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on new products as well, so the critical concepts of product/market fit and growth remain at the heart of product work for the life of a technology-powered company.
INSPIRED described the techniques we use to discover a product that is valuable, usable, feasible, and viable, and the book discussed how this requires an intense collaboration between product management, product design, and engineering.
But while discovering a winning solution may be necessary, it is not sufficient.
We have all seen countless examples of products that go nowhere because:
the product doesn't address real customer needs
or, there aren't enough customers with those needs
or, those customers do exist, but not enough of them learn your product exists
or even if they do find you, they don't see how what you provide aligns with their needs
To avoid this fate, as the name implies, there is another dimension to product/market fit, and that is the market.
When we talk about a winning product, we are referring to a strong solution for a specific market.
A product manager's partner in achieving product/market fit and getting this product to market is the product marketer.
While the product manager focuses primarily on the product side of the equation, the product marketer focuses primarily on the market side, including the go-to-market strategy.
But it's important to realize that pursuing the product and pursuing the market are not independent activities. They are happening in parallel, and they are very much intertwined.
Which is why the product manager/product marketer partnership is so important to get right.
I have always visualized this partnership as the product manager working with the product marketer to triangulate on product/market fit.
And once we achieve product/market fit, and our focus moves to growth, the collaboration of product and product marketing becomes the key to that growth.
While the product marketing role has existed for many years, for technology-powered products and services, with the pace of innovation and with very crowded competitive landscapes, it is especially challenging, and more important than ever.
At a strong tech-powered product company, the product marketer helps to answer some very fundamental questions essential for a product's eventual success:
Determining the best ways to reach the target customer
How and when the customer will be able to learn your product exists
How to position your product so the customer knows how to think about your product
How to message the value so that it resonates with the customer's underlying needs
How the customer can evaluate your product
Who and how the customer will make a buying decision
Finally, if you've done your job well and the customer loves your product, how they can tell their friends and colleagues how much they love your product
Many experienced product leaders will tell you that getting the go-to-market right is as tough as discovering a successful product.
In truth, in our books and articles to date, we know we have focused primarily on the product side of the equation.
That's mainly a result of our product bias. We know there are examples of products that succeeded despite weak product marketing, but great product marketing can't overcome a bad product.
However, in our increasingly competitive reality, in order to succeed, we need both strong products and strong product marketing to succeed.
Which is why I'm happy to tell you about this new book.
Martina has had a remarkable career, with many years of experience at top tech companies, most notably Microsoft and Netscape Communications, covering not just product marketing, but also product management and corporate marketing. She is, I believe, uniquely suited to write this book.
Martina has worked for, and been coached by, several of our industry's most accomplished technology and marketing leaders. As a long-time SVPG Partner, venture capitalist, and UC Berkeley Lecturer, she has been advising, coaching, and teaching literally hundreds of companies and countless product marketers on the critical topic of product marketing.
In some cases, especially at early-stage startups, the product manager may need to cover the product marketing role as well. In other cases, others in the marketing organization may need to cover the role.
Whether you are coming from the product side or the marketing side, you are much more likely to succeed if you have a solid understanding of product marketing.
It is the goal of the Silicon Valley Product Group series of books to share the best practices of the top product companies, and this is an important addition, addressing a long-underserved need.
And our intention is that this is just the start. We plan to do more going forward, sharing more of the best practices and techniques that help product teams and product marketing to collaborate effectively and successfully.
Marty Cagan
November 2021
Introduction: My Story
Getting Flamed by Bill Gates
When Blue walked through my door, I knew it couldn't be good. The only other time the Word Business Unit manager sat down in my office was back when he was doing his whistle-stop get-to-know-you tour. He got right to the point.
“I just got an email from Bill Gates. It said, ‘Word for Mac is depressing Microsoft's stock price. Fix it.’ So, I'm here to ask, what are we doing?”
I was a young product manager for Word for the Mac, and it was the first time I'd been trusted with a major product. A few months earlier, the newest version of Word for Windows released, delivering against a strategic plan that was years in the making. Up to that point, the Windows and Mac versions had different code bases, features, and release cycles. This new version used a single code base for both, meaning for the first time, the two would have the same features and ship simultaneously.
But the Mac version was late—very late. Each day it slipped past the Windows release was viewed as a public failure. We rushed to get the product done, deciding its new features were worth a hit in the product's performance.
Mac users HATED it. It was so slow that in their eyes it felt barely usable. And they missed their more Mac-centric features.
Back then, Word and Excel were the most significant productivity products on the Mac. Apple was a beleaguered company, and if Word didn't work well, there was real fear in the Mac community that it could be the death knell of Apple.
Newsgroups spewed vitriolic hate at Microsoft. When I posted to earnestly defend our decisions, they directed that hatefulness at me. I would sometimes end my days in tears, wondering, “Don't people realize I'm a person?”
The only way to “fix it” was to improve performance and the features Mac users cared about most. We released a significant update along with a discount voucher and a letter from me apologizing to every registered Mac user.
It was a humbling experience. But it taught me an important lesson: the market determines the value of a strategy. And even at a company as good at strategy as Microsoft, things can still go really wrong when a product goes to market.
Start with the End in Mind
Although it didn't get everything right all the time, Microsoft did