Run Sales Enablement Like a ServiceNow PMM

28:51How do they like to buy? Where do they like to go to find more information? What is their buying group looking like? So all that information is super important to me before I started building that messaging house. And then I also had some exciting resources that I've never had access to in smaller companies I've worked at before. And that is called Evidenza. I'm not sure if a lot of folks are familiar with that. Evidenza is a research company that does synthetic persona market research. So you can get all of these synthetic personas interviewed, ask them very specific questions, just like you would any other buyer.

29:34and there could be, you know, more than a thousand personas interviewed. So you're getting kind of a very point of view on things. I love that. I have not heard of Evidenza. So sorry. So it's Evidenza Synthetic AI or is it just Evidenza? Evidenza is the name of this research company. And what they do is synthetic persona research, synthetic market research is overall what they do. We will have to check them out. We'll link them in the show notes so people can Also check them out. I'm not paid by them or anything. I know. I'm like, we should get a referral link for this. Every time I kind of work with them, I'm so amazed about the detail that comes out of their work.

30:16And I've spoken with them and they said that is kind of like 80 % accurate. So 80 % alignment with my kind of target buyer and what I would get. That's not bad. That's pretty good. It's really good. For the volume of work, for the volume that you get. But I'm always very impressed by what we get from them. So that's kind of that's a piece that's obviously not manual that just kind of came in because I work at ServiceNow and I was able to benefit from that. And it's just a really cool way to do research these days. So, yeah, I did most of the work on the messaging house by hand as much as possible, putting together all the information from kind of like how we want to position the solution with our buyers so that they're not confused, but also so that we can explain the full value.

31:06I use the words. I actually usually even have kind of like a little set of vocabulary that I put inside of my documentation that then feeds AI kind of like use. I love that. Yeah, that is such a good idea. I'm going to steal that one. Already gave it to us. Why not use the terminology and make AI kind of do all this work to make it authentic? Yeah, so the goal there is really to capture customer voice as opposed to the PMM voice or the AI voice, right? I really want that customer voice captured so that we can reflect it back and people can kind of self-identify and say, like, yes, this is really me.

31:46This speaks to me. That is so cool. I love that. And I love that you encourage the first draft being of everything, being more as much human driven as possible. And truly, that is where your creativity is going to come out, your unique point of view. So if anyone takes anything away from this conversation, I hope it's that. Um, so, okay. So once the message house, you mentioned the message house itself, that it sees a lot of eyes and you have, it sounds very iterative, but once it's all approved and all said and done, what did AI actually help you create or scale? Yeah, everything. So once we have our messaging house and we have our personas in, so obviously I had those synthetic personas, but I also built something even more bespoke for me because I had all that interview data as well.

32:40So my very specific personas as well, then they form kind of the foundation of my project and my AI. And then we go big. Then it's everything. First cold apps, cold script, website copy, sales plates, enablement materials, partner launch documents. Everything can be scaled from there using your foundation documentation. Obviously, there's best practices. Like I have many years doing this. I kind of make sure it's, you know, the right content for the right audience and it fits within the parameters of what we're trying to do. But honestly, it was so easy to scale because I had that foundation. I'm sure I was able to run at least 50 percent faster, if not kind of closer to 70, because I didn't have to second guess myself.

33:32But would this audience really use these words or am I connected to that on the right level? Even, you know, if we present them with this demo, is this the right demo flow? I was just able to ask my persona what they wanted to see and then got a script out of, you know, AI. It's like, how cool is that? So obviously, unity is judgment, right? It's not going to be you all. But hey, going 50%, 70 % faster is amazing. And I will take that any day. So the ability to scale with AI was truly fantastic. That is so, so interesting. And you mentioned a couple of things here that I feel like I just have to call out.

34:11So one thing that really, really matters here, and I'm not quite sure what the solution is or what my guidance even is, but this is not the first time that this has come up on this podcast where I have a guest like yourself, who's you're very seasoned, you're very experienced. So when you are using these AI systems, you have very strong discernment on what good looks like. You also did the product marketing craft yourself for the most part, a little bit of help from some tools. Everybody's got tools. But you did the work on your own to create this message house. So when you then would turn to AI to create some of these assets or sales enablement material, you know exactly what you're looking for and what good is.

35:07So the reason why I bring that up is because I feel like maybe this is a conversation for another day. I don't want to make this episode too long, but we should come back here and have this conversation. I feel like we're shoving AI down people's throats and I worry for the more earlier in career folks who don't have the expertise that you have. They just frankly don't have the years of experience. They don't have the discernment. They don't have the judgment. And it's not expected that they do. They'll earn it over time. But I don't know kind of what that new generation of marketers is going to look like with the push to use AI in the way that you have.

