120 Presentation Topic Ideas to Help You Hook Your Audience

I recently did a presentation night with my friends. If you’re unfamiliar with the concept, it’s when a group of friends gets together to share presentations they created about a topic of their choice.

The topics are typically light-hearted and fun. For example, mine was “my friends as obscure animals.”

You would be surprised how difficult it was to develop ideas for something as silly and unserious as a social presentation night.

So, it’s naturally even harder to ideate presentation topics for a professional setting with the pressure of needing to impress, influence, educate, or entertain.

I will share how to develop thought-provoking and relevant topics for your presentations to ensure they are memorable and resonate well with your audience.

Table of Contents

• How to Choose a Great Presentation Topic in 5 Steps
• 120 Presentation Topic Ideas
• 5 Presentation Tips

How to Choose a Great Presentation Topic in 5 Steps

I’ve broken down the painstakingly long process of choosing a topic into five simple and easy steps. Let’s walk through it.

Step 1: Begin with the end in mind.

“Some things are better left unsaid” is what I don’t want people to say about my presentations. That’s why I always have a specific goal before choosing a topic.

Some questions I ask myself are:

• What do I hope to achieve from the presentation?
• How do I want to come across?
• What do I want my audience to take away from the presentation?

Having a solid goal helps me begin crafting the title of my presentation. For instance, if I’m presenting a seminar about AI, my goal might be to convince my audience to incorporate more AI into their daily lives.

A punchy idea for a title could be “Why AI Is NOT Ruining Your Life.”

Step 2: Know your audience.

Let’s say I’m preparing an internal presentation for my team at Nickelodeon. I would first consider my audience’s experience and interests.

I don’t want to present something they already know well or have the topic go over their heads. Since it’s my team, I would feel confident that these factors overlap comfortably with mine.

If you’re presenting to an unknown audience, research the individuals or general demographic if specific names aren’t available.

Next, I’d consider what style is preferred. Some workplaces might be more formal, requiring a serious presentation tone.

Based on the type of content we work on at Nickelodeon, we keep things light at work, so I’d integrate humor and a casual tone into my presentation.

Pro tip: Always consider your audience’s knowledge level on the topic before drafting your presentation. For example, a presentation on social media targeted at Gen Z will differ from that targeted at Millennials.

Step 3: Be current.

Of presenters, 47% tailor their presentation topics to current events, which is an easy way to ensure the topic is novel.

I’m not saying the presentation has to be completely centered around a current event. Even including certain references or themes can alert audiences that this isn’t a cut-and-paste presentation that’s been done before.

For instance, if I were giving a presentation to my team at Nickelodeon, I might slip in a humorous reference to the 2024 film Wicked since it’s very culturally relevant.

If I wanted to tailor my entire presentation to this topic, I could highlight some of the ways the PG-rated movie manages to capture hearts of all ages, which is relevant to our team’s family-friendly content.

Step 4: Be precise.

Completing these first three steps puts me in a place with decent topic ideas. Now, I can cut out the excess and select a niche topic with a specific goal.

This is imperative because the broader the topic, the more difficult it will be for my audience to take away key ideas and actionable tips. Also, it would be more difficult to gather an audience intrigued and excited by my topic.

For instance, the first topic in the image is generic, sounds vague, and doesn’t specify any clear benefits. On the other hand, the second topic mentions the target audience, tells them what to expect, and provides a clear, actionable plan.

The audience knows exactly what they will take away from the presentation.

Step 5: Add a personal touch.

Presentations with stories are 22 times more likely to be remembered than those with straight facts. Such is the power of narrative and personalization in storytelling.

Therefore, I always consider topics I can tie back to myself, which also helps the presentations feel more authentic. There are a few ways I would do this:

• Pick a topic I have first-hand experience with.
• Provide a unique opinion or learnings/findings to add value to my words.
• Let the audience view a controversial topic from my perspective.
• Choose a topic I’m genuinely passionate about.
• Tell a personal story that functions as a metaphor for my topic.

Pro tip: Think about where your interests and professional experience meet. Then, narrow these topics or themes down to 2-5 driving factors to focus on in your presentation.

120 Presentation Topic Ideas

Below is an extensive list of presentation ideas from personal experiences to digital marketing and AI. I always reference this list when I find myself in a rut.

I can keep the framework and swap out keywords for many of these titles, providing an infinite combination of ideas.

Presentation Topic Ideas for Personal Experiences

1. The failures that made “Me”
2. My journey balancing full-time and freelance work
3. How I made social media a productive space
4. Five life-changing habit changes I made this year
5. How I got out of my longest writing rut
6. My battle with Covid-19
7. How I turned my weaknesses into strengths
8. Coping with anxiety and depression
9. Leveraging my hobbies to improve my career
10. Remote vs. in-office: Where do I thrive?
11. What I wanted to be and what I became
12. How I rediscovered myself after hardship

Presentation Topic Ideas for Controversial Issues

1. Future of genetically modified food and preservatives
2. Privacy in the age of AI: Ethical issues
3. The power of social media in politics
4. Freedom of expression or harmful content
5. Navigating the line between cultural appropriation and appreciation
6. What can we do to prevent climate change?
7. Women’s rights are everyone’s rights
8. LGBTQ Rights: Balancing equality and tradition in the future
9. The ethics of animal testing
10. The implications of social media for future generations
11. How much screen time is too much?
12. Punishment vs. rehabilitation

Presentation Topic Ideas for Current Trends

1. Five small efforts to fight climate change
2. How local politics play into the big picture
3. What are blockchain and cryptocurrencies?
4. The latest fitness trends of 2024
5. Life on social media vs. real life: How to keep yourself sane
6. Water scarcity and conservation
7. Renewable and sustainable energy sources: Are we ready?
8. The benefits of mindfulness and meditation practices for new moms
9. Understanding and addressing mental health issues in Gen Z and Alpha.
10. 12 Techniques for practicing self-care and self-compassion
11. Transitioning back to hybrid or full-time office models after years of remote work.
12. How X marketers grow their personal brands (and their ROIs)

Presentation Topic Ideas for Industry Insights

1. How new AI technologies are changing the industry: 5 examples
2. Six key trends and industry forecasts for the future
3. How to overcome these 10 challenges to succeed
4. Measuring and optimizing organizational marketing efforts using AI
5. Using predictive analytics to extract key marketing insights
6. 13 strategies to increase customer loyalty and retention
7. Improve your online visibility and traffic: 15 tips from LinkedIn gurus
8. Seven ways to create engaging video content for your company
9. Five ways for businesses to build a strong social media presence
10. Which social media channels are best for your brand?
11. Is AI revolutionizing the retail industry?
12. Digital learning and the future of traditional learning systems

Presentation Topic Ideas for Digital Marketing

1. The next big thing in digital marketing — unlocked
2. The art of storytelling in marketing: 23 businesses that kill it
3. Benefits of cross-channel marketing for software development companies
4. Voice search and its impact on digital marketing in 2025
5. Maximizing ROI for your startup marketing: 3 underestimated tactics
6. Changes in consumer behavior: Reasons and implications
7. Importance of personalization in digital marketing
8. 10 Emerging marketing trends and technologies
9. Designing an effective mobile strategy for your business
10. Importance of infographics in content marketing: HubSpot’s case study
11. Creating effective marketing funnels for health products
12. The power of user-generated content for companies

Presentation Topic Ideas for AI

1. Six top stories about AI in 2024
2. Five weird, but true, facts about AI
3. What these three business experts are saying about AI
4. Three shocking ways AI can make you a better marketer
5. The Dark Side of AI
6. How do presidential campaigns benefit from AI?
7. Five AI tools every marketer needs
8. AI and Big Data: Changing the landscape of modern business
9. Which jobs will AI replace?
10. Why do these X celebrities and industry leaders love AI?
11. AI in human resources: Recruiting and talent management
12. The Ethics of AI: Balancing business interests and societal impacts

