Build with Maggie Crowley

It's a special crossover episode of Build! And the first episode in our brand new dedicated feed. Today's guest? Dave Gerhardt, Drift's VP of Marketing. Dave discusses his one week spent as a product manager at Drift plus, the real meat of this episode – how to write good copy and tell a story with your product. Copywriting and storytelling are key to product management. If you can't tell the story and motivate your team, they won't know where to go next. On this episode of Build, how to build that excitement and get everyone on the same page.

Before you go leave a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review and share the pod with your friends! Be sure to check out more insights on the Drift blog at drift.com/blog and find us on Twitter @davegerhardt, @jayacunzo and @seekingwisdomio.

WHAT WAS COVERED

00:38 - DG’s one week as a product manager

2:17 - The most underrated skill at a company: internal marketing

5:15 - Read it out loud, say what you mean

6:40 - Simplify

8:00 - Would you say that out loud?

8:28 - Use their words

10:45 - Let your customers write the copy

12:20 - The swipe file

13:44 - Storytelling

14:10 - Five parts of a story

15:34 - The best books on copywriting

18:13 - The best books on storytelling

19:00 - DG’s storytelling secret: The Steve Jobs’ keynote

19:46 - The hardest part of storytelling in product

21:34 - Two ways to sell a shovel

In product, you always want to do more discovery, be more customer-centric, and talk to the people who are on the front lines using your product every day. But it’s easier said than done. And it’s also pretty tough to find real-life examples of what the relationship between a PM and the customer should look like. So on this episode of Build, Maggie talks to a customer she’s been working closely with for nearly a year. Rob Stevenson (Product Growth Leader at Keap) joins Maggie live at HYPERGROWTH Boston to talk about what it takes to build a partnership with a customer, how not to ask for feedback, and what it really means to build with your customers in mind.

Contrary to popular belief, product marketing is not just about making decks. In this episode, Maggie sits down with Drift's Director of Product Marketing, Aurelia Solomon. Together, they talk through the ins and outs of a product marketing role, why storytelling is crucial to success, and how to build, and manage, a strong PM to PMM relationship.

Like this episode? Leave a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ review, hit the subscribe button, and share the pod with your friends. You can also connect with Maggie and Aurelia on Twitter @maggiecrowley and @Aurelia90716528

On today's episode of Build, host Maggie Crowley sits down with Richard Banfield, CEO and co-founder of Fresh Tilled Soil, a leading user interface design and experience agency, and co-author of Product Leadership, the manual Maggie lives her life by.

On this episode, Richard dives deep into how to build high performing product teams. Be sure to tune in for actionable insights you can apply to your own team today.

Before you go leave a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review and share the pod with your friends! Be sure to check out more insights on the Drift blog at drift.com/blog and find us on Twitter @maggiecrowley, @drift, @seekingwisdomio and @RMBanfield.

On this episode of Build, Maggie and special guest Alexa Nguyen from the Drift product team talk about what happens after you write a one pager. At Drift, 'story time' is the next step in the product development cycle. It's where product managers, engineers, and designers get together in one room to outline the problem they're solving and identify any open questions. So the goal of the meeting isn't about coming up with a solution to the problem – it's about empathizing with the user and then creating a list of questions you want to answer afterwards. Want to know Maggie and Alexa's three steps to a successful story time? Listen to the full episode.

On today’s episode of Build, Maggie sits down with Drift’s VP of Product, Craig Daniel, to discuss how to ship product – what it takes to hit your dates (and the importance of committing to them publicly), using tracer bullets to de-risk features, “good / better / best” tiering to scope features and the importance of naming conventions.

Also in this episode, how Product Managers can progress in their careers and how to get features built by your team if you’re not on product. Hint: Talk to customers!

Before you go leave a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review and share the pod with your friends! Be sure to check out more insights on the Drift blog at drift.com/blog and find us on Twitter @maggiecrowley, @drift, @seekingwisdomio and @craigdaniel.

On this episode of Build, Maggie and special guest Daphne Funston from the Drift product team tackle the number one question from listeners: what's a one pager and how can I use it to build better products? Maggie and Daphne talk about how one pagers are deceptively simple, yet when done well, they can be a powerful tool for PMs to frame, scope, and communicate a customer problem to engineering and leadership teams. Tune into learn about the six sections that make up a one pager and how Maggie and Daphne use the one pager in their roles at Drift.

You could have a field day researching the tactics, frameworks, mental models, and processes and then apply them to building better products. But David Cancel says most of us are doing this wrong. When you're picking a role model for your product, you can't cherry-pick the best parts – because then you end up with a Frankenstein product. So on this episode of Build, Maggie and DC talk about the importance of stepping back and using first principles. Want to know how DC says product managers should approach systems thinking? Listen to the full episode.

Maggie's already given her best advice on how to deliver a great presentation. But what about enabling your teams to deliver their best presentations? That's what Maggie explores in this episode. Today, Maggie shares the five core elements she looks for in a great presentation, and how she provides feedback to her team based on those five points. This episode is a must-listen for managers new and old.

Like this episode? Leave a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ review, hit the subscribe button, and share the pod with your friends. You can also connect with Maggie on Twitter at @maggiecrowley

Today on Build, host Maggie Crowley chats live in the Seeking Wisdom studio with Acquia’s SVP Products, Matt Kaplan. Matt was previously CPO and GM, Emerging Products at LogMeIn. Now at Acquia, he heads up product strategy, management and design across their digital experience platform. And, fun fact, he was on MIT’s gymnastic team back in the day.

Together Maggie and Matt chat through how great products are like great stories. Specifically, what makes a great story, untangling the relationship between stories and products and how to help your team get better at storytelling.