Episode Transcript
Will: Hi Maria, thank you very much for joining us today.
Maria: Hey Will, really excited to be here. Thanks for having me.
Will: Yeah, absolutely, our pleasure. Our listeners learned just a little about you in the intro, but I always love to hear from people themselves. What is it that you're working on today? What is your role like as the principal product manager Growth at Ancestry?
Maria: I lead the product growth team here at Ancestry. It's a relatively new initiative within the company. We have a new CEO who started the beginning of this year and she comes from Facebook and that's really where product growth started and came to be. She's taking that learning and applying it to Ancestry. I received an email asking if I wanted to join and lead the product growth team. We're building out the product growth team and running a number of experiments within the product. It's something that's relatively new to the company in terms of running rapid product growth experiments, like testing copy and whatnot. A lot of people are getting really excited about the impact that it's having to revenue.
Will: That's a pretty big compliment for someone to reach out to you and invite you to come join them. With the pedigree of Ancestry and Facebook, can you give us a little bit of background on how you got to be in such a desirable position?
Maria: I've always been in tech, but I started in venture capital. I worked at BDC Venture Capital, which is the largest venture fund in Canada, for about four and a half years. We worked with up and coming Canadian companies in the early 2010s like Shopify, Hootsuite, and companies we invested in like Hopper. After BDC, I moved to the operating side. Since then I've only really been doing growth - both growth marketing and product growth. I started in growth marketing and touched almost every channel - Facebook, direct mail, referrals, affiliates. I think the only growth marketing channel I didn't touch is paid search.
My sort of claim to fame is my work on referrals. Depending on which company you're in, it's considered either a growth marketing channel or product growth channel. At my first company it was a growth marketing channel, but when I moved to Lyft, it became more of a product growth channel. I really had the privilege of straddling both growth marketing and product growth. Eventually I realized I'm a much better product growth manager than growth marketer, so now I'm 100% product growth.
Will: That's pretty exciting and definitely some big names there. I'm personally interested in your time at Lyft before we dig more into your time with Ancestry. Help us understand what kind of projects you were working on there and what teams did you interface with in getting those projects done?
Maria: I joined Lyft specifically to build out their referrals program because at my previous startup I had already built a referrals product and they saw they needed someone dedicated to referrals. My role started to expand to other pods as well - touching other growth marketing channels, specifically affiliates, paid email, growth partnerships.
At Lyft we had a number of pods - a search pod, paid search pod, Facebook pod, referrals pod, and others. We worked really closely with the product team. I was technically in growth marketing, but inside the pod there was a growth marketer, product manager, analyst, engineers and other folks. We worked on specific problems with a cross functional approach.
Will: And were those members of the pods all dedicated to that pod or did they get spread around in other pods as well?
Maria: No, they were dedicated to the pod, which was great. For example, with referrals, I consider it really a product growth channel, but there's also a lot of marketing attached to it. Like emails - a product manager doesn't necessarily send out emails. There are some unique product managers who are pretty good at that, but they're very rare. Especially in a big company like Lyft, sending out emails to remind people of referrals is more work for a growth marketer.
Will: And with that very diverse group there, I think lots of marketers don't have that opportunity, whether you're on the growth side or any other side, to work with that diverse of a team. Does that bring up any unique challenges or opportunities that you saw there?
Maria: No, I think that is the most ideal work structure for any growth team - to have pods because you really get to see the cross functional work working well together. Otherwise, if you're a marketer just in the marketing team, you're always trying to find resources and it could really slow you down. But with a pod structure, things can move much more quickly because you have all the resources dedicated to you. I think that's the most ideal, but I understand, especially for smaller companies, that's not usually the case.
Will: Yeah, unfortunately the lack of resources is a big blocker for a lot of marketing initiatives when you're trying to reach in and get time from product or whoever it might be. And I definitely want to dig into your referral experiences a bit, but maybe we'll shelve that for a moment. I'd love to talk about growth marketing and growth product - I think these are very similar but very different roles. I'd love to get your definition of what they are and the difference between those roles.
