2006 Commentary Archive

A busy year for the team. A major product management project in mid-2005 became a full-time assignment for Riggs Eckelberry and select members of his team. Two articles came out of that experience - the first, a clear and useful table from project leader Don MacDonald that shows the difference between product marketing and product management, and the second, the story of our experience at CyberDefender. We're very proud of our record in this young company, and Gary Guseinov, CEO of CyberDefender, agrees! It's The Product, Stupid! On 20 November 2006, a new product was launched. It attracted immediate attention in the press and with users, some of whom wrote in to tech support to thank the company for the product. Downloads of the product increased instantly more than ten-fold over the previous version. Revenue forecasts from the product quickly began to exceed expectations. How did all this come about? What lessons came out of it? Role Definition: Product Management and Product Marketing Don MacDonald, TechTransform's Product Manager in 2005 at CyberDefender, created this table at the time to answer the critical question: what's the difference between product management and product marketing?