35:51So I don't want to derail this totally, but do you have any quick thoughts on that? I'm kind of in the same boat, right? Like, how do you learn if there are no best practices or examples if you're in a small company and, you know, you kind of only have a few resources? I think it's tricky. And that's probably why you listen to folks like yourself, Elle, and kind of participate in some of the other organizations to get some of those best practices. Because, yeah, you don't learn product working in college. That's not a thing. You kind of learn a job. Yeah. And that's why it's so important to still, within companies, maintain some balance with folks that are seasoned while you're still bringing in those new folks to do the work.

36:35Yeah, right. Because you could risk this whole purpose of using AI to actually give you some really bad results if you're not feeding it with the right stuff. Okay. All right. So bring us home. I want to merge two different topics into one question just for the sake of time. So you talked about sales plays in our prep call. So I would love to hear about that. And as we're kind of talking about sales plays, can you talk through how this impacted the overall results of your launch? Absolutely. Sales plays, an important and sometimes misunderstood technique, I would say. ServiceNow goes to market with sales plays.

37:23Folks don't sell individual products or even solutions. They have kind of a whole motion attached to it. It's a step-by-step instruction. of how to sell a bag of products, for lack of a better word. And we create in product marketing the sales plane, right? So then it has all the information they need about who is their specific buyer, what do they need to tell them, what problem are they solving for them, what maturity stage we're going after, and what do they need to show in order to win. And then a product marketing individual prepares all of that and puts it together. So it's kind of like here are all the steps you need to take to have a win, right?

38:08And that's how sales are trained. So they have these sales plays. They don't kind of go and get an individual deck here or there. They just go to their account dashboard, and then they're able to see what is the specific sales play that is associated with a specific account. And then they just simply press a button and then they have all the information they need about kind of like latest intel from this account, what's going on with this company overall and where we can come in and kind of position new products, additional products. And then a deck is generated, kind of a contract can be generated.

38:51They have all of the success stories. So everything they need, they can get in one place. And again, it's not just, oh, here's a pitch deck for a product. It's like all the assets you need in one place, as well as a step-by-step instruction of how to win. So yeah, we just try to make it as easy as possible for our sellers because we realize they're selling so many different things. Yeah. And it's important to note here that as I'm assuming there's some kind of AI component that enables these sellers to generate a pitch tech or a contract, et cetera. And again, that is built on your message house.

39:33So it's all so, we keep coming back to the message house. It's an important document. The nucleus. Yes. Yes. Okay. So you mentioned this earlier that one of your success metrics was that you yourself as an enterprise PMM, you got to move like 50 to 70 % faster with this entire approach that you've taken. Is there anything more to the story here for how you were able to bring this to life? Yeah, I think probably having all the information that you would ever want on your product as well as your persona is extremely important. You're able to move fast. The relationships that you build are extremely important.

40:17That's another human thing that we need to do ourselves. So in my case, whenever I had interviews with my the buyers or with the customers, I would bring back all the intel to my broader team, including product, strategy people, sales ops, so that we were all working kind of from the same set of assets. And they understood that if I'm moving in a certain direction, it is for a reason, right? So we continued to stay aligned. I continued to bring them value. And I was kind of a, I felt like a valued person launching a product because, you know, I was I was part of every single conversation because I had insights that they wanted.

40:57Yeah, you got that seat at the table that every PMM dreams to have. So I absolutely love this story. I love how you did the PMM craft yourself. I love the tools that you mentioned and just how you knew which players to bring along for the ride internally. and everything is something that I think most PMMs, especially enterprise PMMs aspire to. So let's turn this into a very quick coaching session and make a playbook for me. Say that I am an enterprise PMM at another company, different product, different market. So, you know, obviously no competition or anything, but how do I get started? How would you coach me through this?

41:41What would step one be? First place is getting that truth right. You really want to understand your buyer, what they feel, what they actually want to buy, and you want to have that documented and bring that to the rest of the team. So that could be with like customer interviews. This is where maybe we could use, what is it, Evidenza? Yeah. I love that. Okay, perfect. And then once I get that truth, I do all my foundational research, build out personas and everything in between. What's step two? What's next? Step two is building that story. So in my case, it was creating a messaging house. Any type of a document that you will continue to come to and use it as a foundation for everything else, all the assets that you build.