Maria: Yeah, I think this is, quote-unquote, controversial. Well, I won't say controversial, but it really differs from company to company. My definition of growth marketing is a group of people working on growth marketing channels - whether it's Facebook, Google search, affiliates, whatnot, using another platform to create and bring traffic to the website.
I think where product growth comes in is when the user gets to the product post landing page. But again, that's the part that can get really controversial or murky depending on which company you're in. My definition is anything from the paid channel to the landing page should be growth marketing's turf. And then anything else after the landing page should be product growth. But sometimes there could be like an onboarding flow that both teams are trying to claim. At the end of the day, you guys have the same goal, so I wouldn't want to be territorial about it.
Will: And as you said, these two teams have kind of the same goal. When you look at the skill sets between one group and the other group, what skills might they have in common and what skills do you think are different between the roles?
Maria: The skill sets between a growth marketer and a product growth person are almost all the same, except for one - product growth people have dedicated engineering resources, so they have a much deeper experience working with engineering teams. That is a skill set. I remember when I started to work on product, my first product went so bad. When we launched, it should have taken only a few days, but it took a couple weeks just because I wasn't working with the engineering team well. I wasn't really thinking through all the requirements.
But other than that, all the skill sets are pretty similar. For example, you're trying to think of what the user is thinking. A growth marketer building an ad is thinking about what the user is thinking, and the product growth person is doing the exact same thing when writing a spec. They're coming up with ideas like showing ratings and reviews on an ad, but product growth people would also put that on the checkout flow. It's almost exactly the same - the difference is working with engineering.
Will: And in your experience, companies you've worked in, do you find these teams are collaborating or are maybe operating in their own silos and aren't even aware of how similar they are?
Maria: I've seen them mostly in silos, even in a POD environment. At Lyft, even in a POD environment, I don't think there was a mutual understanding that the skill sets are very similar. I think maybe it's just because of perception. Here in the Valley, when you're a marketer, you're a marketer and when you're a product person, you're a product person. But I don't think anyone really has told them you guys are doing exactly the same thing - using the same skill sets like analytics, user psychology, design thinking. It's just that one has more engineering resources than the other.
Will: And I know you're on the product side of that equation now, but if you look to the future and look at the trends of where you think the most impact that a marketer could have - I know it's a broad generalization, but do you think there's more opportunity to have impact inside of a product or outside of the product today?
Maria: It really depends on what the company is and where they're at. If you're in a startup and you don't have a lot of traffic, then probably the most impactful place is in growth marketing, sending traffic to your website. But let's say you're in a company like Ancestry where we get tons of traffic every day just because we've got a really big brand and TV commercials, then the product is where you can make an impact. We haven't really done a lot of product growth experiments before, but we do have a ton of traffic and it's kind of a waste to not test on that traffic. There's a lot of companies that don't have that privilege of having so much traffic. So it really depends on the stage of the company and the level of traffic either outside or inside the product.
Will: Yeah, I like that way of thinking. I think a lot of our listeners are people who want to have impacts at the companies they're at. They're not just there to put words on a screen. They want to have that impact. And I like the way you think about that - stage of the company and where the opportunity is, it's going to change based upon whether there's a lot of traffic or opportunity in product.
Maria: Yeah, my advice for people when thinking of joining a new company - everyone wants to make an impact. At the end of the day that's what they want to do, to put it on their resume and show what they did. They love to be part of those bigger conversations about the most impactful projects for the company. So scrutinize the company as a whole - if you're a growth marketer and that's what you want to stay in, then look for a company where their biggest problem is growth marketing. Because all eyes will be on you. Ask whoever your hiring manager is or the founder, "what is your biggest problem?" If they say growth marketing and you're in growth marketing, perfect. Or if they say product growth, wonderful, you should be in product growth.
Will: Oh wonderful, thank you. Now, if someone was in growth marketing and they wanted to transition to product growth, what kind of advice would you give them? What kind of skills could they build and how could they do that?
Maria: Well, I would say start working with the product team inside your company and start working really closely with the engineering team. As I've been mentioning, the only key difference is working with engineering and building out that skill set of gathering requirements. Where it gets really tricky with product is there are a lot of requirements and you have to think through so many things. With growth marketing, let's say you work on Facebook - you just create the ad, design it, and post it. For product, you have to think about the happy path, what if users don't make it to the happy path, what are all the other paths, what are all the different requirements and events we need to add. Those things need to be thought through.
