| Detail | For this role |
|---|---|
| Department | Marketing |
| Level | Manager |
| Reports to | Head of Marketing |
| Direct reports | Product Marketing Executive |
| Experience | 5 to 8 years in product marketing, product management, pre-sales or B2B marketing |
Product Marketing Manager job description template
Copy this job description, replace the text in square brackets and post it on your careers page or a job portal.
Job title: Product Marketing Manager
Department: Marketing
Reports to: Head of Marketing
Location: [City], [office, branch or site]
About the role
A Product Marketing Manager connects a product to its market. They research buyers and competitors, write positioning and messaging, plan launches, and give sales the pitch, material and training to win deals. The role is common in SaaS and software companies, fintech, consumer electronics, telecom and B2B manufacturers. A product marketing manager works between product management, sales and marketing, and is judged on launch results, win rates and how well the market understands what the product does.
Key responsibilities
- Research target buyers through interviews, win-loss calls and sales feedback, and keep a clear persona for each segment.
- Write positioning and messaging for each product and major feature, and test it with customers and sales before rollout.
- Plan the go-to-market for launches, covering audiences, pricing communication, channels, launch date and success measures.
- Create sales enablement material such as pitch decks, demo scripts, battle cards, one-pagers and objection handling guides.
- Train sales, pre-sales and support teams on new products and features before each launch.
- Track competitors' products, pricing and messaging, and refresh the competitive battle cards every quarter.
- Write product pages, launch emails, release notes and case studies with the content and design teams.
- Feed market and customer insight back to product managers to shape the roadmap and pricing.
- Measure launch adoption, influenced pipeline and win rates against competitors, and share the learnings.
- Support analyst briefings, product demos at events and customer webinars.
Requirements
- Graduate degree in engineering, computer science or business
- An MBA, preferably in marketing, is an advantage
- A product marketing certification is an advantage
- 5 to 8 years in product marketing, product management, pre-sales or B2B marketing
KRAs and KPIs for a Product Marketing Manager
Key result areas for the appraisal form, each with a KPI you can measure every month or quarter.
| Key result area | How to measure it |
|---|---|
| Launch delivery | Every tier-one launch live on the planned date, with enablement completed for all sales teams |
| Product adoption | Adoption of new features among target customers at or above goal within 60 days of launch |
| Win rate | Win rate against named competitors improved each quarter from the baseline |
| Enablement use | Current deck and battle cards used in at least 80 percent of qualified opportunities |
| Message testing | Positioning tested with at least 10 customers before each major launch |
| Competitive intelligence | Battle cards for the top competitors refreshed every quarter |
Skills and tools
Tools used day to day: Salesforce or HubSpot CRM, PowerPoint or Google Slides, Notion or Confluence, Loom for product videos, Typeform or Google Forms, Figma for reviewing designs.
Reporting line and career path
Next roles: Head of Marketing, Product Manager, Vice President Marketing
Interview questions for a Product Marketing Manager
- Write a one-line positioning statement for our product right now, and explain your choices.
- How do you decide whether a feature deserves a full launch or only release notes?
- Tell me about a launch that did not land. What went wrong in the go-to-market plan?
- How do you find out why we keep losing deals to one particular competitor?
- Sales is not using the battle cards you built. What do you do?
- How do you work with a product manager who disagrees with your messaging?
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What does a product marketing manager do?
A product marketing manager decides how a product is positioned and sold. They research buyers and competitors, write messaging, plan launches, build sales material such as decks and battle cards, train sales teams and measure adoption and win rates after launch.
What is the difference between a product manager and a product marketing manager?
A product manager decides what gets built and works with engineering and design on the roadmap. A product marketing manager decides how the product is positioned, launched and sold, and works with sales and marketing. Both rely on customer research and work closely at every launch.
Is product marketing a technical role?
It is partly technical. A product marketing manager must understand the product well enough to demo it, answer sales questions and explain it simply to buyers. An engineering background helps in software and hardware companies, but strong writing and customer insight matter just as much.