Here’s the scenario:

I am the general manager of a sandbox. In this role I get to decide who can come in and who I don’t want. It is new, but my playmates were actively seeking such a sandbox and it quickly becomes a place filled with people who want to come and play.

I decide to open my sandbox to playmates for free; but, I will have some maintenance expenses so  I am charging the toy providers a small fee. After all, they are the ones who want to encourage the use of their toys by my playmates so that when they leave my sandbox, they will want to go and buy the same toys since they are so much fun.

Now, I had one toy provider (the pail) approach me early – even before I finished building my sandbox. They asked for certain things and after I talked it over with some of my playmates we thought it was a good idea. After we publicized this, hoping to draw some attention, other toy makers (the shovel and the truck) decided that it wasn’t fair that they got the first spot; and, as some do, simply took their toys away from the sandbox.

So, now I have a sandbox, with some toys in it, and my playmates are happy. But, it’s pretty obvious to everyone that the major toys – the shovel and the truck – are not playing with us. I’ve gotten questions.

When it first happened, I told the shovel and the truck that it was simply the pail asked for what corner they wanted to own first, and they got it. In fact, I was able and willing to give the shovel and truck the corners they wanted as well. But, they were upset thinking that the pail’s corner was the biggest.

In reality, everyone could have won here. There is room. The pail, shovel and truck all could offer their toys to my playmates. A decision has not yet been made on a favorite toy in this sandbox. It’s still new and growing.

Looking in from the outside, take this into a business context. Think about your partners. How do you respond when partners put “demands” on your relationships? Do the rules change when the partner is more “strategic?” I have no answers, I tried. But, I need your help. What would you tell the shovel and truck? Would you tell the pail, thanks, but I have to change our agreement so you could accommodate the shovel and truck. Or, would you tell the shovel and truck, pound sand?

So, the MN Product Camp happening this weekend has kept me a bit more than occupied. Unfortunately this means I haven’t been able to post articles that have formed in my mind, but not found their way to the keyboard.

So, I simply updated my “rules” page. This is a tab on my site here where I will list the rules I believe are worth following for product managers and product marketers. The rules are not necessarily mine – and I will attribute when I quote directly. But, they are foundational in nature.

If you have any rules that feel should be included, please comment. The list is intended to grow with the product professional community.

Looking in from the outside, there are building blocks we all should master before tackling the harder stuff up the ladder. Only then, when we remember the rules of the game, can we achieve and succeed.

Several months ago, July 2009 to be precise, I posted an entry on this site entitled “Old Dogs…New Tricks.” The post was about how the wave of new tools does not change the need to remember what you do.

Earlier this week I had the pleasure of joining The Altimeter Group’s Webinar “Understand Your Customers’ Social Behaviors” hosted by Charlene Li and Jeremiah Owyang. What do you know? They are reinforcing, to a much larger audience, what I have been saying for years.

In the olden days of marketing – and product marketing – we communicated a new product launch by yelling from the hilltops or sending a town crier on horseback into town. As technology (and civilization) evolved, we (very fast forwarded) moved into direct mail. This tool involved writing compelling messages to get folks to open the envelope we mailed through the Postal Service. (You remember sorting out the bulk mail piles, or using a mailing house where you paid extra money so they would do that work.) We spent much effort buying mailing lists and testing the list, refining the message and testing some more.

More time passed, paper-based mail gave way to e-mail. And, we spent much effort buying email lists and testing the list, refining the message and testing some more. Rather than focusing on how to get the prospect to open an envelope, the focus moved to the email subject line. The goal became trying to get the recipient to not block you as “spam.”

Now, folks are passionate about social media as the vehicle of choice. All you hear from your marketing department, outside agencies and your network is about Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn,Yelp, Foursquare and YouTube. (I know I am leaving about 300 others off this list, but that is not important to the message.)

What has remained constant throughout time is what is really important. It is the focus on the message – - regardless of the communication vehicle that is now in vogue. If we cannot reach our prospects with a compelling message, we have failed. It is truly irrelevant which method is used to communicate – paper based mail, electronic mail, social media or whatever creative and innovative tools come next. Since we know our persona so well, we already know what channel they are listening on for our message. That should guide our efforts.

Looking in from the outside, a fool with a tool is still a fool. You will fail if you think you can move folks away from the mailbox and on to Twitter, or any of the other social media sites. You should be watching for signs that they have already embraced the site before you make the jump.

The PCampMN organizing team is in full-blown gear marketing the event to those for more sponsorships and for attendees. Many times during this week, as we kicked into high gear, we’ve been asked individually “Why?” To help answer this question, I will present – in my unique way – the top ten reasons why you should attend this event.