Presentation Topic Ideas for Sales

1. Cold calls: Unethical tactics and grey areas
2. Sales: Expectations vs. Reality
3. Sales prospecting made simpler with AI
4. Sales calls: Do’s, Don’ts, and Musts
5. Six sales strategies you need to throw out the window
6. Five skills every salesperson needs to develop in 2024
7. Building long-lasting relationships with customers using these three tried and tested methods
8. Dealing with rejections: Five ways and one bonus tip
9. Patient waiting and seven ways to deal with it
10. 13 effective sales strategies for building relationships and closing deals
11. Developing effective sales training programs for new hires
12. 20 effective sales communication strategies

Presentation Topic Ideas for Time Management

1. How to achieve an ideal work-life balance for remote workers
2. How much time should you ideally spend networking on LinkedIn?
3. How to effectively delegate tasks
4. Buy back your time: Ways and benefits
5. Six business principles of time management
6. How to make an effective plan: Three practices you can start today
7. 15 ways to improve personal efficiency and productivity
8. The five steps of the Pomodoro Technique
9. Goal setting and prioritization: For IT start-ups
10. Nine best multitasking strategies of insanely successful businesspeople
11. Time management for busy professionals: Where to start?
12. Stop procrastinating: Eight ways starting tomorrow

Presentation Topic Ideas for IT

1. Advantages and risks of adopting cloud software
2. Open-source software: seven best practices
3. Machine learning: Pros and cons for marketing
4. How to create user-friendly interfaces for software and websites
5. The role of IT in digital transformation
6. The Internet of Things: five opportunities for businesses and consumers
7. Six ways to protect your digital assets
8. Seven benefits and three risks of moving to the cloud
9. How does Big Data work?
10. Best strategies to protect organizational data: five tried and tested techniques
11. Technology and its impact on society and culture
12. Mobile device management: Where to start?

Presentation Topics Ideas for Business

1. Optimizing collaborations to save time across all departments
2. Eight time management tools and apps for businesses
3. 12 common skills of successful businesspeople
4. 10 tips and techniques for a successful marketing strategy
5. Harnessing the power of influencer marketing
6. Allocating a marketing budget to maximize ROI in five steps
7. Five manufacturing techniques to minimize costs
8. Understanding ethical issues in business and marketing
9. 15 ways to reduce your company’s carbon footprint
10. Three old business models making a comeback
11. Seven ways X developed a strong company culture
12. 12 strategies for building a sustainable and responsible business in 2023

5 Presentation Tips

While I’ve stressed the importance of using presentation topics to put audiences first, offer direct solutions, and fill in knowledge gaps, there’s more.

After all, the part that usually keeps me up the night before a big presentation isn’t typically the topic but the thought of actually presenting.

That’s why I’m sharing my five best tips to help you ace your next presentation.

1. Design a clear layout.

I like to organize my presentations into four clear sections — introduction, body, conclusion, and follow-up — to help me construct a clear layout and attractive design. Here’s what I include in each area:

Introduction

• A catchy title with a hook
• A thesis statement or big idea behind the presentation
• Table of contents that gives my audience a preview into what’s coming

Body

• A clear explanation of my topic
• My argument, perspective, or main message I’m trying to convey in three to five key points
• Facts expertly interspersed to help bolster my claims

Conclusion

• A concise summary of the main points and takeaways
• A catchy line to inspire thought-provoking, vivid discussions.

Follow-Up

• Five to ten minutes at the end of my presentation for a Q&A, where I can dispel doubts and provide more context to my audience

2. Use visual aids.

I hate to admit it, but nothing makes me zone out quicker than a black-and-white, word-heavy presentation. My lower attention span and visual learning preference make it hard to focus on a strictly verbal or text-based presentation.

Presentation visuals can increase content engagement by up to 80%.

LinkedIn also provides several reasons supporting the importance of visual aids, such as capturing the attention and interest of audiences, reducing cognitive load by breaking down complex concepts, and increasing the retention and recall of verbal messages.

I work full-time in media and entertainment, so it’s easy to add visuals to my presentations in the form of key art, video promos, and character art.

However, even in less creative industries, visual aids like charts and graphs, varied color schemes, and even brand logos can help break up the text.

3. Choose a presentation style that makes you confident.

I know my strengths and weaknesses best when it comes to presentation skills. I know I’m not the best at getting a high volume of information across quickly, but I have an exemplary memory (no speaker notes here!) and ease of communication.

All this self-knowledge helps me prepare presentation styles that make me feel most comfortable and confident. Presentation topics can also dictate what style is best.

For instance, if my topic is “Five life-changing habit changes I made this year,” I’ll likely adopt a storytelling style. On the other hand, a topic like “The Ethics of AI: Balancing business interests and societal impacts” might call for an instructor style.

The moral is to choose a way of presenting the material that makes me feel most confident. The actual information may be difficult, but how I share it can be simple.

4. Design a slide deck to be proud of.

Source

I live by the phrase “look good, feel good.” If I’m sick, exhausted, or just having a bad day, staying in pajamas and unwashed hair makes me feel worse than I am. But showering and wearing my favorite outfit can turn my entire day around.

The same theory applies to presentations. I’ve had to turn around last-minute presentations on sloppy slides, and feeling embarrassed about the appearance can be enough to throw me completely off.

This makes sense since 91% of professionals feel more confident presenting a well-designed slide deck.

My company uses branded slide templates, which eases the process, but manually going in to make the fonts, colors, text spacing, and visuals look good is imperative.

You can also use presentation templates to save time and discover beautiful, engaging designs.

It’s also important to practice running through these well-designed slides, especially if you’re driving the deck for a group presentation. Walk through the presentation in Slideshow mode and ensure everything looks as desired.

5. Engage with your audience.

Typically, my biggest fear leading up to a presentation is ensuring that I relay all the information I have prepared.

However, I should be more worried about creating a strong enough connection with my audience that my presentation resonates in their minds long after.

Of audiences, 79% prefer interactive presentations with opportunities to get involved, so presenters have used tools like polls and quizzes to increase audience engagement by 40%.

This is also a great way to alleviate some of the pressure from myself — by throwing to the audience at times, I can make the presentation feel more conversational.

Here are a few ways that my colleagues and I have made presentations more interactive:

• Start by asking uncommon questions to the audience. Involve them from the get-go, saying things like, “Raise your hands if X.”
• Add polls to the slides and call on audience members to share their responses.
• Make eye contact to build credibility and show confidence. Don’t stare at the slides or notes. Smile occasionally and talk to the audience directly.
• Share a personal perspective and ask if anyone in the audience agrees or disagrees. Call on them to share why.
• Use active and confident body language. Don’t stand in the same place the entire time. Move around the stage.
• Ask close-ended questions in between to keep the audience engaged without losing time. Address them using their names to keep things interesting.
• Share personal experiences and stories that your audience will find fascinating and relatable.

Feeling Inspired Yet?

As a younger professional in my industry, I’m always looking for ways to make myself known, stand out from the crowd, and prove my ability to be a leader.

This blog post taught me that unique, memorable presentation topics can help me accomplish these goals.

We all have a wealth of expertise, experience, and personality, and that’s enough to create a story worth hearing. So the question is not “What should I say?” but rather “How can I say it?”

My most important takeaway is that authenticity comes from finding ways to personalize presentation topics.

Even something data-driven or industry-focused has the opportunity for a reference to an anecdote, metaphor, unique perspective, or audience interaction tool that can take presentations from informative to remarkable.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in August 2023 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/presentation-topics

I recently did a presentation night with my friends. If you’re unfamiliar with the concept, it’s when a group of friends gets together to share presentations they created about a topic of their choice.

The topics are typically light-hearted and fun. For example, mine was “my friends as obscure animals.”

You would be surprised how difficult it was to develop ideas for something as silly and unserious as a social presentation night.

So, it’s naturally even harder to ideate presentation topics for a professional setting with the pressure of needing to impress, influence, educate, or entertain.

I will share how to develop thought-provoking and relevant topics for your presentations to ensure they are memorable and resonate well with your audience.

