Sources & imports

Start-up or Enterprise 5-5,000 0→1 PMF, venture runway pressure, (virality) etc AI native products ML pipelines, recommendation systems, model evaluation etc Mobile-first growth Experimentation at scale (PLG yes. Consumer internet scale no.) PE/VC backed Physical products or services or platforms/marketplaces Fintech, Healthtech, Cyber security, Energy, Ecom

Acquisition = grew product to 1M+ users in 12 months Vanity, trickier was converting existing customers Revenue (top line) = New customers, existing market - New customers, new market - Retention - $$ Inc renewal wizard work Packaging & pricing (monetising SM, licencing debt (S&M allowing for free upgrades), transition to subscription, price increases) Incre

Sales enablement; pains/jobs, market insight, target segments (revenue x size x vertical), bi-directional + marketing input Authentication; portal, SSO, leads/MQL, future thinking (remote console), 2FA // SG; 2FA Integrations; portal <> HS // eBay, Amazon, E-Com, TVH, bespoke Marketing enablement; leads, quality (validations, activity, domain, removal of dow

CORE SWOT CIRCLES TROPIC FLOP YODA HEART MOAT AARRR HMW GIST ICE / MoSCoW OST TeQuila SoBeR Strategy & Commercial

Depth and Breadth Strategy at a glance

It was something thought up by the founder and leadership at the time - we need to move to subscription. A COO, CPO, CRO were brought in to help the transition. During investigations (digging out the ICP) we were able to attribute where current revenue was coming from (cohorts & products) as well as purchase/renewal behaviour - it’s where we discovered OEM’s

(importance + process + dependencies) Strategy: winning aspirations, where to play, how to win, core capabilities (winning aspirations - we don’t lead on anything, we’re the challenger / where to play ties into competitor analysis i.e extreme focus on backup vs swiss army knife approach / geography, segmentation, products & services, production, channel, ind

(links to ICP, product pages (site deploy), onboarding, tactical: what do we need to learn, product/feature direction) + personas

“Strategy is more about focus and saying no”

Winning aspirations - customer focused, revenue, market orientated Where to play - customer segments, channels, products & services, geography, supply chain How to win - cost vs differentiation Core capabilities - branding, scalability, customer insights, innovation, GTM Management systems - capture, emerging, refining, communicating, managing

Revenue (cohort) analysis; where is our revenue coming from? Product, Size of business (geography) Type of business (IT/OT, OEM, MSP, Other) Frequency of purchases (1:1, 1:M, M:M) / AOV / LTV

Industry - segmentation & structure (porters 5 forces) Customer - channel & end user Current situation - costs & capabilities Competitor reaction

How to get to where to play and how to win decisions

Part of the venn strategy i.e grow existing products and markets, growth (engagement, accounts, revenue), data (DAU/WAU/MAU, #users, feature usage) Tactics: ABM, direct sales, ICP, onboarding, features (new & optimised) Learnings Market segmentation Geographic: domestic, international, emerging, developed Maturity: emerging, growth, mature, declining

(positioning SM, sunsetting perpetual, potential new markets - circles, expectations, processes, impacts, data gathering / potential - re-introducing a version of free) Pivot examples: target market, product features (new, removal or optimise), technology pivot (refactor/splitting), business model (perpetual to subscription), channel pivot (more direct sales

Business model (revenue, cost, channel, customers, relationships, value prop, key activities, partners & resource) GTM (adding direct sales > channel focus), positioning & messaging + greater focus on PLG Value proposition (incrementally improve, radically improve, open up to more people, open up more jobs, pivot on jobs, prioritise jobs)

Removal of free, recurring revenue first Business (enterprise/SME) over home Enterprise > SME OT over IT Direct vs channel (MO/MF, margins, AOV) Positioning & messaging Messaging - cloning to OT (downtime, environment, security, compliance & ease of use) Target audience (who/ICP) super refined (beachhead) Who are our best customers and where can we grow? (wh

Pivots can impact roadmaps; prioritise Linux vs cloud, sorting fulfilment (subscription management) vs engagement MA - engagement play pivoted to self-service/reduce cost to serve Roadmap impact; remote console & onboarding parked / support ticket volume prioritised (resetting licences, changing emails etc) Reflect - free to paid, perp to sub, home to OEM Ro