42:26And keeping in mind that that messaging house is going to be seen by all of those stakeholders. And I really love how you're partly just lucky that ServiceNow is already aligned on what the messaging house looks like. But if you work somewhere that maybe your stakeholders have never seen a messaging house before, definitely make sure that everybody's familiar with the document and how to use it. Otherwise, chaos could arise. Um, so, okay. So I get build out the, my differentiated story and it's documented in the messaging house. So I did my research. I got the buyer truth. I did the messaging house.

43:05What's next? Make sure that story reaches the field in a useful way. In my case, it is of course the enablement of our sellers as well as the partners, but then it's also to make sure that I have my sales play that is linked in all of their tools so that they can easily use it, easily generate their sales play, follow the steps, have all the assets available. If that's not there, if you were just thinking that launch is like building a story in a pretty deck, I'm afraid there's a little bit more to it, right? And you just need to make sure you have that route to market. Perfect. Okay. So including the sales play, and this was actually one of your goals that you stated in the very beginning was creating the clarity for not only obviously for your buyers, but like for your sellers so that they know how this fits into everything and obviously giving them the tools and resources for them to use this amazing story that you just put together in the messaging house.

44:07Okay. So makes sense. What's next after I get all of my materials out to sales? Yes. While you drink a glass of champagne, you celebrate and you quit your job. Obviously. Oh, hello. No, no. It's not done yet. No, the job is never done. You treat launch as the first goalpost. This is not the finish line. Launch is just one moment in time. It is not the And you keep doing the real work of connecting with your sellers. You want to understand what's working, what's not working. How is this landing in the field? And you make changes to both your assets as well as potentially your messaging house. You work very closely with your campaigns teams, your BDRs to make sure they have what they need to take your story to market.

44:59So you need to continue the momentum. The one thing that I like to do for sellers, for me, it's not a nice to have, I think it's a great tool, is whenever there is a win in the field, I like to document that win and then bring it back to sellers on the channels they already use, so Slack or Teams. It's an easy way to show that, hey, we're doing something exciting and this is really a landing and exactly how it is landing. So there's a write-up about, you know, who was this company then bought? Why? Who did we compete with? And what did the seller do to lend? It's a perfect way to do kind of like just-in-time enablement because you never really get a chance to have another big enablement on the same launch, right?

45:43But this way, your sellers still get these little bits of snack enablement over time that you can leverage with them. I love the win stories tip. that is so strong and such a good way to keep building momentum. And there's also something to be said about your earlier insight that you had around, not insight, I would say maybe it's more intuition is more what I meant to say, but around taking your product and attaching it to the broader company and making sure that it fit in with the narrative of the broader company. There's something to continuing with that intuition. And as the company's narrative continues to change and new campaigns get developed, that you're keeping a pulse on that for opportunity to bring your product narrative into that broader enterprise narrative as well.

46:39Yeah, it happened for me in a really cool way. As I was working through the launch, there was a kind of a nice to have, but because I was able to scale myself with AI and like run so fast, I really took that as an initiative. And that is getting a great customer story. There was a short list of like 10 customers and I went for the one with the biggest and best name and their story aligned so well. I honestly never had that experience, but just hearing them tell me what they're experiencing and the solutions they're using and how they're going about and what success they're seeing. I'm like, oh, my God, this is perfect.

47:17I need this story. Thankfully, the customer was super receptive. And at the end of the day, they did a ton of things with us, like an interview. a PR quote for our quarterly release as well as... It's amazing. Yeah. Like they were also part of our big knowledge customer event in Las Vegas on stage. And we were able to do so much because, you know, they were willing, but also because I had the time to actually go and like interview them and build a relationship and do all the things. And so that story, we were able to tie that to kind of a bigger company narrative that was evolving and we were able to tie it to this new AI native launch.

48:00And, you know, so it became a bigger moment than what it was supposed to be originally just because we had all the pieces in place. That's amazing. Sometimes it's good to do the extra work because it might just land you in a better position and give you some spotlight. Yes. You brought up such a great point and something that I think is pretty unique to enterprise And your example and your story is like a testament to this. So when you have, and you already know this, but when you have an enterprise customer, when they are selecting their vendor, they are not looking at a company for like, oh, you have the feature I want.

48:42I'm going to buy your product because you have the feature, it checks the box and we're done. No, no, no, no. When an enterprise customer chooses an enterprise solution, they are choosing a path, which means they are likely going to select multiple other products from your portfolio that is going to be very deeply entrenched into their tech stack somewhere. So all the more reason why it is to your benefit as a PMM to think about how your product is going to fit into that product narrative. And I love that you had like a bold, you know, strong brand customer to validate all of that for you. It makes it even better.

