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Spring Has Sprung! So that must mean I’m Camping and Talking all over the place…

There are just a bunch of events I’m planning on attending which should be a blast over the next 45 days or so. Every year spring marks the time for rebirth, but also a bunch of travel for me and always has. I really like to see how the country changing in spring, but also meeting with folks that read this blog and getting the opportunity to meet people I don’t already know. To that end, I thought I would do a post on places I’m going to be in an effort to hopefully catch up with more folks along the way. Traveling around and having interesting conversations around product marketing and product management is not just part of my job, it’s something I really enjoy. I guess that makes me a little geekier than most, but you have to love what you do.

Speaking of conversations, I just had the pleasure last week to do a Podcast on innovation with Scott Sehlhorst and Josh Duncan which was a blast. If you are interested in listening, you can hear it on A Random Jog or via iTunes. I hope Josh makes this into an ongoing series, since there is still a good deal of stuff to tackle in product marketing for technology folks.

So here is my schedule of where I’m speaking publicly and the events I plan to be @

April

ProductCamp Chicago – 4/2 @ Orbitz: This is the second installment of PCAMP Chicago and it has reached the maximum number of registrants already, so while you can’t register, you should be able to keep up to date on the happening online this weekend via Twitter. This weekend is a busy ProductCamp weekend, with several of my fellow instructors at Pragmatic Marketing also participating in Silicon Valley PCamp and the Boston ProductCamp.

ACETECH 4/7 – This is an interesting event without a doubt set in beautiful Whistler. So while I’m going Whistler I’m probably not skiing, but I’m definitely looking forward to talking strategy with some of Canada’s senior technology leaders and getting better insight from founders and CEO’s on their take of what they are seeing in their markets. While I’d love to spend time skiing, I’m excited about the event because it is chocked full of interesting activities and a schedule of great content which I’m looking forward to from a learning perspective. I already know at least two readers who are planning to make it so if you are, drop me a note.

ProductCamp DC – 4/30: This is the second installment of ProductCamp DC and will be first one for me. There is still space for registering, but if this is like other PCAMP’s it’s probably not going to have room soon, so don’t forget to register. I’m certainly looking forward to meeting folks who I’ve been following on twitter and in the marketplace who I have yet to meet in person like @pradsam.

May

Austin 5/2 -4 – I’ll be in ATX for both an Effective Product Marketing and a Product Launch Essentials seminar at the AT&T conference center which is one of my favorite venues. If you haven’t had been to one of the training courses for outbound marketing, this course is anchored in the Pragmatic Marketing Framework and how to better manage engagement and content to influence buyers. You can find out more on the seminars from the website.

Schedule Updates

So with being on the road like this for the next month or so it might be hard to keep up with the whole blogging thing, but I’ll try. Regardless, now that you know where I am let’s catch up on the road if you are attending one of these events.

I’ll continue to update by my schedule in the widget up on the right for those of you who are interested. Now if you’re interested in staying up to date on product camps, you can do so at www.productcamp.org.

If you want general schedule information for marketing training events or product management courses, you can sign up for alerts on when Pragmatic Marketing is in your area, subscribe to the RSS feed or even go to the facebook page and join the other 500+ product marketing and management folks keeping up to date on all the blogs, seminar dates and product camps around the globe.

Enjoy spring and see you on the road, cheers!

~jon

March 29, 2011 by Jon Gatrell

Marketing is in the Middle: Lauren Carlson

The next person in the series, is Lauren Carlson. I asked Lauren to participate since as the interviews started to unfold from a content perspective, no one was really talking about tools which provide marketers an edge. Lauren writes about various topics related to CRM software, with particular interest in sales force automation, marketing automation, and customer service and this background clearly made her a great fit to help fill this gap which has emerged in the discussions around marketing being in the middle.

Like all marketers or people around tech – Lauren isn’t formally trained in technology or marketing. She has a background in the music industry, and when she isn’t writing about software, you can find her running at Town Lake and singing at local venues around Austin. So maybe, just maybe I should have entitled the series Austin is in the Middle of Technology marketing with a couple of other geographies added to the mix, just for fun.

Here is Lauren’s take:

What marketing roles have you had and in what markets?

I am relatively new to marketing but I continue to get exposure to many software marketers, companies and service providers as a journalist. The role I have at Software Advice provides great access to leaders in the community. As a practitioner, I am actively involved in doing search engine optimization.

When you look at your career in marketing, what activities have you found most interesting/challenging?

Targeting the right segments in the market. Ultimately as marketers, we have to find our niche or audience. So finding the right audience can often be difficult. Sometimes we have really great content, but if it doesn’t hit the right person, it is useless.

Based on your experience what activities do you think get the most return?

Doing the background research! Certainly it can take a good deal of effort and a bit of time, but it often brings back the most returns. I spend days researching keywords and search stats to better understand my audience. It can be tedious, but when we start to rank for those competitive terms, that’s really when you see the fruits of your labor.

What do you feel is the most important component of a successful marketing gig?

Content. Content. Content. Content drives everything. You can have the most talented people or the best business model, coolest tech, but if your content is bad, you’ve got nothing to keep your audience/buyers engaged.

If you could design the perfect corporate environment for a marketer to be successful what would that be?

It would be focused on collaboration and creativity. Sometimes I get my best ideas when talking with a co-worker or when I am simply away from my desk interacting with others. Don’t get me wrong – some structure is great, but I think having the freedom to team up or step out of a structured environment can really free the mind to come up with some awesome stuff.

How far is this from reality?

I think that a lot of new start-ups are adopting this environment. Our company is working toward it and I have heard of others that are using this model. I think it is possible in organizations with a legacy in the traditional way of marketing. It is simply a matter of them accepting it and making the decision to adopt it.

So what’s next?

I have personally done a lot of research in the area of marketing automation – a piece of software that automates basic to complex marketing tasks. Companies are beginning to see the value of adding a marketing automation system to their enterprise software mix. However, the issue of adoption is what is holding it back. Software Advice just published a very interesting article from Jeff Pedowitz called, “Why the Marketing Automation Market is Floundering & 5 Fixes to Fuel It.” One of the stumbling blocks faced by the industry is education. We have this great new software, but we have not educated marketers on what it is or how to use it. I think we will see a new generation of marketers popping up in the next few years. These marketers will be true analytical thinkers more focused on process. We still need creative minds, as well. I think when you combine great technology and process with vibrant creativity and ideas, you have the perfect marketing mix.

——-

Twitter: @MASoftwareGuide or @CRMadvice

Blog: www.softwareadvice.com/articles/crm/

February 14, 2011 by Jon Gatrell

Mobile Trends for Marketers, Product Marketers and Product Managers

Market research isn’t easy – it’s always a bunch a work. Gaining insight into trends and alike not only requires a keen eye on the data, but continuous interaction from folks in the market. To that end, researching trends can definitely be more difficult than it should be and researching markets can be even harder if you don’t have an analyst budget.

For the past 2 or 3 years or so, I’ve been consistently tracking the mobile markets and trends for some time and here is some more stuff for y’all, with another one from Mary Meeker. It also looks like Meeker apparently recently joined – KPCB. OK maybe not recently, but at least since the last published Morgan Stanley pitch on internet mobile trends.

Mobile megatrends 2011 (VisionMobile)

View more presentations from andreasc.

Again a bunch of meeker slides:

Top 10 Mobile Internet Trends (Feb 2011)

View more presentations from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.