Table of Contents

• How to Choose a Great Presentation Topic in 5 Steps
• 120 Presentation Topic Ideas
• 5 Presentation Tips

How to Choose a Great Presentation Topic in 5 Steps

I’ve broken down the painstakingly long process of choosing a topic into five simple and easy steps. Let’s walk through it.

Step 1: Begin with the end in mind.

“Some things are better left unsaid” is what I don’t want people to say about my presentations. That’s why I always have a specific goal before choosing a topic.

Some questions I ask myself are:

• What do I hope to achieve from the presentation?
• How do I want to come across?
• What do I want my audience to take away from the presentation?

Having a solid goal helps me begin crafting the title of my presentation. For instance, if I’m presenting a seminar about AI, my goal might be to convince my audience to incorporate more AI into their daily lives.

A punchy idea for a title could be “Why AI Is NOT Ruining Your Life.”

Step 2: Know your audience.

Let’s say I’m preparing an internal presentation for my team at Nickelodeon. I would first consider my audience’s experience and interests.

I don’t want to present something they already know well or have the topic go over their heads. Since it’s my team, I would feel confident that these factors overlap comfortably with mine.

If you’re presenting to an unknown audience, research the individuals or general demographic if specific names aren’t available.

Next, I’d consider what style is preferred. Some workplaces might be more formal, requiring a serious presentation tone.

Based on the type of content we work on at Nickelodeon, we keep things light at work, so I’d integrate humor and a casual tone into my presentation.

Pro tip: Always consider your audience’s knowledge level on the topic before drafting your presentation. For example, a presentation on social media targeted at Gen Z will differ from that targeted at Millennials.

Step 3: Be current.

Of presenters, 47% tailor their presentation topics to current events, which is an easy way to ensure the topic is novel.

I’m not saying the presentation has to be completely centered around a current event. Even including certain references or themes can alert audiences that this isn’t a cut-and-paste presentation that’s been done before.

For instance, if I were giving a presentation to my team at Nickelodeon, I might slip in a humorous reference to the 2024 film Wicked since it’s very culturally relevant.

If I wanted to tailor my entire presentation to this topic, I could highlight some of the ways the PG-rated movie manages to capture hearts of all ages, which is relevant to our team’s family-friendly content.

Step 4: Be precise.

Completing these first three steps puts me in a place with decent topic ideas. Now, I can cut out the excess and select a niche topic with a specific goal.

This is imperative because the broader the topic, the more difficult it will be for my audience to take away key ideas and actionable tips. Also, it would be more difficult to gather an audience intrigued and excited by my topic.

For instance, the first topic in the image is generic, sounds vague, and doesn’t specify any clear benefits. On the other hand, the second topic mentions the target audience, tells them what to expect, and provides a clear, actionable plan.

The audience knows exactly what they will take away from the presentation.

Step 5: Add a personal touch.

Presentations with stories are 22 times more likely to be remembered than those with straight facts. Such is the power of narrative and personalization in storytelling.

Therefore, I always consider topics I can tie back to myself, which also helps the presentations feel more authentic. There are a few ways I would do this:

• Pick a topic I have first-hand experience with.
• Provide a unique opinion or learnings/findings to add value to my words.
• Let the audience view a controversial topic from my perspective.
• Choose a topic I’m genuinely passionate about.
• Tell a personal story that functions as a metaphor for my topic.

Pro tip: Think about where your interests and professional experience meet. Then, narrow these topics or themes down to 2-5 driving factors to focus on in your presentation.

120 Presentation Topic Ideas

Below is an extensive list of presentation ideas from personal experiences to digital marketing and AI. I always reference this list when I find myself in a rut.

I can keep the framework and swap out keywords for many of these titles, providing an infinite combination of ideas.

Presentation Topic Ideas for Personal Experiences

1. The failures that made “Me”
2. My journey balancing full-time and freelance work
3. How I made social media a productive space
4. Five life-changing habit changes I made this year
5. How I got out of my longest writing rut
6. My battle with Covid-19
7. How I turned my weaknesses into strengths
8. Coping with anxiety and depression
9. Leveraging my hobbies to improve my career
10. Remote vs. in-office: Where do I thrive?
11. What I wanted to be and what I became
12. How I rediscovered myself after hardship

Presentation Topic Ideas for Controversial Issues

1. Future of genetically modified food and preservatives
2. Privacy in the age of AI: Ethical issues
3. The power of social media in politics
4. Freedom of expression or harmful content
5. Navigating the line between cultural appropriation and appreciation
6. What can we do to prevent climate change?
7. Women’s rights are everyone’s rights
8. LGBTQ Rights: Balancing equality and tradition in the future
9. The ethics of animal testing
10. The implications of social media for future generations
11. How much screen time is too much?
12. Punishment vs. rehabilitation

Presentation Topic Ideas for Current Trends

1. Five small efforts to fight climate change
2. How local politics play into the big picture
3. What are blockchain and cryptocurrencies?
4. The latest fitness trends of 2024
5. Life on social media vs. real life: How to keep yourself sane
6. Water scarcity and conservation
7. Renewable and sustainable energy sources: Are we ready?
8. The benefits of mindfulness and meditation practices for new moms
9. Understanding and addressing mental health issues in Gen Z and Alpha.
10. 12 Techniques for practicing self-care and self-compassion
11. Transitioning back to hybrid or full-time office models after years of remote work.
12. How X marketers grow their personal brands (and their ROIs)

Presentation Topic Ideas for Industry Insights

1. How new AI technologies are changing the industry: 5 examples
2. Six key trends and industry forecasts for the future
3. How to overcome these 10 challenges to succeed
4. Measuring and optimizing organizational marketing efforts using AI
5. Using predictive analytics to extract key marketing insights
6. 13 strategies to increase customer loyalty and retention
7. Improve your online visibility and traffic: 15 tips from LinkedIn gurus
8. Seven ways to create engaging video content for your company
9. Five ways for businesses to build a strong social media presence
10. Which social media channels are best for your brand?
11. Is AI revolutionizing the retail industry?
12. Digital learning and the future of traditional learning systems

Presentation Topic Ideas for Digital Marketing

1. The next big thing in digital marketing — unlocked
2. The art of storytelling in marketing: 23 businesses that kill it
3. Benefits of cross-channel marketing for software development companies
4. Voice search and its impact on digital marketing in 2025
5. Maximizing ROI for your startup marketing: 3 underestimated tactics
6. Changes in consumer behavior: Reasons and implications
7. Importance of personalization in digital marketing
8. 10 Emerging marketing trends and technologies
9. Designing an effective mobile strategy for your business
10. Importance of infographics in content marketing: HubSpot’s case study
11. Creating effective marketing funnels for health products
12. The power of user-generated content for companies

Presentation Topic Ideas for AI

1. Six top stories about AI in 2024
2. Five weird, but true, facts about AI
3. What these three business experts are saying about AI
4. Three shocking ways AI can make you a better marketer
5. The Dark Side of AI
6. How do presidential campaigns benefit from AI?
7. Five AI tools every marketer needs
8. AI and Big Data: Changing the landscape of modern business
9. Which jobs will AI replace?
10. Why do these X celebrities and industry leaders love AI?
11. AI in human resources: Recruiting and talent management
12. The Ethics of AI: Balancing business interests and societal impacts

Presentation Topic Ideas for Sales

1. Cold calls: Unethical tactics and grey areas
2. Sales: Expectations vs. Reality
3. Sales prospecting made simpler with AI
4. Sales calls: Do’s, Don’ts, and Musts
5. Six sales strategies you need to throw out the window
6. Five skills every salesperson needs to develop in 2024
7. Building long-lasting relationships with customers using these three tried and tested methods
8. Dealing with rejections: Five ways and one bonus tip
9. Patient waiting and seven ways to deal with it
10. 13 effective sales strategies for building relationships and closing deals
11. Developing effective sales training programs for new hires
12. 20 effective sales communication strategies

Presentation Topic Ideas for Time Management

1. How to achieve an ideal work-life balance for remote workers
2. How much time should you ideally spend networking on LinkedIn?
3. How to effectively delegate tasks
4. Buy back your time: Ways and benefits
5. Six business principles of time management
6. How to make an effective plan: Three practices you can start today
7. 15 ways to improve personal efficiency and productivity
8. The five steps of the Pomodoro Technique
9. Goal setting and prioritization: For IT start-ups
10. Nine best multitasking strategies of insanely successful businesspeople
11. Time management for busy professionals: Where to start?
12. Stop procrastinating: Eight ways starting tomorrow

Presentation Topic Ideas for IT

1. Advantages and risks of adopting cloud software
2. Open-source software: seven best practices
3. Machine learning: Pros and cons for marketing
4. How to create user-friendly interfaces for software and websites
5. The role of IT in digital transformation
6. The Internet of Things: five opportunities for businesses and consumers
7. Six ways to protect your digital assets
8. Seven benefits and three risks of moving to the cloud
9. How does Big Data work?
10. Best strategies to protect organizational data: five tried and tested techniques
11. Technology and its impact on society and culture
12. Mobile device management: Where to start?