49:25So kudos to you. That's awesome. Okay. Last question for you on this topic. And then we're going to switch on to the next segment of the show. If you had one piece of advice for a PMM who is maybe a new enterprise PMM, they're going through their first launch ever. Like what's maybe one piece of guidance that you have for them? Just one piece of guidance, right? Yeah. No, understand the company and where you sit in the ecosystem, because it will make things so much easier for you. Sometimes you need to lean into certain areas that, you know, are not natural, like having lots of conversations to get alignment.

50:06You know, it feels like why are we spending so many hours talking about the same thing? But it's actually very, very important to align with all your stakeholders before you go fast and kind of build out all of your more traditional launch assets. Yeah. So it's understanding what's important for your specific company and how you can kind of provide the most value with that space. I love that. You know, typically when I ask this question, I get some variation. I would say at least like 75 % of the time, some variation of like, know your customers, talk to customers. But I love that your recommendation is to start with know where you sit in your org.

50:44And it's so true for enterprise. It just, it is what it is. I think that's a great piece of advice. So thank you so much for that. And thank you for this story. It was just such a delight to walk through this with you. Okay. So now I want to switch to the next segment of our show, which is the messaging critique. So this is where as product marketing experts, we will analyze real world marketing. And the fun part is Anna, as my guest, you get to pick the company we'll look at today. Some quick ground rules. One, we're going to pick a company that you're pretty familiar with, or you're familiar with the market, because it wouldn't be fair to critique a company that we don't really know their customer.

51:19And then you're going to tell me what stood out to you, what they do really well, and what you wish the PMMs would have considered differently. Without further ado, reveal the company we'll be looking at today. Well, today we're talking about Microsoft Copilot. If you are one of the people within the 40 % of the working adults in the world using Microsoft tools, you're probably very familiar with Copilot. Okay. But for those of us, admittedly me, I mean, I've heard of Copilot, obviously, but briefly summarize for the 60 % that does not use Copilot. What is it? Yes. Microsoft Copilot is an AI productivity assistant that works with all of your Microsoft 365 tools.

52:05So things like Outlook, Excel, Teams, PowerPoint, all have this Copilot AI that can assist you. I love it. It's giving like older brother, next generation of like Clippy, remember from the old. I'm kidding. I'm sure it's far more sophisticated than that. Okay. So, so it sounds like target audience or target customers, probably like the working professional, working professionals who are, who are working maybe traditional desk jobs, you know, would you say that that's accurate? Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. That makes more sense. Okay. What stood out to you about the messaging or like what's working really well with the messaging?

52:50Yeah, I'm looking at their website as we speak. I think overall there's messaging here that, you know, works for the audience. So if I'm the audience and I'm using Microsoft tools, I do want to run faster. I do want assistance with my work. And I am very happy that this works across the applications. So you can get things done across all of your Microsoft applications without kind of logging in and out. That definitely helps. So I think they hit on some very important points for a knowledge worker like you or me. Okay, so it sounds like they know their audience pretty well, or at least it seems like they know their audience pretty well.

53:37So what's one thing that you think they should consider to do differently? Yeah, looking at their page, I would say the time of the copy sounds a little bit generic. Someone may have just gone in with AI and did some copy creation here. So looking at the wording, empowering organizations, supercharging. Oh, that should be on the do not use list. Some of the words that are becoming a little taboo in the product marketing space definitely have the place on this page. And it's like, oh, my gosh. So I feel like as individuals, if I was just trying to look at Microsoft Copilot versus some of the other tools in the space and I saw this copy, I would be a little bit put off because it just sounds a little bit generic.

54:28So you're like now to tune out, right, when we hear this copy. Totally. And as a non-Microsoft user, it just kind of makes me feel like, is this kind of like their version of Gemini from Google that is in everything? Is it something else? Because they're using those words, it just feels like, oh, maybe this isn't for me. Maybe this is supposed to be for an IT person who's purchasing the technology. So I don't know. It's still while they are an enterprise company and they have all the resources, as most people think. It's interesting that an enterprise company that you think would have all these resources to have the perfect messaging maybe could improve on the messaging.