SiteDeploy - pricing & packaging (already in-flight when I arrived, had to unpick & unwind)

Actual revenue vs potential i.e bigger resellers/distro’s have weaker relationships, Macrium guys assess and prioritise by revenue potential Geography - resellers/distro’s allow market easier/wider market penetration (some territories don’t have distro’s so resellers come direct) Revenue breakdown - ~ 50/50 between channel vs direct (plans to increase direct

Venn diagram: expansion (existing markets and products), retention and migration, growth (new markets and products), ICP answers where to play question, Venn answers how to win + building core capabilities, lacking winning aspirations End of year planning rush - annualised thinking Bowtie: implementing the right-hand side, move away from ‘set & forget’ Left:

Description: Horizon 1 focuses on the core activities that are currently driving the company's revenue and profitability. This includes maintaining and defending the core business to ensure it remains competitive and continues to generate income. Key Actions: Optimise Efficiency: Improve processes and reduce costs. Enhance Performance: Focus on incremental i

Description: Horizon 2 focuses on emerging opportunities that have the potential to become significant revenue drivers in the near future. This involves investing in new products, services, or markets that are adjacent to the core business. Key Actions: Develop New Capabilities: Invest in R&D and new technologies. Expand Market Reach: Enter new geographic or

Description: Horizon 3 focuses on transformational initiatives that are highly innovative and speculative, with the potential to create entirely new markets or industries. These initiatives often involve breakthrough technologies or business models. Key Actions: Invest in Innovation: Allocate resources to exploratory research and radical innovation. Incubate

Inch deep, mile wide is the starting point (what do we have in the backlogs and roadmaps currently, what’s not in them but should be, what other places might requests/problems sit?) Of the stuff that’s in the backlog / roadmap, what’re the confidence levels for each item (where is discovery up to) What discovery has been done at a product level? (Reflect fir

Cross-reference with other assets (docs, confluence, presentations etc) Build the roadmap (NNL) Identify pillars, levers & bets Group bets to expose levers - it will be bidirectional (top-down, bottom-up) Prioritise bets (RICE)

Different level of altitude Ground level is feature/problem (PRD) Rooftop level (CIRCLES) 10,000 feet (Bet/Slides)

Get alignment/buy in from technology Get alignment/buy in from SLT (inc board)

Starts at ground level (“need to see the wood through the trees”) You’ll begin to see patterns emerge/connect the dots & bets/levers will emerge Need ability to roll up & down (altitudes) Putting into roadmap (NNL) will help flesh out what future/urgent discovery is required + helps you think about the priority of items < bets Better off doing the first poin

Split by cohort; size, jtbd Link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ZgZO21sWP9f2_6aft2TFiKKDO3HuGnTJ/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=102349939570996491795&rtpof=true&sd=true Pricing roadmap Fencing & laddering (inc tiering) Packaging (what you’re buying) Pricing model (how you’re buying; sub, perp) Price point Look at price elasticity, effects on demand Fencing (foc

I felt the product organisation was missing the above (for about 20 months after I joined). Craig had a different model in his head (notion board) but think both are attempts to operationalise the function and its activities The biggest example that springs to mind is the Partner Portal. I put together a call with Craig (CPO), Nick B (channel expert), Ingmar

MAP THE FLOWS/FUNNELS ANALYSE > IDEATE > PRIORITISE > EXECUTE

Best customer behaviours; feature usage, screens visited, purchases, AOV, time of purchase, how often do they open the app Best customer characteristics; source were they acquired from (ad, WOM, organic, email etc), demographics, tech stack What events cause users to abandon the app; which screens have the highest exit rate, known bugs, price comparisons, wh

Engines: sales forces, SEO, paid (ppc, ads etc), word of mouth Positioning (long term) & Messaging (short-term / language market-fit) Channel market-fit (direct vs channel, social media, email, WOM etc) Viral/WOM - social media, community engagement, referrals, online videos Organic - SEO, content marketing, public speaking/relations, email marketing, commun

Create a funnel report of conversions & drop-offs “What’s the one thing that nearly stopped you from completing your order?” Desire - Friction = Conversion Rate Eradicate friction Enhance NUX Hook Model Trigger > Action > Variable Reward > Investment