Presentation Topics Ideas for Business

1. Optimizing collaborations to save time across all departments
2. Eight time management tools and apps for businesses
3. 12 common skills of successful businesspeople
4. 10 tips and techniques for a successful marketing strategy
5. Harnessing the power of influencer marketing
6. Allocating a marketing budget to maximize ROI in five steps
7. Five manufacturing techniques to minimize costs
8. Understanding ethical issues in business and marketing
9. 15 ways to reduce your company’s carbon footprint
10. Three old business models making a comeback
11. Seven ways X developed a strong company culture
12. 12 strategies for building a sustainable and responsible business in 2023

5 Presentation Tips

While I’ve stressed the importance of using presentation topics to put audiences first, offer direct solutions, and fill in knowledge gaps, there’s more.

After all, the part that usually keeps me up the night before a big presentation isn’t typically the topic but the thought of actually presenting.

That’s why I’m sharing my five best tips to help you ace your next presentation.

1. Design a clear layout.

I like to organize my presentations into four clear sections — introduction, body, conclusion, and follow-up — to help me construct a clear layout and attractive design. Here’s what I include in each area:

Introduction

• A catchy title with a hook
• A thesis statement or big idea behind the presentation
• Table of contents that gives my audience a preview into what’s coming

Body

• A clear explanation of my topic
• My argument, perspective, or main message I’m trying to convey in three to five key points
• Facts expertly interspersed to help bolster my claims

Conclusion

• A concise summary of the main points and takeaways
• A catchy line to inspire thought-provoking, vivid discussions.

Follow-Up

• Five to ten minutes at the end of my presentation for a Q&A, where I can dispel doubts and provide more context to my audience

2. Use visual aids.

I hate to admit it, but nothing makes me zone out quicker than a black-and-white, word-heavy presentation. My lower attention span and visual learning preference make it hard to focus on a strictly verbal or text-based presentation.

Presentation visuals can increase content engagement by up to 80%.

LinkedIn also provides several reasons supporting the importance of visual aids, such as capturing the attention and interest of audiences, reducing cognitive load by breaking down complex concepts, and increasing the retention and recall of verbal messages.

I work full-time in media and entertainment, so it’s easy to add visuals to my presentations in the form of key art, video promos, and character art.

However, even in less creative industries, visual aids like charts and graphs, varied color schemes, and even brand logos can help break up the text.

3. Choose a presentation style that makes you confident.

I know my strengths and weaknesses best when it comes to presentation skills. I know I’m not the best at getting a high volume of information across quickly, but I have an exemplary memory (no speaker notes here!) and ease of communication.

All this self-knowledge helps me prepare presentation styles that make me feel most comfortable and confident. Presentation topics can also dictate what style is best.

For instance, if my topic is “Five life-changing habit changes I made this year,” I’ll likely adopt a storytelling style. On the other hand, a topic like “The Ethics of AI: Balancing business interests and societal impacts” might call for an instructor style.

The moral is to choose a way of presenting the material that makes me feel most confident. The actual information may be difficult, but how I share it can be simple.

4. Design a slide deck to be proud of.

Source

I live by the phrase “look good, feel good.” If I’m sick, exhausted, or just having a bad day, staying in pajamas and unwashed hair makes me feel worse than I am. But showering and wearing my favorite outfit can turn my entire day around.

The same theory applies to presentations. I’ve had to turn around last-minute presentations on sloppy slides, and feeling embarrassed about the appearance can be enough to throw me completely off.

This makes sense since 91% of professionals feel more confident presenting a well-designed slide deck.

My company uses branded slide templates, which eases the process, but manually going in to make the fonts, colors, text spacing, and visuals look good is imperative.

You can also use presentation templates to save time and discover beautiful, engaging designs.

It’s also important to practice running through these well-designed slides, especially if you’re driving the deck for a group presentation. Walk through the presentation in Slideshow mode and ensure everything looks as desired.

5. Engage with your audience.

Typically, my biggest fear leading up to a presentation is ensuring that I relay all the information I have prepared.

However, I should be more worried about creating a strong enough connection with my audience that my presentation resonates in their minds long after.

Of audiences, 79% prefer interactive presentations with opportunities to get involved, so presenters have used tools like polls and quizzes to increase audience engagement by 40%.

This is also a great way to alleviate some of the pressure from myself — by throwing to the audience at times, I can make the presentation feel more conversational.

Here are a few ways that my colleagues and I have made presentations more interactive:

• Start by asking uncommon questions to the audience. Involve them from the get-go, saying things like, “Raise your hands if X.”
• Add polls to the slides and call on audience members to share their responses.
• Make eye contact to build credibility and show confidence. Don’t stare at the slides or notes. Smile occasionally and talk to the audience directly.
• Share a personal perspective and ask if anyone in the audience agrees or disagrees. Call on them to share why.
• Use active and confident body language. Don’t stand in the same place the entire time. Move around the stage.
• Ask close-ended questions in between to keep the audience engaged without losing time. Address them using their names to keep things interesting.
• Share personal experiences and stories that your audience will find fascinating and relatable.

Feeling Inspired Yet?

As a younger professional in my industry, I’m always looking for ways to make myself known, stand out from the crowd, and prove my ability to be a leader.

This blog post taught me that unique, memorable presentation topics can help me accomplish these goals.

We all have a wealth of expertise, experience, and personality, and that’s enough to create a story worth hearing. So the question is not “What should I say?” but rather “How can I say it?”

My most important takeaway is that authenticity comes from finding ways to personalize presentation topics.

Even something data-driven or industry-focused has the opportunity for a reference to an anecdote, metaphor, unique perspective, or audience interaction tool that can take presentations from informative to remarkable.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in August 2023 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

via Perfecte news Non connection

Content Workflow: What Marketers Need to Know

The best content creators make it look easy, but behind every slick YouTube video and delightful blog post is a digital content workflow that might involve a couple people or a couple dozen.

Technology has not yet advanced to the point where marketers can snap their fingers to launch a successful email campaign, YouTube series, or blog.

Until then, content requires extensive planning, team effort, and a consistent content workflow to keep everything and everyone on track.

In this article, we'll explore what a content workflow is, why your team needs one, and the steps to building the right one for your marketing goals.

Table of Contents

• What is a content workflow?
• Content Creation Workflow: Task-based Workflows vs. Status-based Workflows
• Content Strategy Workflow: How to Build One

Defining roles, goals, and output is critical to an effective content workflow. You’ll also want to make (and adhere to) a realistic timeline.

Your content workflow may change depending on the type of content or resources available to you. It‘s normal for the materials, people, and timelines defined in one workflow to change depending on the content you’re creating, such as a blog, video, live stream, or web copy.

Why Marketers Need a Content Workflow

Content workflows ensure a project launches successfully without any hiccups. With a content workflow, you can:

• Create content that is consistent, timely, and accurate.
• Guarantee realistic deadlines and outcomes.
• Proactively plan for common roadblocks in content planning and launches
• Clearly establish how every team member fits in the big picture of creating the content

Essentially, a content workflow keeps you and your team on track to a seamless launch. Without a content workflow, you and your team are more likely to miss deadlines, make errors, and experience difficulty working toward your common goal.