55:20So what would your guidance be if you were the PMM coach for the PMM for Microsoft Copilot? How would you coach them to take this to the next level? Yes, a couple of things. I would definitely go in with a more human message to really connect with someone who is using your solutions. My biggest use case for Copilot is really finding information. You go through so much every week, and then two weeks later, you really need to find the document or what the person said word by word. Especially in enterprise, having the context is huge. It's huge. It makes or breaks your job. Absolutely. And that's where Copilot is so very useful.

56:01You just ask it kind of to go and find find the thing. And it does. So that's that's been such a big time saver. Or if you've been on vacation, summarizing what's happened and kind of what you need to do next, extremely, extremely helpful and efficient. So I would connect with some of those more human elements and use the voice that a knowledge worker may have without supercharging or transforming. I don't feel if my day is transformed, but it is very helpful. Yeah. It's a stretch. Right? Yeah. And then also something that you highlighted, how is Copilot different from some of the other tools like Gemini or Quad, et cetera?

56:44It would have been great to have a little bit of a description of what Copilot brings to the table when others don't. Finally, why I think Microsoft is still doing an amazing job and none of what we said probably even matters is because distribution matters so much for an enterprise company. Yeah. We are not buying Copilot from this website ever. It's already built into our subscription and we just get it in our apps. And I'm thinking that probably it's the distribution and it's the sellers out in the field for upselling and, you know, providing all these packages directly to enterprise buyers.

57:25That's where the magic really happens, not on the website. I imagine Microsoft is doing a really good job of selling in the field as opposed to selling through the website. So that's just a lesson in sales and the importance of distribution models. Absolutely. You're spot on here. And I was going to say, I bet this page isn't even for humans anyway. It's for like AI to be able to help the procurement team make sure that, you know, their Microsoft suite checks a box. It's a good point. I wasn't supposed to do it. Oh, man. I know. Yeah. This wasn't for us. What were we thinking? Okay. So good. Well, Microsoft, obviously you're clearly crushing it.

58:10So maybe none of this even matters. But just some tips in case you do want to spruce up your Microsoft co-pilot messaging. Okay. So Anna, thank you so much. This has been such a wonderful conversation. And of course, one thing I always like to make space for in this podcast is a moment of gratitude because none of us get anywhere in our careers without having someone else to guide them and coach them. So thank you so much again for you taking the time to prep for this and share all your insights. And I'd love to turn it around for you to give some shout outs to some PMMs who have made a real impact on your career.

58:50So let us know who are those PMMs that we can give some kudos to. Yay. Thank you. And yeah, it's been it's been a pleasure to be here and have this conversation. So thank you for the time and the space to tell my story. As for PMMs, is it weird to give a shout out to my boss? Not at all. Literally, like more than half my episodes are like, you know. Juliana Bouquet is pretty amazing and really great at strategic thinking, navigating big organization, change management, and just allowing space for her team to do their best work, which I so appreciate. The launch was a lot of work. I'm not going to lie, but I was happy and excited because I felt like I have room and space to bring my best work forward and it will be encouraged and kind of embraced.

59:41So that was a really fantastic experience for me. And another person who's doing an incredible job in helping us transform the whole service now actually is Abed Chandri. He is the Godwa father of Nucleus at my company. Pretty important person to have for this launch. He's a PMM who came up with an idea that we needed grounding and is figuring out the way to make all of this happen on an enterprise level, which is not for the faint at heart because there's so many systems and security and teams that need to all. That is so cool. These objectives. So some really cool work that he's undertaking and leading PMFs to do and helping us actually stand out in this huge organization and kind of have a voice.

1:00:32That's wonderful. Sounds like people that should be on the podcast sometime. Yes. Awesome. Okay. And this is my last question for you, I promise. Where else can we access your expertise? Is it best to just find you on LinkedIn? Yes, I am active on LinkedIn. I usually share tips on product marketing as well as job search, especially for some of the younger PMMs looking to learn the craft and loan grant positions. My handle or what do you call it? My... I know. Yeah. URL, maybe? I don't know. Well, I'm sorry. I'm like Twitter. My handle. I know, right? Yeah. Starts about PMM. You can easily find me.

1:01:11There are very few PMMs with my name. It's very unique and loud and would love to connect and keep the conversation going. Awesome. And I think I saw that you have been speaking with PMA as well, like with various public speaking engagements or sharing your expertise there. So just another place for folks to find you. All right. Thank you again, Anna. And hey, PMM listeners, if you liked this episode, please share it with a PMM friend. And I would be so grateful if you would leave a review. It helps tremendously with our reach. Thank you so much for coming on this adventure with us today. I hope this episode leaves you with inspiration to take in the next step of your own journey.