Will: And I just want to step back just a little bit there. You mentioned the happy path and then these other paths. Maybe you could dive in a little bit more to kind of what the happy path is and some of these other things that might emerge.
Maria: Yeah, that's a really good question, because a lot of people actually forget about the non-happy path. When you're building out a product, you're always thinking the ideal flow - if they make it here, then they'll make it here, then they'll get to the part of the product that we want them to do. But most of the time, users don't go through that happy path.
I'll give an Ancestry example. With Ancestry, users get to the site and start to build a family tree. If we can find records about their ancestors, then we show the records. But a lot of our records are here in the United States. For me, I've lived in many other parts of the world, so I don't have a lot of records here. The happy path for users at Ancestry is if your family has lived here for years, then we would be able to show you records about your family. But for me, I won't go through the happy path - I won't see any records. So what should I end up seeing? Those are the types of paths people should think about. Work closely with your analyst to see what percentage of people are going through that happy path versus other paths, and really think about the product experience for people who aren't going through that happy path. Even though you can't serve them the same way, maybe there are other ways you could serve them. That's where product thinking comes to play - they're already here, they've spent maybe 10, 30 minutes inside the product, what else can we show them?
Will: And I think that's a great point to think about, especially coming from growth marketing onto the product side, because quite often, whether we're forcing someone through a squeeze page or running an ad that really only has click or no click - that's my only two paths. It can be quite a different view of the world to remember that there are potentially thousands of paths someone could go down.
Maria: Exactly, yeah.
Will: And you've talked about requirements a couple times here, and I feel like the level of requirements that one might put forward in a marketing world might look and feel differently than those requirements you would see in a product world. Since you did that transition, maybe you could share some of your experience as to some of the things you learned or the surprises you had as you navigated from a marketing style requirement to a product requirement.
Maria: Well, I guess the most simplified way I can give advice to people when thinking about requirements is just think about the user experience. Think about what the user is going through. For example, you have a paid advertisement, a user will click on it, what is the page that they see? And then where is the call to action? And when they click on that, what is the page that they see? You go through that entire user journey and then think about what the user needs, but also what we need. If a user gets to the landing page and clicks on the call to action, you need to make sure there's the event behind that call to action so you can track those things. Just thinking through the user flow and thinking about the requirements for both the user and the company to track user behavior. That's it for both marketing specs and product specs. But as we talked about with product specs, it's more complicated because there are so many more user flows, so your requirements become much more complex.
Will: And when you're in that more product growth side, or maybe you're a growth marketer who's being asked to support in product, you seem like you're more likely to be interacting with a product manager and those engineering teams. Are there any challenges that you found that the product managers and engineering teams might have with understanding what you're asking? Maybe there's like a terminology barrier or a process barrier there outside of the specs?
Maria: I think there may be a couple of things. Number one, product managers and engineers don't really have a good sense of marketing. I don't mean that in a demeaning way, but for the most part, if people come just from an engineering background, they're really thinking from an engineering background. Or if someone came from purely product, let's say they started as an associate product manager at Facebook, then they're always just thinking about the product domain.
It's actually very rare to find people who really think about the entire user journey, from brand marketing to paid marketing to the product. Product people may not completely understand what marketers are trying to do. If you're working on a Facebook channel and there is a specific requirement, you probably need to educate the product manager a bit. Maybe walk them through the user experience - show them the ad on Facebook, the user flow, and where you need help from product. They definitely need education on marketing channels because they've never touched them before.
The second point is being clearer in the engineering needs. Engineering always asks "what exactly is the specific thing you need?" They like being told the problem, but they're also asking if this will take five minutes or two weeks. If you're not a product manager, they want to help you, but they also know they have a Sprint and the product manager owns that Sprint. They need to balance their priorities.