Risks of Not Using Workflows

It may be tempting to just wing it, particularly if you have a small editorial team and a low publishing cadence. I beg of you: Don’t give in.

I’ve worked at several places where a formal workflow didn’t seem necessary because the team was so small. But as the company grew, new hires would get confused and frustrated by the lack of structure and documentation.

And eventually, people leave for new jobs, and all that institutional knowledge leaves with them.

According to a 2024 study by Marketing Charts, 50% of B2B tech marketers “build content based on research and website analytics,” and 39% “closely follow a content calendar based on campaigns developed to map to the product delivery schedule.”

When your content strategies involve cross-functional collaboration like this, all teams need access to your workflows.

If the product roadmap changes or if website analytics take a sudden turn, you’ll need established processes to communicate and course-correct. Even on a small team, the alternative is often chaos.

Content Creation Workflow: Task-based Workflows vs. Status-based Workflows

Before learning how to build a content creation workflow, you must understand which would benefit your team the most, a task- or a status-based workflow.

Knowing the difference between the two will help you strategize the right workflow for your next project.

Task-based Workflows

Each stage of a task-based workflow is a task that needs to be carried out before moving on to the next step. In a task-based workflow, each step is described in detail, and everyone working on the project knows what is expected of them.

Here’s a simplified example of a task-based workflow:

In this example, each piece of content would have four associated tasks that would take it from research to publication. Task-based workflows are especially useful for new content teams because of the detailed instructions at each stage.

Any writer, freelance or in-house, would be able to keep the content moving through the workflow.

Status-based Workflows

Status-based workflows are often preferred by more experienced teams. In a status-based workflow, each stage is defined by status, and the stages don't include detailed descriptions or instructions like in task-based workflows.

Here’s a simplified example of what a status-based workflow might look like:

In this example, there are four stages, or statuses: Unassigned, Writing, Ready for Approval, and Published. If these stages were integrated into a content workflow, anybody looking at it could see where each piece of content was in the overall workflow. This can make it easier to plan and schedule high-volume content.

Status-based workflows may be easier to track and can be used for a wide variety of content types. However, it's crucial your team understands the content creation process and their roles within it.

Pro tip: Popular workflow tools like Asana, Trello, and AirTable have dozens of templates for different workflows. Even if you end up using a different tool, I find that it’s helpful to mock up a quick workflow and walk through it with a few teammates. It’s often a faster way to identify pain points and figure out what will work best for your team.

Here’s an example of one of AirTable’s content marketing management templates.

You can see that each piece of content includes which customer personas it should be targeted to; if you have a lot of content and a lot of personas, this might be something you’d want to recreate in your own workflow.

Source

Content Strategy Workflow: How to Build One

Follow these steps to craft a content workflow for you and your team.

1. Establish your content goals and audience.

Your goals will inform the content you want to create and the audience you're trying to reach. As always, knowing your customer is the foundation of great content.

If you need to build or refine your customer profiles, check out our guide with templates.

Is your goal to create brand awareness? If so, you‘ll likely want to create product-led blogs or engaging social media posts. If you’re working to delight and retain your current customers, an effective email campaign might be a better fit.

You’ll also want to set realistic parameters — your content workflow won’t succeed if your goals outpace your resources.

2. Clearly define the roles and responsibilities of everyone on your team.

Once you know your content goals and target audience, you're ready to decide who on your marketing team will be involved in the project.

For content creation workflows, you'll need content creators (bloggers, YouTubers, videographers, etc.), editors, and other stakeholders involved in content creation.

Whether your team is using a task-based workflow or a status-based workflow, everyone involved must have a clear definition of their role, duties, and where they fit within the process.

For example, if your workflow is for a YouTube content series, the content creators will be in charge of crafting the content. The editors will be tasked with ensuring the content is of the best quality and contains no errors.

Senior editors or project managers will give the final approval to launch each episode in the series.

This is also the time to figure out the tools and materials your team will need to create and launch the content.

For example, content management systems like Content Hub are essential for publishing blog posts. Canva and Adobe Photoshop are great design tools.

You'll also need to consider your budget for tools like mics and cameras for videos, or email automation software for email campaigns.

3. Decide the content types and frequency of output.

Figure out the kind of content you want to create and how often you want to put this content out. For example, you may want to publish YouTube videos once a week or Instagram Reels every other day.

Now is also a great time to create a content calendar to plan your projects and to ensure your content launches on time. In the LinkedIn newsletter Marketing Strategies 4 Growth, Joe Kovacs suggests planning a quarter’s worth of content at a time.

If you’re stuck at this point, Kovacs has some great advice that can help you decide on content types and frequency (he’s specifically talking about scalable content, but I think it’s widely applicable): Center your buyers or customers.

“Your priority will be their problems, which you’ve defined in your buyer personas,” he writes. “Your solutions … [are] the foundation of your content planning.”

4. Develop the content creation process.

Brainstorm with your team the different steps that must take place for your brand‘s content to launch successfully. These steps will vary depending on the kind of content you’re creating.

For example, the process to craft and publish a blog post may look something like this:

1. Strategizing
2. Planning
3. Creating
4. Editing
5. Publishing
6. Analyzing

These tasks may seem broad, but this is where you want to expand. For example, strategizing typically means performing content audits, creating buyer personas, and conducting keyword research.

Editing might involve implementing SEO techniques or adding images and links.

Every step in the process needs to be accounted for so it can be assigned to the appropriate team member.

5. Document and automate your workflow.

According to a 2024 report by the Content Marketing Institute, nearly half (45%) of B2B marketers who use generative AI say they have more efficient workflows.

If you haven’t jumped on the AI bandwagon yet, workflow automation is a great place to start.

Jamie Juviler, managing editor of HubSpot’s Website Blog, used ChatGPT to help him create a tool called BlogBot, which automates a major pain point for HubSpot writers: transferring our posts from Google Docs to the CMS.

Juviler has what he describes as a “light background” in coding, but he says that “there’s no way I would have built this tool as efficiently as I did without ChatGPT’s help.”

And there’s no way HubSpot writers would be able to publish at the volume we do without BlogBot, which has collectively saved, no joke, thousands of hours.

Juviler also uses AI to sort, filter, and extract data from a database or list. “For example, if I have a list of hundreds of blog posts and I want to see which ones would be good candidates for a certain CTA, I’ll ask ChatGPT to pick out the most relevant blog posts based on the post titles.”

Pro tip: If you use HubSpot (or are curious about it), workflow automated software that allows users to align all of their teams‘ processes so there’s no confusion or hiccups from task to task.

The Future of Workflows

Content workflows are a must-have if you want to create content regularly and efficiently with your team informed every step of the way — think of it like a roadmap for a seamless content launch.

And now that AI has entered the chat, it’s easier and faster than ever to create, test, and automate workflows, whether you’re using a free version of Asana or HubSpot’s enterprise customer platform.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in June 2022 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/content-workflow

The best content creators make it look easy, but behind every slick YouTube video and delightful blog post is a digital content workflow that might involve a couple people or a couple dozen.

Technology has not yet advanced to the point where marketers can snap their fingers to launch a successful email campaign, YouTube series, or blog.

Until then, content requires extensive planning, team effort, and a consistent content workflow to keep everything and everyone on track.

In this article, we'll explore what a content workflow is, why your team needs one, and the steps to building the right one for your marketing goals.

Table of Contents

• What is a content workflow?
• Content Creation Workflow: Task-based Workflows vs. Status-based Workflows
• Content Strategy Workflow: How to Build One

Defining roles, goals, and output is critical to an effective content workflow. You’ll also want to make (and adhere to) a realistic timeline.

Your content workflow may change depending on the type of content or resources available to you. It‘s normal for the materials, people, and timelines defined in one workflow to change depending on the content you’re creating, such as a blog, video, live stream, or web copy.

