Michael FertmanProduct Marketing Leader and CMO
I lead a product's pricing, packaging, positioning and sales enablement. When product, finance, sales and marketing each own part of it, I bring them onto one plan and take responsibility for its revenue target.
I work with businesses over $25M in revenue that have a new product to sell, or an established product whose growth has stalled.
I led products and pricing for the $500M subscription business, which grew by $30M a year, up from $14M a year.
Dun & Bradstreet
Product marketing, product management and pricing for product lines from $5M to $500M.
Guidepoint
First chief marketing officer, reporting to the founder and chief executive. Built the function from the ground up.
Apex Fintech Solutions
PE-backed fintech. First VP of product marketing; both new hires promoted.
Booz & Company
Associate on data-intensive projects for consumer goods clients.
US Navy
Navigator of a 950-person nuclear-powered ship during the First Gulf War.
If everyone owns the number, then nobody owns the number
A product can miss its revenue target even when every team meets its own goals. Product owns the roadmap, finance owns the price, sales and partners own the channels, and marketing owns the promotion.
The chief executive is often the only person all four report to, so the product's revenue falls to the chief executive by default.
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01
A new product competes with the core business.
Sellers need a reason to put it first, a pitch they can use and the accounts to call first.
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02
An established product needs more than another campaign.
The gap may be in the price, the package, the channel or how quickly customers get value.
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03
A winning deal stays with the seller who won it.
The rest of the team needs the buyer, the pitch and the proof behind that win.
“I can go out and sell one of these [new products] or I can sell two [of our core products] and meet my number.”
I'm accountable for the number nobody owns
An agency can run strong campaigns, and a strategy firm can give you sound recommendations. Many chief marketing officers lead demand and the brand across all products. I own one product's revenue across all four teams.
I'm a former chief marketing officer who has also led teams in product management, pricing, product marketing and sales enablement. I use that experience to choose the changes a product needs and to make sure your teams put them into practice.
Your sales leader keeps the team and its quarterly target. I lead pricing, packaging and the pitch, and I agree on the pay plan with your sales leader. A few of your sellers prove each change in live deals before the whole team gets it. The revenue target and its date go in writing at the start. That target is how I am measured.
Revenue responsibility without running the sales team
At Dun & Bradstreet, each product leader carried a revenue target, and the selling went through a 1,000-person sales organization that reported to someone else. I led product lines there and supported that sales organization across its six channels.
Who hires me
The person who hires me changes with the size of the business. The job stays the same: making sure a product reaches its revenue target. An operating partner can bring me into a portfolio company of any size.
At Guidepoint, I was that chief marketing officer, and I helped grow revenue from $30M to $50M in a flat market.
At Apex Fintech Solutions, a $400M business, I built the first product marketing team.
At Dun & Bradstreet, I led the $200M Sales & Marketing Solutions suite and took its growth rate from 6.0% to 12.4%.
Give your sellers the price, proof and pay to sell the new product from launch day.
I interviewed launch leaders at 15 B2B SaaS companies with $600M to $20B in revenue. Almost all of them pointed to the same six go-to-market decisions. In many launches, the date is set by when the product is ready, and those decisions come afterward. I get all six made before launch, in three groups:
A clear commercial target
One launch goal, one owner for the revenue target, and a written rule for which early customers prove the product is ready to sell to everyone.
An offer tested with customers
Positioning, packaging and pricing shaped by how the first customers respond.
Sellers ready to sell
Training a month ahead on the accounts to call first, and a pay plan that makes the new product worth selling.
Settling the six takes about four weeks, with one working session a week for your leadership team.
I took a new product into Dun & Bradstreet's sales channel in under four weeks.
Working with the senior executive team, I redesigned the launch process for a publicly traded business with 5,000+ customers.
Find the revenue gap, then close the biggest part of it so the product grows again.
I split the product's revenue into customers who left, cut back, stayed, bought more or joined. That shows where growth is being lost and where to focus.
Then I choose one or two changes based on the size of the gap, how quickly sellers can adopt them and what customers will notice. The changes can include:
- Pricing by customer segment and buyer
- Packaging that lets customers start small and expand
- Positioning and comparisons for deals against a rival
- A package and price for each sales channel
- Faster onboarding, so customers use the product sooner
By focusing the team on retention and moving clients to a new platform, I turned around a $30M portfolio that was losing customers.
For a $5M product, I cut implementation time, which raised new customers' first-year revenue by 9% on average.
Turn the first winning deals into a pitch every seller can use.
I find what the first deals had in common, and the sellers who closed them show the rest of the team what worked, with the chief executive in the room. Every seller then gets two things:
- A pitch for each buyer, drawn from deals sellers have already won
- Claims, numbers and customer stories, each with the deal it came from
I repositioned the product as premium, priced it by industry and trained the sellers. Those who closed at the new price presented their deals to the rest of the team.
While I was there, I repositioned Guidepoint around compliance and built the sales materials for four products across five customer segments.
“Mike's strategic thinking and execution capabilities were critical to the success of the product and sales/partnership strategy.”
Start with one product and a paid diagnostic.
The diagnostic takes four to six weeks. I run it with your teams and do some of the work myself, and it ends with three things:
- A short list of changes, in the order to make them
- The sellers who will prove those changes first
- A revenue target and date agreed in writing by the chief executive, your sales leader and me
Bring a product and its revenue target
On a 30-minute call, we'll talk about where the product stands and whether my experience fits the work.
Let's talk ↗