This presentation was delivered at the 2022 Product Marketing MisUnderstood event. Catch up with a variety of talks with our OnDemand service.
We all know that structure matters. Think about how much time we as product marketers spend laboring over the structure of storylines, narratives, and pitch decks, or how we'll structure a sales training session to ensure reps understand how to sell a new product in the market.
It's only natural that you begin to wonder, Is my team structured for success? Are we aligned with the right needs of the business? What could make us more efficient and effective?
In the latest State of Product Marketing Report, Product Marketing Alliance found that the majority of PMM teams (65%) report to marketing. Far fewer report to product, the CEO, or other business functions. But within those departments, what exactly are the product marketing teams orienting around?
Lindsay Bayuk, Pluralsight’s CMO and my longtime product marketing mentor, offers her expertise on the most common product marketing team structures. They’re generally shaped around feature, function, line of business, buying segment, or objective. Let's dig a little bit deeper into each of these.
I’ll specifically be taking a look at structuring your PMM teams around:
- Features,
- Functions,
- Lines of business or segments,
- Objectives, and
- Also, be looking at which structure will be right for you.
Structuring your PMM teams around features
Organizing a product marketing team around features is a simple and traditional approach, and it can make the most sense for product marketing teams that are just getting started. Often, these product marketers are paired with anywhere from one to four product managers to focus on messaging, positioning, launch strategy, and enablement for that feature set.