Why Marketers Need a Content Workflow

Content workflows ensure a project launches successfully without any hiccups. With a content workflow, you can:

• Create content that is consistent, timely, and accurate.
• Guarantee realistic deadlines and outcomes.
• Proactively plan for common roadblocks in content planning and launches
• Clearly establish how every team member fits in the big picture of creating the content

Essentially, a content workflow keeps you and your team on track to a seamless launch. Without a content workflow, you and your team are more likely to miss deadlines, make errors, and experience difficulty working toward your common goal.

Risks of Not Using Workflows

It may be tempting to just wing it, particularly if you have a small editorial team and a low publishing cadence. I beg of you: Don’t give in.

I’ve worked at several places where a formal workflow didn’t seem necessary because the team was so small. But as the company grew, new hires would get confused and frustrated by the lack of structure and documentation.

And eventually, people leave for new jobs, and all that institutional knowledge leaves with them.

According to a 2024 study by Marketing Charts, 50% of B2B tech marketers “build content based on research and website analytics,” and 39% “closely follow a content calendar based on campaigns developed to map to the product delivery schedule.”

When your content strategies involve cross-functional collaboration like this, all teams need access to your workflows.

If the product roadmap changes or if website analytics take a sudden turn, you’ll need established processes to communicate and course-correct. Even on a small team, the alternative is often chaos.

Content Creation Workflow: Task-based Workflows vs. Status-based Workflows

Before learning how to build a content creation workflow, you must understand which would benefit your team the most, a task- or a status-based workflow.

Knowing the difference between the two will help you strategize the right workflow for your next project.

Task-based Workflows

Each stage of a task-based workflow is a task that needs to be carried out before moving on to the next step. In a task-based workflow, each step is described in detail, and everyone working on the project knows what is expected of them.

Here’s a simplified example of a task-based workflow:

In this example, each piece of content would have four associated tasks that would take it from research to publication. Task-based workflows are especially useful for new content teams because of the detailed instructions at each stage.

Any writer, freelance or in-house, would be able to keep the content moving through the workflow.

Status-based Workflows

Status-based workflows are often preferred by more experienced teams. In a status-based workflow, each stage is defined by status, and the stages don't include detailed descriptions or instructions like in task-based workflows.

Here’s a simplified example of what a status-based workflow might look like:

In this example, there are four stages, or statuses: Unassigned, Writing, Ready for Approval, and Published. If these stages were integrated into a content workflow, anybody looking at it could see where each piece of content was in the overall workflow. This can make it easier to plan and schedule high-volume content.

Status-based workflows may be easier to track and can be used for a wide variety of content types. However, it's crucial your team understands the content creation process and their roles within it.

Pro tip: Popular workflow tools like Asana, Trello, and AirTable have dozens of templates for different workflows. Even if you end up using a different tool, I find that it’s helpful to mock up a quick workflow and walk through it with a few teammates. It’s often a faster way to identify pain points and figure out what will work best for your team.

Here’s an example of one of AirTable’s content marketing management templates.

You can see that each piece of content includes which customer personas it should be targeted to; if you have a lot of content and a lot of personas, this might be something you’d want to recreate in your own workflow.

Source

Content Strategy Workflow: How to Build One

Follow these steps to craft a content workflow for you and your team.

1. Establish your content goals and audience.

Your goals will inform the content you want to create and the audience you're trying to reach. As always, knowing your customer is the foundation of great content.

If you need to build or refine your customer profiles, check out our guide with templates.

Is your goal to create brand awareness? If so, you‘ll likely want to create product-led blogs or engaging social media posts. If you’re working to delight and retain your current customers, an effective email campaign might be a better fit.

You’ll also want to set realistic parameters — your content workflow won’t succeed if your goals outpace your resources.

2. Clearly define the roles and responsibilities of everyone on your team.

Once you know your content goals and target audience, you're ready to decide who on your marketing team will be involved in the project.

For content creation workflows, you'll need content creators (bloggers, YouTubers, videographers, etc.), editors, and other stakeholders involved in content creation.

Whether your team is using a task-based workflow or a status-based workflow, everyone involved must have a clear definition of their role, duties, and where they fit within the process.

For example, if your workflow is for a YouTube content series, the content creators will be in charge of crafting the content. The editors will be tasked with ensuring the content is of the best quality and contains no errors.

Senior editors or project managers will give the final approval to launch each episode in the series.

This is also the time to figure out the tools and materials your team will need to create and launch the content.

For example, content management systems like Content Hub are essential for publishing blog posts. Canva and Adobe Photoshop are great design tools.

You'll also need to consider your budget for tools like mics and cameras for videos, or email automation software for email campaigns.

3. Decide the content types and frequency of output.

Figure out the kind of content you want to create and how often you want to put this content out. For example, you may want to publish YouTube videos once a week or Instagram Reels every other day.

Now is also a great time to create a content calendar to plan your projects and to ensure your content launches on time. In the LinkedIn newsletter Marketing Strategies 4 Growth, Joe Kovacs suggests planning a quarter’s worth of content at a time.

If you’re stuck at this point, Kovacs has some great advice that can help you decide on content types and frequency (he’s specifically talking about scalable content, but I think it’s widely applicable): Center your buyers or customers.

“Your priority will be their problems, which you’ve defined in your buyer personas,” he writes. “Your solutions … [are] the foundation of your content planning.”

4. Develop the content creation process.

Brainstorm with your team the different steps that must take place for your brand‘s content to launch successfully. These steps will vary depending on the kind of content you’re creating.

For example, the process to craft and publish a blog post may look something like this:

1. Strategizing
2. Planning
3. Creating
4. Editing
5. Publishing
6. Analyzing

These tasks may seem broad, but this is where you want to expand. For example, strategizing typically means performing content audits, creating buyer personas, and conducting keyword research.

Editing might involve implementing SEO techniques or adding images and links.

Every step in the process needs to be accounted for so it can be assigned to the appropriate team member.

5. Document and automate your workflow.

According to a 2024 report by the Content Marketing Institute, nearly half (45%) of B2B marketers who use generative AI say they have more efficient workflows.

If you haven’t jumped on the AI bandwagon yet, workflow automation is a great place to start.

Jamie Juviler, managing editor of HubSpot’s Website Blog, used ChatGPT to help him create a tool called BlogBot, which automates a major pain point for HubSpot writers: transferring our posts from Google Docs to the CMS.

Juviler has what he describes as a “light background” in coding, but he says that “there’s no way I would have built this tool as efficiently as I did without ChatGPT’s help.”

And there’s no way HubSpot writers would be able to publish at the volume we do without BlogBot, which has collectively saved, no joke, thousands of hours.

Juviler also uses AI to sort, filter, and extract data from a database or list. “For example, if I have a list of hundreds of blog posts and I want to see which ones would be good candidates for a certain CTA, I’ll ask ChatGPT to pick out the most relevant blog posts based on the post titles.”

Pro tip: If you use HubSpot (or are curious about it), workflow automated software that allows users to align all of their teams‘ processes so there’s no confusion or hiccups from task to task.

The Future of Workflows

Content workflows are a must-have if you want to create content regularly and efficiently with your team informed every step of the way — think of it like a roadmap for a seamless content launch.

And now that AI has entered the chat, it’s easier and faster than ever to create, test, and automate workflows, whether you’re using a free version of Asana or HubSpot’s enterprise customer platform.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in June 2022 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

via Perfecte news Non connection

What Is a Product Marketing Manager? Job Description and Salary

Your research and development team has been working on a new product for months and putting valuable resources into its design and manufacturing.

They’ve carefully researched the market and the problem they intend to solve — and now it’s time to let your product marketing manager work their magic.

I hate to tell you this, but without marketing, your product (no matter how amazing it is) will never be found by the customers whose problems it would solve.

This could lead to lackluster sales, financial failure, and potential customers who are still suffering from their original problems.

A product marketing manager can help you avoid this by finding strategic angles to connect your product’s features with your customers and their pain points.

Recently, I asked Nathan Oakley, marketing manager at RJ Living, to talk to me about product marketing and the job’s responsibilities. I also asked him to describe a typical day as a product marketing manager. Here’s what I learned.

