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Retention starts with product marketing.
And no — I don’t mean asking PMMs to build a deck to try and save a churning customer.
For the most part, customer retention relies on two things:
- Setting clear, truthful expectations about what your product can do, and the value it delivers.
- Making sure you deliver on that promise.
#1 sits directly in the product marketing wheelhouse.
It’s our job to take big visions and complex products and distill them down to messaging, demos, and images that are easy for people to understand.
If we overpromise or somehow misrepresent our product, that’s when churn happens.
It’s easy to blame sales for over-selling or promising things on the roadmap.
And don’t get me wrong — they often do.
But I think in many cases it comes down to product marketing not enabling them with the right information.
So, what can we do as product marketers to reduce churn?
1️⃣ Put clear positioning and messaging on your website. Make it easy for buyers to quickly understand your product capabilities, who it’s for, and what realistic benefits they can expect. This includes a clear ROI story.
2️⃣ Show your product. Make it easy for buyers to get behind the wheel without having to jump through too many hoops. You can use videos or product gifs, but I personally love interactive demos. Trainual found Navattic tours drove 1.75X more free-to-paid conversions than videos.
3️⃣ Support your claims with social proof. Not from a place of trying to make your product seem better than it is. Do it to help buyers understand how people and companies like them have been successful with your product. Platforms like UserEvidence are making it easier to consistently capture feedback from customers and quickly create all kinds of helpful content for buyers.
4️⃣ Enable your sellers with all three. This could be sales reps, partners, account managers, anyone selling your product. The point is to enable them with clear messaging, product demos, and social proof to set realistic expectations up front.
If you do these things effectively, you’ve done your part to minimize churn.
Unless I’m missing something…
#productmarketing #foundingpmm