(adoption + different products + tactics + impact + engagement (HEART)) Phase 1; home & best practice - metrics; DAU/WAU/MAU, completion % & time Phase 2; other products & specific steps Phase 3; tailored onboarding inc behaviour-based emails & actions Lessons Onboarding has many tentacles; activation, habitual, renewal, advocacy Different to Service Geeni o

Moving from perpetual to subscription opens up a new focus on retention, bow tie analogy, bringing in CS, timeframe (from first launching subscriptions > 12 months), work to get the data, financial modelling (month 13 + ⅓ drop in revenue for months 1-12), roadmap theme Work Home Origins - CIO came across data where some home users coming up for renewal hadn’

Initial retention; period (days/weeks) + frequency of visits (immediate stickiness) Hook model; external triggers Medium retention; possibly John’s 2 month without activity (get habits forming, novelty has worn off) Hook model; internal triggers Long-term retention; renewals (keep refreshing the customers perception of the product being a must-have i.e new f

Map the monetisation funnel CX Pricing AOV + frequency (get more customers, buying more, more frequently Principles; Reciprocity i.e ‘feeling obligated to purchase’ Commitment & consistency i.e emailing a recent purchaser with an offer on their next purchase (Amazon wishlist) Social proof (cases studies, testimonials, logo’s, # of purchase on basket) Authori

(history (sales finger in the air), how complicated it can get (units, competitors, impact on demand), competitor-based (inc analysis), helping with tiering, revenue goals, positioning) + take into account perpetual migration to subscription, existing loyal customers, offering multi-year discounts (comparing perpetual one-off + price of major upgrades) & way

What Put the product at the centre of the customer experience (PQL), the product(s) needs to find the right people where they are, deliver enough value in the shortest amount of time which makes sense and the path to purchase is clear Background/Context Setting Unknown quantification of trial conversion, no mapping, implicit knowledge meant we had to go fish

(portal - ~1,400 accounts to X, new & existing customers, forcing, website dependencies, phased approach, historical clean up (licence management, set and forget), benefits moving forward (data collection, self-service, reduced confusion, increased efficiency, future development (console), stakeholders (customer, partners) qual & quant examples) Existing cus

Fed into CRO/CPO recommendation Context; partner portal was built back in 2016, the individual who built it is no longer working at Macrium, it has gone unloved for some time (just BAU, no tech debt or real innovation). Internally, channel sales & cs have made their own workarounds (sending quarterly renewal spreadsheets, relying on John for hot fixes, manua

(Historical context (i.e not having any) + competitor analysis + decision making process + wider strategy + positioning and messaging + impact (i.e less confusion from customers, ability for business to implement upgrade paths) + ties into ICP/positioning & messaging work/subscription migration)

(Website optimisation - AB, GA, project management, impacts, goals, dependencies, historical context inc CMS migrations, resource constraints, ownership, SEO(content), messaging, UI/UX) Work Product pages SiteDeploy - value prop (pains, gains, jobs, use cases, competitor research, feature mapping, feature gaps (roadmap items)) > page update (SEO, story (pain

Product sense = Empathy - product teardowns & usability Creativity - leader thinking & technology https://www.productcompass.pm/p/your-pm-competence-map-skills-assessment

What Product positioning and messaging are critical elements of a company's marketing strategy that help define how a product or service is presented to the target audience. They play a crucial role in shaping the perception of the product in the minds of potential customers and differentiate it from competitors

Before E-commerce Inbound sales Inbound marketing (SEO, content (blogs), social media marketing, email marketing) Product - free (freemium), trial, demo Channel PLG After E-commerce (reduce friction, increase AOV, deliberate messaging/positioning) Inbound & Outbound Marketing (inc above) ABM Webinars, eBooks Paid (ppc, ads) Testimonials/case studies Inbound

Labyrinth (internal dynamic ERD tool) Restore (waiter, scope, schedule, QA) AI

F-gas canister, auto notify when threshold reached (empty, need to fill up) Reflect X release (missed QA) Timezone (new to Macrium, sprint slipped, not high priority) Any feature released without telemetry

Not firing Ashok sooner Kurtis (lateness, output, ethic) Mike - superstar turned rockstar

GTM - direct sales

Qualitative What The Oprah side of the equation - gives you the ‘Why’ behind the ‘What’ Background/Context Lack of access to customers/users, which in turn leads to lack of qualitative data, unsure of tooling (notably initially used, but then moved onto enjoyHQ). Impacts: understanding of customers and users (jobs, pains, gains, needs, feelings, desires), ri