10) Where else can you learn about product management and product marketing while eating a funnel cake? (The stand in the amusement park is around the corner, a three-minute walk. Trust me, I DID time it.)

9) This will be a collection of great product management and product marketing minds from the area. If your company is planning for growth in 2010, this is THE place to find those new employees.

8 ) No travel budget or education budgets will be touched for you to attend. The event is local, at the Mall of America, and is of no cost … free.

7) There is no football game to occupy your time.

6) This is a chance to share your experience, by presenting, to your peers. The shared learning is how we all grow from each other.

5) Steve Johnson from Pragmatic Marketing will offer a keynote. If you have never heard Steve present – sit back and enjoy the education and laughter. (He tells great stories too! And, you are just as sure to hear about his son’s band, The Alternate Routes.)

4) You know that feeling of “no one in my company understands what we do in product management and/or product marketing ?” When you’re in a room of 100+ peers, you won’t feel so alone. We all have been there and understand you.

3) The organizing team has put in a LOT of time and effort to make this a great day for us and our peers. But, you don’t want to leave us there alone, feeling like we don’t have any friends or peers in the product management and product marketing world that care… do you?

2) This will be the first product management and product marketing event of its kind dedicated to, organized by, and supported by the Upper Midwest community.

1) A free day of product management and product marketing learning, in your backyard. Did I mention free?

This event is unique. Looking in from the outside, it’s too cold to be outside ice fishing at this time of the year, and I can guarantee you that your product management and product marketing peers won’t be sharing their presentations with you in those ice houses. If you find a glimmer of truth in any of these statements, join me and register today at http://www.pcampmn.org.

I realized it’s been awhile since I updated everyone on PCampMN. It’s not that I have had nothign to share; it really is that we have been very busy getting ready for our first ProductCamp Minnesota event on January 30th. And, we’re getting very excited!

Plans are underway!

• Location – the world famous Mall of America, in the Great Room. Participants can bring the whole family for a day of fun while we are learning and networking with colleagues.
• Presentations – Presentations are being created, excerpts are starting to come in. We can always use more though. And, remember, your peers will get to vote on which presentations they want to experience. It could be a demo, a panel discussion, a facilitated roundtable discussion or a straight out lecture.
• Keynote presentation from one of the industry’s brightest bulbs, Steve Johnson from Pragmatic Marketing.
• Sponsors – they help to make the event possible, and free to participants. Of course, we could always use just one more…
• Participants – will all get some educating, do some teaching, network a bit, enjoy a free lunch and get a cool tshirt, just for registering in advance at www.pcampmn.org. They are coming from near and far – North Dakota, Iowa, Wisconsin and even from the far reaches of out-state Minnesota.
• Volunteers – help to make the event possible, and free to participants… but they won’t be serving you your free lunch! We can always use more of them too.
• The weather – it promises to be cold outside, but in the Mall, it will be toasty warm.

Keep up on the action – Follow us on Twitter, join the Facebook Group, Join the LinkedIn Group – however you prefer your news – get all the details at www.pcampmn.org. 

Oh, and one more thing – - tell your friends about this unique event too. Tweet about it, blog about it, talk about it. It’s gonna be fun!

Join me

We all know that roadmaps exist in product management. Everyone is clear on all of the best reasons for having a product roadmap.

There are different types of product roadmaps including market and strategy roadmap, visionary roadmap, technology roadmap, platform roadmap, and a slew of variations on a “classic” product roadmap (internal or external). But, does anyone ever plan out a product marketing roadmap?

I actually heard this term (a roadmap) used in relation to product marketing. When I probed, it was defined as “we need to know that we are doing the right stuff at the right time”. This got me thinking that, yes, that makes sense and we should be defining a product marketing roadmap that supports our product roadmap.

As I peruse my product roadmap, I was thinking about what the benefits would be for a product marketing roadmap, how would we change behaviors? We could start product positioning sooner, define the product benefits, do internal education while product is being developed, test potential messages as we test the features – matching critical product launch elements to the product roadmap process.

Maybe the concept of a product marketing road map is something we should all be looking at doing – doesn’t sound so far-fetched now, does it?  Maybe we should be looking at product marketing roadmaps as our first new value to introduce to our organizations for the new year.

From the outside looking in, I see that we are so concerned with checklist marketing, that we forget to strategically plan, or roadmap, our efforts so that when the product is ready – the launch side is ready when we are ready to release the product.

So, what elements would you include in a product marketing roadmap?

The New Year holiday came, and went. I hope that you, your family and your loved ones all enjoyed the celebrations. But, now, it’s time to focus back to work.

You spent the time between Thanksgiving and the New Year holidays tying up loose ends, and hopefully even planning your first few actions to start the new year when you go back to work (and work goes back to normal around you.) So, what are you going to do?