Will: Yeah, and I think both those are great points. I think many of us can shy away from that second point almost feeling like we're sharing too much or we're in too much detail too early. But absolutely, those product teams, those engineering teams, they're just trying to estimate - they like details so they can actually figure out if they can do it. My experience is they're always trying to help, they just need to know maybe more information or different information than you thought.
Maria: Yeah, and I know this may be a really dull topic talking about requirements, but this is where it really comes in handy. If you really start to think like a product manager and think through all the requirements, you can figure out that specific thing you need. When you talk to the engineering manager, they'll be able to help you pretty quickly, especially if the scope is quite small. They're happy to do so. But again, when you put your product manager thinking on and think through the requirements, you can sell what you need much better.
Will: And for those people who haven't put these kind of requirements together and haven't maybe worked closely with product managers, do you think it's normally okay if you had to go ask a product manager, "how do you want specs?" Do you find that they're helpful with that request or is there a better way someone can learn if they've never written specs?
Maria: That is a good question. I would say most people are pretty helpful. They're always open to help out. I would say reach out to the product manager you're closest to and get 15 minutes of their time and ask how to write a proper spec. There have been some really good product managers I've worked with who have a spec template with very clear definitions of what you should put in for each topic. That has helped out a lot for people who aren't in product. But if that template isn't available, just pull a PM aside and ask for help. Most people here in the tech industry are just so open to giving feedback and helping others out.
Will: Yeah, I find that sometimes some of the people I've worked with have a wonderful tendency that they want to respect others' time and they don't want to waste people's time. And it can seem counterintuitive but getting that 15 minutes to understand how the specs should be written or how they can best help them is going to save a lot more time.
Maria: Yeah, and I think this applies to everything. I remember in my first company, I was learning SQL. Of course, there are so many tables and you're trying to figure out what tables connect to what. I realized a faster way to learn our tables was to just talk to the guy who built all the tables to see what the data infrastructure is like. So I had a half-hour meeting with him, he showed me the map of the data infrastructure. That helped me out a lot. I got to the point where the two of us were the most proficient in analyzing our data because I really understood the infrastructure. People understand that when you're asking for their time for help, they know it's actually making you more efficient and making them efficient as well. Instead of me constantly asking "what does this table do?" he just saved hours by meeting with me for 30 minutes.
Will: Yeah, and I'm going to say that's an impressive feat if you're operating as a growth marketer and you become the number two most knowledgeable person about the data infrastructure.
Maria: I don't know, maybe it's dangerous. I think I broke one of the tables at one point. I don't think he was really happy. But anyway, sometimes it can be efficient.
Will: Yeah, fair enough. And we've definitely been digging into requirements and this transition from growth marketing to product marketing.
Maria: I just want to clear - product growth, not product marketing. Product marketing is like a whole different can of worms. That's a completely different other team.
Will: Pardon me. Yes, absolutely. Transition from growth marketing to product growth. Any other advice for people who look at that transition? Specs are really important, but any other advice you've got along your career that you think others would really benefit from?
Maria: If you want to move into product, then you really gotta show your product chops and be one of the louder people in the team. Let's say you're in a big company with pods - there's a growth marketer, analyst, engineers, product manager, and others. Usually, the product manager is the loudest because they're technically leading the pod team. But as a growth marketer, don't just sit back, really start to have conversations with the product manager. For every meeting, start to show your product chops. When that product manager believes in you, and then you want to move to the product side, they could be one of your ambassadors.
If you're in a smaller company without pods, still have those conversations with the product team, show your interest and give them ideas of what to build. But also be very frank with people, whether it's the head of product or your boss, that "hey, I want to move into product, how can you help me?" Actually, that second thing is probably the most important - if you want to move to product, say it out loud and show that as your intention. People can help you start to move into product. Then show your value as a product thinker and potential product manager. This advice works for both big and small companies - ask for what you want.
Will: Yeah, you don't get the deal unless you ask for it. You don't get the role.
Maria: But also people will really start to mentor you and get you prepped for being a product manager.
Will: Yeah, absolutely. You ran one heck of a referral program over at Lyft, and did so beforehand as well. Very experienced in multiple different product growth channels. If someone right now, whether they're on the growth marketing side or product growth side, has been asked to start a referral program for their company, can you share some best tips you'd give them?