(delivery: dashboard, communications, release management, resource management, QA, pipeline security / discovery: roadmaps (both types), GIST, OST)

Prioritisation (discovery) > Planning (roadmap)

Sources (internal stakeholders, partners, customers, PRESTO, competitors) Data; product usage, forum, reviews, support tickets, surveys, customer/user interviews, sales win/loss)

Understand more around where the request came from, what problem it attempts to solve, what today looks like inc workaround, how far into the idea we are (evidence), any other similar ideas, have we tried solving this before? Add into productboard (discovery tool) Reduce, Eliminate, Raise, Create

Non-technical (ex: surveys, prototypes, web-page updates / uninstall survey) Technical (ex uninstall survey, leveraging ad space in reflect) MVP (KANO) + Amgen multi-user POC PR/FAQ - how do we talk about this? Outcomes (success criteria/failure criteria, XY hypothesis) Customer B2B; compliance, reduced costs, increased money B2C; reduced cost, improved perf

Checklist Trade-offs - new learnings Idea level > release/people > feature level Iron triangle; scope, schedule, resource, QA Examples: Auto sub vs manual renewals Multi-user management MVP release Short-term vs long-term Pricing & packaging Budget Tech preview Communication (vertically, horizontally, inward)

Communication (internally & externally) Monitor for any issues Katrin’s tiers; Tier 1 = Linux, major release Tier 2 = Blockstore Tier 3 = multi-user organisations Tier 4 = minor patches

Ties back into outcomes from step 3

As-is: no roadmap(s) (causes: capacity, technology-led, implicit, poor (lack of) process) Feature-based: “What we know we need to get out of the door”, lack of goals, lack of vision, lack of strategy, No ICP, no access to tech roadmap To-be: goal/theme-based Forecast (blocks/quarters/months) Iron triangle considerations Risks and dependencies Communication +

How and where are ideas gathered from? How: manually Where (source): Internal stakeholders, support tickets, forum, intercom, competitors, customer/user insights, brainstorming, business model canvas/value proposition Tools: excel, EnjoyHQ Who: PM (ideally ProductOps) When: Weekly + Adhoc Prioritisation (More about what we say no to): (R)ICE, Kano, Value/Eff

Communication + stakeholder management (between departments - product: sales, marketing, customers, partners, design, support, CS) Monthly showcase: planned, actual, challenges (resources, constraints, QA etc), next steps Presentation skills (sales enablement, marketing, ideas (offline activation, immutability)) Styles of working; blue/red/yellow/green

Examples: free-page, product pages

Examples: home retention, onboarding + outcomes

Context: Multi-user management on roadmap, customer specific request, good relationship, low effort, real MVP (giving x2 employees visibility on all connected email domains)

Examples: KEY; Restore, Dawson group, Sales (prospects) / MACRIUM; usability tests (EnjoyHQ)

KEY: Restore (v8) / MACRIUM: Site Manager (survey’s/CS, feedback loops)

How are users using the product? How are they feeling? What do they want? Sources 3rd party i.e TrustPilot Support tickets Forum Surveys inc exit Customer/user interviews Competitors Innovation i.e technology PRESTO i.e regulations (MIS2) Industry + Vertical i.e industrial revolution 4.0 + google trends Observations i.e hotjar recordings (heatmaps), live (Ru

Taps into my Lean Six Sigma Green belt qualification (Lean/Waste [TIMWOODP])

(portal stages - understanding what needs to get out the door + including feedback items + feeding in smaller wins + discovery work + roadmap building) Products/initiatives Portal Basic - authentication (email, SSO (google/microsoft), 2FA, overview, licences, profile, billing Home trials + CX Business trials + CX Health stats + CX Remote console Blockstore M

Official QA job role circa April 2023, lack of infrastructure, variation between teams/products, constraints, automation, data (i.e bug leakage), black-box/white-box techniques, plans for apprentices

Sunset: 4 packs only to bring back due to demand, same with deployment kit (product), internally (SKU’s from ~280 > X - caused complications with selling, simplified the process), perpetual (POA) Launch: SiteDeploy circa April 2023 (blueprint for product launches) [Development, Growth, Mature, Decline]