Product management and marketing requires you to constantly step it up. How are you aiding that? You need to do something different. You need to change something that has been the same for too long. You need to add an education piece to your plans. You need to get out of the office and visit your market. It doesn’t matter what you do – just take action.

From the outside looking in, if you continue to do what you do the way you’ve always done it nothing will change. Take advantage of the new year and try something new.

A holiday gift to my colleagues in product management and product marketing…

‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the firm,
Every dev team member was struck by the germ.
The code had to be finished right away and with care,
In hopes that on Xmas Day, they would not still be there.

The product managers were dreaming about their soft beds,
While visions of market requirements danced in their heads.
Personas, pcamps, pricing and analysis,
Makes you think – get to work and stop the paralysis

The sales team calls with just one more request,
It’s the demo again, something we just detest.
Of course it was something needed real bad.
To delay would only make sales really mad.

When on the conference call there arose such a clatter,
I shot from my chair, fearful of what was the matter.
The PowerPoint preso was up in a flash,
But the network was down – get the helpdesk on the dash.

Marketing was staring outside at the new-fallen snow
Wondering when they could join their friends down below.
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But the CEO dressed in full Santa gear.

He carried a sack, all red, big and bright
It was just one more diversion from this long night.
He put his hand in, drew out envelopes that were hard,
No bonuses this year, just a “thanks” and $5 coffee gift card.

“So thank you, thank you” he called to one and all.
As our AV geek put the projection on the wall.
A last review of test cases was finally to occur
(And, to be honest, this last hour was one big blur.)

So the meetings were done, and code put to rest
Customers were happy and said we’re the best.
Another release met the deadline, got out the door,
We took a moment to lift our jaws from the floor.

The release may be out, and the dev team said good day
But the product management team knew there was more to say.
Positioning and material left to write,
With fears still that this could turn into another long night.

But, sales expected the PowerPoint today
It didn’t matter to them if it was a holiday.
To avoid their calls and emails during tomorrow’s time,
Working on these tools now was worth the dime.

I write the requirements and create the tools
I’m in product management, I’m no one’s fool!
The rest of my company may have left hours ago,
But the work never stops for me, this much I know.

My present will be waiting when the sales numbers are met,
And I meet the big forecast, and win the company bet.
I then get to use the frequent flier miles I have earned,
As I head to a sun-drenched beach (with no cell service) to get burned.

So, no matter what celebration of the holiday you observe,
There is enough credit, accolades and attention you deserve.
And if you’re a colleague in this product management land,
Stand up now… join me and give yourself a hand!

[And, If you’re thinking this is a career for you,
Think twice then again, before you do.
For while it is exciting and rewarding, full of joy, and fragile
Get ready for next year, for then we tackle Agile!]

I spent this last weekend thinking about my next post here. I was intrigued by a post written last week by Dr. Jim Anderson on “Tough Times Call for You to Fire Your Customers.”  I did some more research, and had a nice draft written. Just a little clean up and I was ready to post it this afternoon.

Then, I opened my RSS feeds of my blogroll, and I have a lot, only to see that this morning Steve Johnson beat me to it and wrote a post referencing the “fire your customer” concept.

So, now, what do I do? If I do a complete post using the nicely worded draft, I look like a copycat; and, if I don’t post it, I look like…well, the early bird with the best intentions who missed the worm.

Yep, that’s me.

The only thing I would add to the esteem colleague posts above – and this will only make sense if you read the two posts referenced – is that at the end of the day, while you may want to “fire your customer,” there is another option. I had the chance to ask Forrester Research’s CEO George Colony once if he ever fired his “troubled or over-demanding” customers. His response, which I think is the best one I have heard, was simply “No. I don’t fire them. I invite them to my competitors.”

From the outside looking in – there are two lessons in this post: 1) don’t wait to act – despite taking time to learn, craft and put in due diligence, sometimes you need to follow your gut and act more swiftly; and, 2) if you can’t make a customer happy, let your competitor spend their time, money and resources doing it. It will leave you with more to go after the rest of the market.

This time of year, your big product has launched and is receiving acclaim in the market… so where will the next big idea come from?
 
Some folks have ideation sessions – often with cross functional teams involved with each trying to top the crazy thoughts previously proposed.
 
These ideas, once gathered, should be classified by the type of idea.
 
1. A minor enhancement to an existing product
2. A major enhancement to an existing product
3. A derivative product
4. A brand new upgrade product
5. A totally new breakthrough product
 
Looking from the outside in, rather than gather a cross functional internal team together, perhaps you should be talking to customers (and even non-buyers) to discover ideas they solve their problems and that they may even have budget to purchase.