Farhan Manjiyani, Technical Product Marketing Manager at Rev.com, got PMM certified with Product Marketing Core: OnDemand after hearing about the course in our Slack community.

In this case study, he discusses:

  • Why he enrolled
  • Why he picked us
  • Product Marketing Core's main benefits, and
  • Key outcomes

Farhan’s motivation

At the time of his enrollment, Farhan was on the lookout for a new PMM role and was keen to establish exactly what constitutes good product marketing practice.

“When I enrolled in Product Marketing Core, I was in the middle of a transition myself, and was looking for new PMM roles.
"At that moment in time I was a solo PMM, so I wanted to make sure I had an understanding of what ‘good’ actually means, when it comes to positioning, messaging, enablement, apart from what others thought about the work I was doing.
“It was about having a full understanding of the core elements of the responsibilities of being a PMM, as I searched for a new role.”

Why Product Marketing Core?

With career development high on Farhan’s agenda, enrolling in the right product marketing certification was essential as he sought to enhance his credentials.

Farhan explained why Product Marketing Core made him sit up, take notice, and Get Certified.

“A couple of things appealed to me when looking at the program.
“Firstly, the opportunity to hear from product marketers at companies I respected, liked, and had used myself; being able to get that level of access was important for me - it was my proxy for credibility.
“The second piece of it was information is always valuable, but I wanted a check for understanding to be built in. Whether it was a quiz or exercise, I wanted to make sure it wasn’t a case of spending hours watching videos and then ‘cool, if you feel you’re good, then you’re good. I wanted some level of clarification that I’d understood the material properly.
“I also wanted reference materials I could go back to if I needed a refresher. Whether it was the video, a deck, or a one-pager, I needed a reference point I could visit at a later date.”

What are Product Marketing Core’s main benefits?

Professionals enrolling in Product Marketing Core have provided consistently positive feedback about their experience of getting certified; the diverse material on offer ensures there’s something to appeal to every product marketer.

In Farhan’s case, he explained how the flexibility of the course, and the variety of presenters featured, helped his engagement during the 11 modules. The quality in the deliverance of course material also gave Farhan an insight into which PMMs can provide the best insights to support his development.

“I liked how the order of the syllabus wasn’t mandatory - if I wanted to jump to a completely different topic, that was fine. As my interest and motivation levels varied, I could change topics and go deeper.

“I also found it interesting how different components were broken up to introduce other parts of PMA. If we were speaking about positioning and messaging, we heard from Marcus Andrews, and his views on narrative design, or you’d be watching a piece of a conference when we were talking about personas.

"As someone relatively new to product marketing, this made me think: ‘hey, here are some thought leaders I should probably be keeping in touch with and keeping a pulse on the outside of this educational process’, and I really appreciated that. With many courses, you hear from one instructor the entire time.”

Key outcomes

In securing a spot in PMMC, Farhan Manjiyani put his faith in Product Marketing Alliance to deliver a course that’d help him progress in the infantile stages of his PMM career - and he wasn’t disappointed. He gave an insight into his initial reaction to the course material.

“It was incredible! It was incredibly thorough and incredibly straightforward.

“I’m a relatively new product marketer, and I found it included just about the right amount of information. Even when I shared it with more senior PMMs, they felt there was enough information to get that refresher, whilst keeping their attention at the same time.

“I think balancing enablement and education is hard, but  it was pretty clear you knocked it out of the park.”

Support in job interviews

Farhan’s desire to secure a new role served as a driving force behind his decision to enrol in Product Marketing Core. But did his PMMC certification help him in his hunt for a new position?

“The interviews I had post-certificate included a case study, or exercise as part of the component of the interview; for every single one of these, I went back to the reference material and every time I got to the head of the department, where there was s Director of Product Marketing, CMO, etc.
“Every person mentioned in the interview, ‘hey, I see you’re certified by PMA?’; this meant a lot if they knew who PMA are, and if they didn’t, as soon as I explained, that piqued their own interest and we would have a nice conversation about PMA against other competitors.
“I can’t say it was the only reason I got a new job, but it certainly helped me impress interviewers consistently time after time.”

Day-to-day benefits

So far, so good. 😏

With a role under his belt, how are the learnings gained from our certification course helping Farhan in his day-to-day practice?

“We’re just going through a round of new messaging now, and thinking about our overall positioning. I went back and said, ‘Right, let’s compare the format PMA is using vs what we’re using.’
“I looked at the reference materials and went to the on-demand videos from some of the conferences; it was nice to have the resources in place to influence our plan going forward, and we made our own changes based on what we thought was most applicable to the examples included in the course.
“Productivity in the team has also improved since I got certified. For example, we’re in the process of evaluating our CI tools.
"Being able to search through the various threads in the competitive channel and find evaluation material, what people are finding coming from one product to another, how multiple products are working together.
"We extensively reviewed this material and went into the tools report to see what PMA recommended. It’s been like having an extended team.”

New job? Check. Transferable materials? Check. Extended team. Check. Product Marketing Core has undoubtedly impacted Farhan’s PMM output for the better. 😏

Product Marketing Core's overall impact

What we wanna know, is what difference would Farhan (and his team!) have experienced if he hadn’t registered for the course?

“I would’ve gone out and looked for core learning platforms where people were simply talking about positioning, messaging, enablement, GTM, etc.
“However, this wouldn’t have been as thorough as PMMC. PMA has been a one-stop shop for authority, comprehensiveness, and follow-up resources.
“If you’re thinking about enrolling, I’d say you have to invest in yourself if you want to advance in this career. The constant question we ask others is: ‘what is the ROI for this investment?’ In the case of PMA, you gain access to materials made for product marketers, by product marketers.
“If you ask other people who’ve done the certification before, I think you’ll find no matter what stage they’re at in their career if they’re in a role or looking for a role, the certification program has either been useful for refreshing/refining their skills or helping to learn skills to make the jump into the area.
“PMMC is one of the best resources you’re going to find if you’re looking to level-up.”
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