Table of Contents

• What is a product marketing manager?
• What does a product marketing manager do?
• How does a product marketing manager differ from a product manager?
• How to Become a Product Marketing Manager

What is a product marketing manager?

I didn’t get into marketing through the traditional college route. And if you’re like me (or you work in another field, like sales or customer service), you might not be as familiar with product marketing managers or their roles.

Through talking with Oakley, I learned that a product marketing manager, or a PMM for brevity, is a specialized marketer who takes ownership of a product’s positioning, messaging, and branding.

To get an even better idea of their job duties, let’s take a look at this sample product marketing job description.

Product Manager Job Description

A product marketing manager will be responsible for overseeing the creation and distribution of promotional campaigns for key products.

This individual will have a keen understanding of the product’s target audience, and in-depth knowledge of relevant product features.

Product Marketing Manager Skills and Qualifications:

• Foundational marketing and campaign management experience.
• Project management skills.
• Strong organizational and communication skills.
• The ability to analyze relevant information and make informed decisions.
• The ability to prioritize tasks and responsibilities across projects.

While I fully believe you can do any job with the right training and experience, employers look for a minimum of a Bachelor’s degree for this role.

Ideally, your Bachelor’s degree will be in business administration, marketing, or a related field of study.

Some employers may even seek candidates who hold advanced degrees and have more extensive experience in marketing, sales, or advertising.

While not required, there are certifications available (such as the Certified Product Marketing Manager distinction) that can help better prepare Product Marketing Managers for the responsibilities they are about to take on.

I find certifications to be a great way to continue your education and gain new skills, especially if you’re looking to advance your career or jump into a new role.

The next question you might have about this role is ‘How much does a product marketing manager make?” It’s a valid question that I had, too, because, as a former teacher, I am always surprised at the salary ranges for other careers.

According to PayScale, the average base salary for Product Marketing Managers in the U.S. is $99,814 per year, though this can vary depending on the company and level of experience.

Product Marketing Manager’s Core Responsibilities

Just like salaries, a product marketing manager's responsibilities may vary from company to company. However, I found there are a few core responsibilities that are universal to the role.

1. Market Research

When diving deep into the role, the first thing I saw was market research. A product marketing manager is responsible for understanding the target audience and market trends.

It’s their job to get into the minds of the customer, understand their pain points, and then figure out how your product can appeal to them.

2. Positioning and Messaging

Once your product marketing manager has a clear idea of how your product can help your ideal customer, they’ll work on creating clear product messaging and positioning.

Ideally, your product’s position and message are what will make your product stand out from the crowd. So, it’s important your PMM has done their research.

3. Create Your Go-To-Market (GTM) Strategy

What is a marketer without a marketing strategy?

Just like your content marketer is tasked with creating and ensuring the success of your content marketing operations, your product marketing manager is also responsible for working alongside other team members to craft and execute product launches.

4. Sales Enablement

You might think sales enablement is squarely in your sales department’s domain.

And while that might be true, it’s helpful to partner with the product marketing manager to equip your sales teams with the tools and training they need to effectively sell your product to customers.

A product marketing manager can help create scripts and sales sheets to aid your sales teams in their efforts.

5. Performance Analysis

While chatting with Denise, she also told me that performance tracking is crucial to her role, too.

Denise said, “Tracking performance is a must as well — I always make sure to review our analytics quarterly to fine-tune our campaigns, which has helped lower our cost per acquisition by approximately 20% without sacrificing engagement.

In the end, I'd say it’s all about staying tuned in to both the market and our audience to keep everything together.”

So, if you want to know how your product resonates with your customers, ask your product marketing manager.

Since they’re responsible for tracking metrics to determine product performance, your PMM can refine the marketing strategies or tweak product positioning.

What does a product marketing manager do?

After I learned about the core responsibilities of a product marketing manager, I wondered, “What does a product marketing manager do?” So, I thought I would ask Oakley for specifics.

Although their job titles might not explicitly say “Product Marketing Manager,” that’s exactly what they do.

Oakley told me they’re responsible for crafting a story about their products that will entice potential customers to purchase them. They then collect customer feedback after a product launch.

In other words, when the product is being prepared for launch, the product marketing manager (or team) will be involved in educating the public about the value and benefits of the offering so that they can convert potential customers into raving fans.

According to Oakley, you’ve got to be good at analyzing people. “Because you’re working directly with the product, you need to be good at strategic thinking and understanding people and their needs,” he said.

I also learned that the role of the PMM goes far beyond understanding people and how they’ll use your product. Instead, you also have to consider how they move through the sales funnel while considering your product.

That means the PMM will focus on three levels of the sales funnel:

1. Acquisition. Bringing awareness to your product through content such as social media, copywriting, and blogs. This requires the product marketing manager to determine what type of campaign needs to be done, create a budget for the marketing endeavors, craft a project plan to map out when this content will be released, and oversee a team that will create the desired content.
2. Engagement. Building trust and creating conversations with potential customers through events, campaigns, and specific calls to action.
3. Conversion and Retention. Converting potential customers into paying customers for one-time purchases and keeping existing customers loyal through subscription models or add-on purchases (when appropriate).

It’s worth noting that from one company (or campaign) to the next, the responsibilities and expectations placed on a product marketing manager may differ.

How does a product marketing manager differ from a product manager?

With similar titles, it can sometimes be difficult to understand the different roles available within a company.

Many often confuse product marketing managers with product managers, and while there are similarities, the roles carry very different responsibilities.

Both a product marketing manager and a product manager provide a voice for the product. However, the difference is who they are speaking to.

A product manager is vocal during the production stage of a product. They speak internally on behalf of the product, communicating with engineers and developers regarding its features and functionality.

A product manager is focused on answering the question, “Does this product solve the problem we intend it to solve?”

A product marketing manager, on the other hand, is responsible for speaking to the outside world.

While these individuals will fulfill very different roles, they will sometimes work together. Both the product manager and the product marketing manager must have a solid understanding of the buyer persona and will share the research they’ve done to assist the other.

How to Become a Product Marketing Manager

Since both Oakley worked in this role, I asked if he could share some tips with me about how to become a product marketing manager.

Both of them suggested there are two ways you can become a product marketing manager: getting a marketing degree with internship experience and upskilling.

Study marketing or business to gain experience.

Oakley suggested that the easiest way to get into product marketing is by completing a Bachelor's degree program.

“To get into product marketing, it’s easiest to start with an undergraduate degree in business or communications, followed by internships in digital marketing, branding, or sales. This will give you a solid foundation to get your foot in the door,” he added.

While a Bachelor’s degree is helpful to have, Oakley stressed the importance of continuous learning because the marketing field is ever-changing.

He told me, “Never stop learning or upskilling in the industry. So be sure to keep on educating yourself on content and industry knowledge so you can flourish in your role.”

Upskill and transition to product marketing.

You can transition to product marketing after gaining marketing experience, even if your experience is in digital or content marketing.

When hoping to transition into the field, it's always best to kick things off with experience in fields like digital marketing or brand management. You’ll build analytical and communication skills along the way.

There are various online courses you can complete to gain and strengthen your skills. However, Oakley suggests you use LinkedIn Learning.

Product Marketing Managers: A Valued Team Member

I’ve learned that creating a product is only half the battle.

In order to succeed with your product launch, make your product wildly profitable, and ensure that it gets into the hands of the individuals you intended to help, you need someone at the marketing helm.

And through my chat with Oakley, it became more clear to me the importance of having a dedicated product marketing manager on the team.

Product marketing managers combine their expertise in marketing and psychology to help find the best positioning for your product. When you choose the right product marketing manager, they will lead the right customers to you.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in January 2022 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/product-marketing-manager

Your research and development team has been working on a new product for months and putting valuable resources into its design and manufacturing.

They’ve carefully researched the market and the problem they intend to solve — and now it’s time to let your product marketing manager work their magic.

I hate to tell you this, but without marketing, your product (no matter how amazing it is) will never be found by the customers whose problems it would solve.

