Why Product Marketing Is Moving Upstream
Product marketers are being brought in earlier in the product development process - but what's driving the change?
TL;DR: If your GTM feels messy, if your launches aren’t landing, or if your product team is building in a vacuum, taking PMM upstream might be your big unlock.
In my last post for The Product Marketer I shared a fresh new definition of Product Marketing, thanks to many PMMs around the world. And there was a clear takeaway: Product Marketing has changed.
It’s not just this newsletter’s fine readership saying so, either.
A report by Gartner earlier this year found ‘a growing need and emphasis for “upstream” product marketers to ensure offerings address customer expectations and market demands.’
This is all great to hear, as it’s what so many PMMs have been advocating for in recent years, but I’m curious about why it’s happening. Why now?
Why Now?
Another quantum leap in tech
One explanation is that the tech industry is evolving again - at pace. The great AI race has led to an explosion of new startups. As a result, every category feels saturated. In this scenario, laser-sharp positioning and meaningful differentiation become essential.
Today’s customers are more discerning than ever. They can see through (and will gloss over) vague messaging and inauthentic claims. Products need a compelling, distinct story - and you don’t get this by pulling product marketing in at launch. You need customer insights to shape product direction and to know the narrative you’re going out with before any code gets written. And you need a great product marketer to make this happen.
GTM is getting harder
It also feels like that new startup saturation has made it more difficult to stick the landing when it comes to product launches. How do you stand out in such a noisy space?
There’s a fantastic McKinsey report from last year, which dug into the rise of product marketing among software companies, which backs this up: the report found that while building products has gotten easier, bringing them to market has become vastly harder.
To land something well, you now need:
Deep understanding of your audience
A story that cuts through and ties the emotive problem you’re solving together with a meaningful, valuable solution
Messaging tailored to different roles
You can’t do this kind of work reactively. It needs to be baked in from day one. Product marketers should be tasked with thinking about distribution and GTM from the moment new product development work begins.
Demand for better collaboration
There has long been demand for product marketing acting as the bridge between different teams, but the difference now is that businesses don’t just want a conduit - they need a function that can actually align everyone and set a product-distribution direction for the whole company to work towards.
The Gartner report found that 50% of tech CMOs and PMM leaders cite poor collaboration across teams as a key blocker to growth. The most successful companies are fixing that by focusing PMM on upstream activities, so that GTM strategy, roadmap planning, messaging, and pricing are all aligned from the get-go.
Word gets around
In recent years, more companies have seen what good upstream Product Marketing looks like. And once you’ve experienced it and worked with a PMM who genuinely helps shape strategy, sharpen product decisions, and make launches feel like less of a gamble, you inevitably become a champion for it.
You tell your peers. You tell your colleagues. And you push for hiring a similar style of function when you move to a new role at a different company.
Word of mouth is powerful. Especially in tech. And this trend is playing out right now - at scale.
What This Means for PMMs
If you’re a product marketer, this is a brilliant time to be investing in your upstream skills.
Become the customer’s and market’s voice early in product planning.
Ground everything you do in insights - qualitative and quantitative.
Get comfortable taking part in (and influencing) product conversations.
Build trust with cross-functional partners.
Don’t wait to be invited to start this kind of work.
The job is no longer just about battlecards and launches. Let’s embrace this shift.
What This Means for Founders, CMOs, and CPOs
If you’re hiring or managing PMMs, treat this role as a strategic growth engine - not just a delivery function. It’s not one of the marketing departments or an extension of Product - it’s its own discipline.
Hire earlier than you think. A lot of companies leave it too late, creating a vacuum that can cause big problems down the line.
Find people who understand both product and go-to-market. Great product marketers can be the product person in the room in marketing conversations, and vice versa.
Include PMM in product development and strategy conversations from day one.
Give them access: to customers, to data, to the company’s senior leadership. I encourage regular PMM contact time with the founder/CEO.
Resource them properly: with research tools, budget, buy-in from leadership, and - most importantly - headcount. (That McKinsey report suggests a ratio of 1:1.6 of PMMs to product managers might be optimal.)
Data tells us there is much correlation between successful companies and how they approach product marketing, so investing sufficiently - with the right people - will likely unlock something new and impactful within your business.
If you’re keen to talk about how upstream product marketing can transform your company - let’s chat ☕️.
Cheers! 👋
The Product Marketer is a London-based consultancy, helping ambitious companies across Europe - and the wider EMEA region - achieve world-class product marketing. If you’d like to discuss raising your company’s product marketing game, just reply to this email.