications (and why Marketing Communications Must Die)”.  Rocket Watcher states that Product Marketing should be hired before Marketing Communications.  However, I contend that it be Product Management.  Here’s why…

Both Product Marketing and Marketing Communications play very important roles in the communication of product benefits that Engineering releases, but they don’t focus on driving product and development direction like Product Management does.  Experienced Product Management can also take on Product Marketing and Marketing Communications roles by...
  • driving and executing go-to-market strategies
  • developing key marketing messages
  • creating collateral
  • managing the website
  • writing press releases
  • briefing analysts
  • leveraging social media
  • coordinating events
For organizations that are looking to add Product Management after Marketing Communications is already in place, consider putting Product Management on par with other company functions like Sales, Marketing, Engineering, and Finance.  This means that if the other functions are reporting to the CEO, so should Product Management in order to be effective. 

If Product Management reports under another function, not only will it have to fight for attention amongst the other roles within that function, but it will also have less influence across the organization.  Product Management becomes a supporting role and a source of deliverables for the function to which it reports. 

Especially during tough economic times, organizations must have strong Product Management leadership in place to ensure product and business success.


Related posts:
Marketing Is Not Just About Promotions and Advertising