This could lead to lackluster sales, financial failure, and potential customers who are still suffering from their original problems.

A product marketing manager can help you avoid this by finding strategic angles to connect your product’s features with your customers and their pain points.

Recently, I asked Nathan Oakley, marketing manager at RJ Living, to talk to me about product marketing and the job’s responsibilities. I also asked him to describe a typical day as a product marketing manager. Here’s what I learned.

Table of Contents

• What is a product marketing manager?
• What does a product marketing manager do?
• How does a product marketing manager differ from a product manager?
• How to Become a Product Marketing Manager

What is a product marketing manager?

I didn’t get into marketing through the traditional college route. And if you’re like me (or you work in another field, like sales or customer service), you might not be as familiar with product marketing managers or their roles.

Through talking with Oakley, I learned that a product marketing manager, or a PMM for brevity, is a specialized marketer who takes ownership of a product’s positioning, messaging, and branding.

To get an even better idea of their job duties, let’s take a look at this sample product marketing job description.

Product Manager Job Description

A product marketing manager will be responsible for overseeing the creation and distribution of promotional campaigns for key products.

This individual will have a keen understanding of the product’s target audience, and in-depth knowledge of relevant product features.

Product Marketing Manager Skills and Qualifications:

• Foundational marketing and campaign management experience.
• Project management skills.
• Strong organizational and communication skills.
• The ability to analyze relevant information and make informed decisions.
• The ability to prioritize tasks and responsibilities across projects.

While I fully believe you can do any job with the right training and experience, employers look for a minimum of a Bachelor’s degree for this role.

Ideally, your Bachelor’s degree will be in business administration, marketing, or a related field of study.

Some employers may even seek candidates who hold advanced degrees and have more extensive experience in marketing, sales, or advertising.

While not required, there are certifications available (such as the Certified Product Marketing Manager distinction) that can help better prepare Product Marketing Managers for the responsibilities they are about to take on.

I find certifications to be a great way to continue your education and gain new skills, especially if you’re looking to advance your career or jump into a new role.

The next question you might have about this role is ‘How much does a product marketing manager make?” It’s a valid question that I had, too, because, as a former teacher, I am always surprised at the salary ranges for other careers.

According to PayScale, the average base salary for Product Marketing Managers in the U.S. is $99,814 per year, though this can vary depending on the company and level of experience.

Product Marketing Manager’s Core Responsibilities

Just like salaries, a product marketing manager's responsibilities may vary from company to company. However, I found there are a few core responsibilities that are universal to the role.

1. Market Research

When diving deep into the role, the first thing I saw was market research. A product marketing manager is responsible for understanding the target audience and market trends.

It’s their job to get into the minds of the customer, understand their pain points, and then figure out how your product can appeal to them.

2. Positioning and Messaging

Once your product marketing manager has a clear idea of how your product can help your ideal customer, they’ll work on creating clear product messaging and positioning.

Ideally, your product’s position and message are what will make your product stand out from the crowd. So, it’s important your PMM has done their research.

3. Create Your Go-To-Market (GTM) Strategy

What is a marketer without a marketing strategy?

Just like your content marketer is tasked with creating and ensuring the success of your content marketing operations, your product marketing manager is also responsible for working alongside other team members to craft and execute product launches.

4. Sales Enablement

You might think sales enablement is squarely in your sales department’s domain.

And while that might be true, it’s helpful to partner with the product marketing manager to equip your sales teams with the tools and training they need to effectively sell your product to customers.

A product marketing manager can help create scripts and sales sheets to aid your sales teams in their efforts.

5. Performance Analysis

While chatting with Denise, she also told me that performance tracking is crucial to her role, too.

Denise said, “Tracking performance is a must as well — I always make sure to review our analytics quarterly to fine-tune our campaigns, which has helped lower our cost per acquisition by approximately 20% without sacrificing engagement.

In the end, I'd say it’s all about staying tuned in to both the market and our audience to keep everything together.”

So, if you want to know how your product resonates with your customers, ask your product marketing manager.

Since they’re responsible for tracking metrics to determine product performance, your PMM can refine the marketing strategies or tweak product positioning.

What does a product marketing manager do?

After I learned about the core responsibilities of a product marketing manager, I wondered, “What does a product marketing manager do?” So, I thought I would ask Oakley for specifics.

Although their job titles might not explicitly say “Product Marketing Manager,” that’s exactly what they do.

Oakley told me they’re responsible for crafting a story about their products that will entice potential customers to purchase them. They then collect customer feedback after a product launch.

In other words, when the product is being prepared for launch, the product marketing manager (or team) will be involved in educating the public about the value and benefits of the offering so that they can convert potential customers into raving fans.

According to Oakley, you’ve got to be good at analyzing people. “Because you’re working directly with the product, you need to be good at strategic thinking and understanding people and their needs,” he said.

I also learned that the role of the PMM goes far beyond understanding people and how they’ll use your product. Instead, you also have to consider how they move through the sales funnel while considering your product.

That means the PMM will focus on three levels of the sales funnel:

1. Acquisition. Bringing awareness to your product through content such as social media, copywriting, and blogs. This requires the product marketing manager to determine what type of campaign needs to be done, create a budget for the marketing endeavors, craft a project plan to map out when this content will be released, and oversee a team that will create the desired content.
2. Engagement. Building trust and creating conversations with potential customers through events, campaigns, and specific calls to action.
3. Conversion and Retention. Converting potential customers into paying customers for one-time purchases and keeping existing customers loyal through subscription models or add-on purchases (when appropriate).

It’s worth noting that from one company (or campaign) to the next, the responsibilities and expectations placed on a product marketing manager may differ.

How does a product marketing manager differ from a product manager?

With similar titles, it can sometimes be difficult to understand the different roles available within a company.

Many often confuse product marketing managers with product managers, and while there are similarities, the roles carry very different responsibilities.

Both a product marketing manager and a product manager provide a voice for the product. However, the difference is who they are speaking to.

A product manager is vocal during the production stage of a product. They speak internally on behalf of the product, communicating with engineers and developers regarding its features and functionality.

A product manager is focused on answering the question, “Does this product solve the problem we intend it to solve?”

A product marketing manager, on the other hand, is responsible for speaking to the outside world.

While these individuals will fulfill very different roles, they will sometimes work together. Both the product manager and the product marketing manager must have a solid understanding of the buyer persona and will share the research they’ve done to assist the other.

How to Become a Product Marketing Manager

Since both Oakley worked in this role, I asked if he could share some tips with me about how to become a product marketing manager.

Both of them suggested there are two ways you can become a product marketing manager: getting a marketing degree with internship experience and upskilling.

Study marketing or business to gain experience.

Oakley suggested that the easiest way to get into product marketing is by completing a Bachelor's degree program.

“To get into product marketing, it’s easiest to start with an undergraduate degree in business or communications, followed by internships in digital marketing, branding, or sales. This will give you a solid foundation to get your foot in the door,” he added.

While a Bachelor’s degree is helpful to have, Oakley stressed the importance of continuous learning because the marketing field is ever-changing.

He told me, “Never stop learning or upskilling in the industry. So be sure to keep on educating yourself on content and industry knowledge so you can flourish in your role.”

Upskill and transition to product marketing.

You can transition to product marketing after gaining marketing experience, even if your experience is in digital or content marketing.

When hoping to transition into the field, it's always best to kick things off with experience in fields like digital marketing or brand management. You’ll build analytical and communication skills along the way.

There are various online courses you can complete to gain and strengthen your skills. However, Oakley suggests you use LinkedIn Learning.

Product Marketing Managers: A Valued Team Member

I’ve learned that creating a product is only half the battle.

In order to succeed with your product launch, make your product wildly profitable, and ensure that it gets into the hands of the individuals you intended to help, you need someone at the marketing helm.

And through my chat with Oakley, it became more clear to me the importance of having a dedicated product marketing manager on the team.

Product marketing managers combine their expertise in marketing and psychology to help find the best positioning for your product. When you choose the right product marketing manager, they will lead the right customers to you.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in January 2022 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

via Perfecte news Non connection