Environments (Lee testing, old cyphers servers) Requirements (PRD’s + getting the right people in the room “Remove the fog”) Personnel (Andre on releases, John on systems) Other systems/products (dependencies on SM offline for example/licence system [legacy]) Resource (budget, personnel (skill/availability), infrastructure) Personnel; Chandan @ Key Releases;

Trial conversion work (growth levers/hacks) inc onboarding Product development/feature enhancement, cross/upsells

What A stage before Alpha & Beta which is a pre-release of software to a limited audience - offering a sneak peek into future innovations and helping developers refine and improve their offerings based on early user feedback Background/Context Setting One of the developers (Beata) had used TP’s previously in her time at Sophos (cyber security), off the back

CV items The machine work Telemetry + data literacy building Pricing & packaging Founding PM foundations ICP Identification GTM Server Plus direction

150% uplift in trial-to-paid conversion (2%-5%) Telemetry > fixing issues + email shots + purchase-flow optimisation (in-app) + onboarding (MA) Improved home retention 60-80% Email shot (early retention) + email renewal reminder (auto-renew disabled) + changed renewal mechanics (no new licence required) + slicker renewal process + onboarding (?) No new major

Generation, Storage, Ingestion, Transformation, Serving Security, data quality, data ops, data architecture, orchestration, coding Stakeholder management - commitment curve + RACI Workshops, PRINCE2 (progress, change, quality etc), altitudes, SCQA Commercial + technical + operational Project management - notion database, phasing, gantt, RAID Who, What, When,

Generation, storage, ingestion, transformation, serving Security, management, data ops, data architecture, orchestration, coding Mapped out in miro to understand/explain DIS - Data, Insights, So what? (think about the easter presentation) Having data is a start, we can collect more as we learn more Getting insights is useful for story telling (9/10 scheduled

Main work done around Reflect X October 2024 Price increases throughout 2024 SKU management Q1/2 2026 as part of machine work + mechanical/data model fixes Reflect X Upgrades, new licencing (LTSC) Legacy pricing Volume discounts Monetisation = broader umbrella and can include; pricing & packaging licensing models services support contracts Subscription manag

“Built the product engine, not just run someone else’s” Processes, Tooling & Comms (PTC) - (product ops hat) Processes Roadmap governance, prioritisation frameworks, discovery & delivery rituals, release readiness, PRD & decision documentation standards Tooling Tech stack (roadmap & planning, customer feedback, product analytics, internal communication & the

Context Historically the company has been technology-led, “Build it and they will come” & if we think back to the origins of the company, the founder a software developer himself was using a competitors solution but it failed to recover so he built his own - introduced as a free tool, then into a paid tool, then into business The company grew in revenue and

Discovery (inc testing) > Implementation > Outcomes We didn’t start off looking at TAM/SAM/SOM, instead we looked at our existing customer base first - this is where our discovery efforts first started Revenue - all types (new purchase new customers, new purchase existing customers (expansion), renewals (S&M)) purchase behaviour (1:1, 1:M, M:1, M:M including

Transformed fragmented GTM into a structured, data-driven system spanning channel, sales, PLG, and marketing Reduced reliance on manual processes and Excel-based operations, improving scalability, reporting accuracy, and operational throughput Reduced operational overhead across GTM through system consolidation and automation (HubSpot, portal, data pipelines

AI call analysis Automated insights Call + notetaker > summary pushed into Slack channel + insights stripped & added against feature/bet & company in Notion Notion/FF notetaker, Zapier, GPT Support ticket Automating discovery Takes tickets > export PDF to vector > AI chatbot sits on top + RAG > semantic searches = summaries, counts, breakdowns Vectordb, Zapi

Automation AI call analysis Weekly industry research (scheduled GPT agent) Competitor analysis (Clay) GPT’s (product coach & forum borg) More sources Exit survey (uninstall > HubSpot web form > insights) Support tickets (manual + AI flow) 3rd party reviews (TrustPilot deepdive) Telemetry (data > insights > so what?) Win/loss, pipeline data (CRM) Techniques E

Direct reports QA - team of 8, 1 team lead, 6 across teams & 1 automation engineer ‘Product’ - x4 BA’s, x2 Designers Development team (we’d report into CTO & CPO) - x5 teams, around 25-30 offshore