Maria: Yeah. The first thing you need to do is build out a model. Figure out what your traffic is and then calculate how many referrals could come out of your current existing traffic. It's actually easier said than done. I have a template of this model in my Medium account somewhere. But basically setting the right expectations - this is the amount of traffic we have, based on this back-of-the-napkin math, this is what I expect for referrals on a monthly basis. You're setting expectations, but also you can compare how large or small referrals is compared to other growth marketing channels like Facebook or Google search. I think this is always the case with companies - they think if referrals really start to be good, then suddenly we'll hit virality. But what exactly is virality?
Maria: Yeah, you really need to temper and set those expectations. People expect if you have a really good referrals program, you'll turn into the next Dropbox or Lyft right away, which won't happen. It all comes down to a formula. I can share that with you or you can find me on Medium. That's number one, set the right expectations. Number two, what you'll discover in your model is that top of the funnel tactics are going to perform the best.
Maria: Here is a really easy tactic for referrals. Say you have the referrals product where people can add email addresses or phone numbers. You need as many entry points to that product as possible. Put it everywhere in your product. At Lyft we would show referrals when you create your account - we'd show "why don't you start referring people" before their first ride, during their ride, after their ride, before their second ride, after the tip. We put it everywhere, in the tab. That would probably be the most impactful thing you could do for referrals. It sounds really easy - just put entry points everywhere - and yeah, that's really all you do. The more entry points, the better. But you'll reach a ceiling. There was that point at Lyft where there were no other places we could put a referral.
One other tip - put your entry points at the beginning of the user experience. This sounds really counterintuitive. People always think they need to experience our product first, then we show them a referral prompt. No, when they create their account, show them a referral prompt right away. That is the entry point that will generate the most referrals. It seems really counterintuitive, but it's true. Just trust me on that. I've tested this many times.
Another tactic is optimizing those entry points. Your first experiment might say "refer a friend." Now start to optimize that - "get $50, give $50," "refer your mother." Test different copy. Test out different entry points. Maybe your entry point is too small - what if you make it bigger?
There's so many things you could do with entry points. It sounds silly or small, but believe me, that is going to be the most impactful part of referrals. That's why referrals feels more like a growth marketing channel. It does sound more like growth marketing, but it's also product growth.
Will: Yeah, for sure. Thank you very much for your time here. Is there any last little tidbits or last comments you want to leave with the listeners today?
Maria: No, I think maybe just an emphasis that if you're a growth marketer and want to move into product growth, you already have 80-90% of the skill sets that a product growth manager has. The one thing you need to do is really learn how to be efficient and productive working with the engineering team. That is a skillset you will need to learn, and it could take time, but you will learn it. And you already have 80% of the skillsets anyway, so don't be afraid to move to the product growth side.
And even for product growth people, if they want to move to growth marketing... Actually, now that I think about it, moving from growth marketing to product growth is a lot easier than moving from product growth to growth marketing, because in growth marketing you need to learn the different platforms like Facebook and Google search and all of this. And they're different. The nuances are really different. And then you get into direct mail, then TV - it can get even more complicated. Moving over to the growth marketing team is much more complex. So I want to empower growth marketers that you already have a really good set of skill sets. If you want to move over, do it. Just do it.
Will: Awesome. Well, thank you very much, Maria. If people wanted to find you online, is there anywhere they could follow along with you?
Maria: Yeah, definitely. Find me on LinkedIn, my email address is on my LinkedIn page as well. Feel free to reach out to me. I'm always open to talk about anything about growth. I can talk about this for another 12 hours. I love sharing what I've done before, but I also love talking to people who can share what they're doing. Just because I've been doing this for a while doesn't mean I'm closed to all ideas. I'm pretty sure everyone else has a lot of ideas as well. Please feel free to reach out. All my contact details are on my LinkedIn page.
Will: Wonderful. Well, thank you very much again for your time today, Maria. This has been wonderful. Really enjoyed the conversation, and I'm looking forward to having you back on the show so we can continue that 12 hours more of conversation.
Maria: Yeah. Thank you, Will. Thanks for having me.
