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This article was taken from a presentation for the Product Marketing Summit, San Francisco 2019 when Eugenia was the Product Marketing Manager, Monetization at Trello. She is now the Product Marketing Manager, Monetization - Video at Instagram. Catch up on all presentations with our OnDemand feature.
Data might sound like a dull topic, but the truth is, it doesn’t have to be! Especially when that data tells a compelling story. We’re not just talking about stats and graphs on a screen now, we’re talking about key metrics that can establish a clear trajectory for success.
The aim of this article is to show you how that can be done, but first, a little breakdown of our agenda:
- About me
- Specific, personalized, actionable
- Let’s talk about messaging
- Data within your internal teams
- Data and customers
About me
I'm a Product Marketing Manager at Trello, supporting B2B products. My main aim is to focus on how businesses can use Trello to achieve results. Before that, I was a PMM for various major corporations.
Very early on, I was particularly interested in the data. Right from the get-go, I really saw the data as the most compelling argument for why you should run certain campaigns.
This really translated to my role at Tumblr where I actually worked on the ad operation side. This was particularly focused on the metrics. The truth is, I’m a nerd. 🤓 I love data and metrics, and hopefully in this article, I can make you as passionate about the subject as I am!
Specific, personalized, actionable
First things first, I want you to get your head around this acronym: SPA. You want to make sure that your data is specific, personalized, and actionable. This is how you transform your data from some figures on a screen to something that’s actually meaningful, driving data driven storytelling that resonates.
But what does it mean? Let’s break it down here. 👇
Make it specific
This means that you really can't be too broad. You have to make sure that the data and the research you do is relevant to your audience. For example, when it came time to prepare for this article, I didn’t focus on marketing managers, I focused specifically on product marketers.
Did you know that there are 7.7 million product marketing managers out there? I certainly didn’t.
Make it personalized
Not everyone has the same pain points and concerns when it comes to the product. Someone in the C-suite might be more concerned with broader organizational concerns, e.g, overall revenue stream, whereas someone in customer success might be looking more at CRM-type metrics, like conversion rate/churn rate.
Remember that data is a golden opportunity to persuade and influence people, but if you’re presenting the wrong metrics, you might as well have nothing at all. You have to know what to do with the data you have.
Make it actionable
The most important thing of all: is your data actionable?
When they look at this stat, do people get excited? Do they see a path for the future in that data? Do they want to learn more when they see that data? Data and metrics aren’t just about where we are with our business now. Do they point the way to the future? What mistakes and oversights do they tell us that we should be avoiding?
What if I told you that the average American consumes 34 gigabytes of data daily? What would you do with that information in terms of your marketing strategy? How would you position the distribution channel?
The key purpose of this acronym is that it can power all functions of your PMM role. I've used these metrics to really inform our key messaging and positioning when it comes to all of our products. We need to use it when working closely with the product team and other internal teams to have a strong product development strategy.
Let’s talk about messaging
This is a part that people don’t pay attention to enough. As product marketers, it's our job to be the advocate for the customer, both internally for the company and making sure that the customer is finding your message. The way that you can accomplish this is to focus on three different areas in terms of research and data.
Sometimes with data and data driven storytelling, it can be pretty easy to get overwhelmed. It can be really difficult to even know where to start. So, let’s filter out all the noise.
How does the product succeed?
Use that framework to filter out the sources that you're getting. Look at your NPS score, for example, what story does that tell you about whether or not your product is succeeding?
To get more specific about this, look at your customer reviews to find out what really makes your customers tick. Here, you’re getting more into qualitative data over quantitative data.
Both are of equal importance, but if you want to put your finger on the story that your data is telling, qualitative is going to allow you to highlight specific concerns.
But that information isn’t doing anything unless you share that information. When I say share, I don’t just mean share it with your product team, make it a central part of your product messaging. Make it an integral part of your story.
Keep your friends close, but keep your competitors closer
I'm obsessed with competitive intelligence. This is a product marketing muscle that isn't normally flexed enough. This doesn’t necessarily mean imitating your competitor, although there’s nothing to say you can’t learn from what your competitors are doing and integrate it into your own playbook.
What’s more important though is learning from how your competitors are going wrong. This is how you’ll really differentiate yourself. By knowing what your competitors are doing, you can find an opening in the market to see if you can really make yourself even more unique.
Don’t ignore market intelligence
Things happen so quickly that you don't want to be caught flat-footed. If you stay on top of your data and research, you can almost anticipate and work with a product team so that you know exactly what to do when things are changing.
One of the things that many people struggle with is having that access to data from internal data teams. Luckily, there are a bunch of organizations that do a lot of free research to help get a really good snapshot of what's happening in your industry for your customers.
