Cindy F. Solomon of Global Product Management Talk on Product Marketing in Silicon Valley

Cindy, welcome to Take Charge Product Management.

As you look across the product marketing profession what do you see?

(Cindy Solomon) I see that what may have previously fallen under the umbrella of the product marketing function, is gaining attention in the blogosphere with sexier names, such as Agile marketing, growth hacking, or customer experience management. These may be new approaches, but they are grounded in the product marketing managment function to increase current product ROI, identify opportunities for new product iterations, manage the value proposition via positioning of the product, and create the business case for remaining competitive in the current market conditions and future trends.

Product marketing management has always been charged with concerns about how to squeeze additional value out of products already in the market, align the goals of the product with the business case KPIs, translate the value of the company brand into every experience, extract information from non-customers, identify patterns from data collected across various inputs, increase efficiency across the entire product management lifecycle, attach ROI to every program attached to the product in the marketplace, streamline sales and marketing procedures, facilitate new partnership, co-marketing, and strategic channel opportunities, track the market opportunities, threats and trends, and make the case for new products and innovation.

Given your unique perspectives, how do you think the ProdBOK Guide will help address the challenges of being a product management or product marketing management professional?

(Cindy Solomon) Having a product management body of knowledge will clarify the skills, knowledge, language and perspective for the product management professional. The ProdBOK will provide an orientation for people being thrown into product management roles without any foundation and open the door to understanding all of the elements that comprise the knowledge necessary, the procedures available, and how to identify appropriate tools to apply at various points in the product management lifecycle.

For those seeking product management positions, and for those identifying product management functions within their companies, it will define the requirements, orientation and basic foundation which is desperately sought after by individual product management professionals, product teams, decision makers, HR departments, and organizations of all sizes seeking to increase market share and product success.

The ProdBOK seven phase product lifecycle framework provides the visual representation to enable conversations across functions for everyone in the organization to be on the same page to identify what needs to happen based on the maturity of the product externally in the marketplace and internally within the organization culture.

(This concludes the first part of our two part interview with Cindy. More on product marketing management next week…To learn more about Cindy or to listen to Global Product Management Talk’s weekly broadcast click here.)

Greg Geracie is a recognized thought leader in the field of product management and the President of Actuation Consulting, a global provider of product management consulting, training, and advisory services to some of the world’s most well-known organizations. Greg is also the author of the global best seller Take Charge Product Management. He is also an adjunct professor at DePaul University’s College of Computing and Digital Media where he teaches graduate and undergraduate courses on high-tech and digital product management.

The ProdBOK mark is a registered trademark of AIPMM.