TL;DR In this article I’ll walk through exactly how I approach my first three months building the product marketing function at a new B2B SaaS company, from listening and auditing through shipping and proving value.
I’ve joined enough companies now that I can feel the moment when uncertainty shifts into conviction. It usually happens around day 45. By then, I’ve sat through enough sales calls to hear the patterns, read enough customer emails to understand the real problems, and talked to enough cross-functional leaders to know what’s actually broken versus what people think is broken.
The first 90 days matter. They set the tempo for everything that comes after. But they’re not about heroics or quick wins. They’re about building trust, gathering signal, and establishing the foundation for repeatable product marketing work.
Here’s what I actually do.
Days 1-30: Listen, don’t build
My first instinct when I start a new role is to resist the urge to fix everything immediately. That instinct has saved me more times than I can count.
Instead, I listen.
The first thing I do is schedule sales calls. Not training calls. Not product demos. Real customer conversations where sales is trying to close a deal. I commit to sitting in on 10 to 15 of these in my first two weeks. I don’t speak. I take notes. I listen to how sales describes the product, what objections come up, how they handle competitive pressure, and what actually moves a buyer closer to a decision.
These calls tell me more about product positioning than any internal strategy document ever could. Sales lives in the reality of how buyers think. Everything else is assumption.
While I’m doing that, I’m reading. All of it. Every sales deck, one-pager, battle card, website copy, email template, and competitive analysis that exists. I’m looking for consistency. There rarely is any. One deck emphasizes speed, another emphasizes security. A sales rep calls the product “mission control,” but the website says “operating system.” The battle cards contradict each other.
This inconsistency is data. It tells me where positioning has broken down and where everyone’s improvising.
At the same time, I’m pulling a list of 5 to 8 recent customers (wins and losses both) and asking for 30-minute conversations with them. I’m not doing formal research. I’m asking what problem they were trying to solve before they bought, how they evaluate options, and if our messaging actually resonated with them or if they bought in spite of how we talked about ourselves.
I also pull together a comprehensive audit of the tool stack. Where does messaging live? Who owns the content calendar? Are we in a CMS or scattered across Confluence docs? Who has admin access? This matters because I’ll be building systems that need to work within the reality of what we actually have, not what we wish we had.
By the end of week three, I start assembling the message map. This is the framework I keep coming back to: a positioning statement at the top, message pillars underneath it, the pain points and benefits tied to each pillar, and the proof points that bring those claims to life. It’s not fancy. It’s the connective tissue between strategy and execution.
The biggest thing I’m looking for in month one is the gap between what product thinks we do and what sales is actually selling
The biggest thing I’m looking for in month one is the gap between what product thinks we do and what sales is actually selling. I’ve seen companies where product built an AI platform but sales is selling it as an automation tool. That gap gets bigger every quarter unless someone closes it.
Days 30-60: Build the foundation
Now I have enough context to start building with intention.
The first thing I do is present the message map to the team. I do this in person whenever possible, not in an email. I walk through the positioning, show examples of how it applies to different customer segments, and explain the reasoning behind each pillar. This is also where I invite the corrections. Positioning is directional, not gospel. I need the team to own this, not inherit it.
Right after that, I identify the one piece of sales enablement that’s most clearly broken and fix it first. There’s always one thing that sales complains about constantly. Usually it’s the competitive battle cards (they’re outdated), or the qualification process (no one uses it), or the RFP response template (it’s bloated). I pick the one thing that will have the most immediate impact and I own the fix.
This isn’t because it’s the most strategic project. It’s because I need to build credibility fast. I need the team to see that I listen to their problems and I actually solve them. That’s how I earn the trust to do bigger work.
I also set up a feedback system. Weekly Slack digest of customer insights, competitive intel, and win/loss patterns. Nothing complex. Just a routine way for customer feedback to flow back into the organization so that product and sales know what I’m learning.
Running the first win/loss retrospective happens here too. I pull together 3 to 4 recent deals (won and lost) and walk through the actual progression. What did we say in the first conversation versus what the customer actually cared about? Where did we miss the mark? What did competitors say that was more compelling? This is data that product needs to see.
I also align with product leadership on the next launch and take ownership of the go-to-market plan. That means positioning, launch messaging, the sales motion, competitive positioning, and the metrics we’ll track. I’m not abdicating this to a project manager. I’m owning it.
And I start building the enablement hub. This is just a Confluence space (or whatever you use) where all messaging, battle cards, competitive intel, and frameworks live in one place. Organized, searchable, current.
Days 60-90: Ship and prove value
By day 60, I need to have something visible to ship. It might be a repositioned sales deck. It might be a competitive response that’s gone live. It might be a campaign that positions us differently in the market. The point is I need the organization to see that product marketing isn’t just a staff function. It’s a function that ships.
I also present my first set of insights to leadership. Not a long report. Maybe a 20-minute presentation with the key findings from my month-one listening: here’s where our positioning has drifted, here’s where competitors are beating us, here’s what customers actually care about versus what we think they care about.
I establish a retrospective cadence. 30 minutes, scheduled two weeks after every major launch or campaign. What worked? What didn’t? How does it change what we should do next? This becomes the feedback loop that keeps product marketing sharp.
And I start tracking metrics that matter. Sales content adoption rates (are they using the things I build?). Pipeline influence (when we use specific messaging, do deals move faster?). Competitive win rate trends (are we getting better at responding to competition?). These aren’t perfect metrics. But they’re evidence that product marketing is adding value.
The principle underneath all of this
There’s a mindset that ties this together. I call it high agency. I don’t wait for permission to do things. I don’t wait for a directive from leadership. I identify what needs to happen and I figure out how to do it within the constraints I have.
Sit in on sales calls? I just schedule them myself. Don’t ask for approval. Create the message map? I start asking questions and taking notes. No meeting required. Fix the broken battle card? I get input from sales and product and I ship it. I don’t need a project plan.
This doesn’t mean going rogue. It means being thoughtful about what problems you’re trying to solve, gathering the right input, and moving forward with conviction.
Most companies also have this weird dynamic where people overestimate how much permission you need to ask for and underestimate how much you can just do. I learned this early. The answer is no if you ask. The answer is done if you move.
By day 90, I should have established credibility, built the foundation that the team can work from, and proven that product marketing adds value. The message map becomes the reference point. The sales enablement hub becomes where things live. The retrospective becomes the habit. The metrics become the language we use to talk about impact.
This isn’t a checklist. It’s a rhythm. And the rhythm is the same every time I join a new company.
FAQ
What if sales is too busy to sit in on calls in the first weeks?
They’re not. If they say they are, it means you haven’t explained why this matters yet. The way I frame it: I’m here to make their job easier. To do that, I need to understand how they actually sell. When I frame it that way, people make time.
How do you know what counts as a “win” or “loss” for the retrospective?
Any deal over a certain size that closed or didn’t. If you have 10 deals a month, maybe you look at the top 4 or 5 each retrospective cycle. The goal isn’t to analyze everything. It’s to identify patterns.
How long before you actually influence how the company positions itself?
The message map is influence. By day 30, I’ve already shifted how people think about positioning because I’ve made the inconsistencies visible. But real market-facing change usually happens around day 60 to 90, when a campaign launches or a new sales deck goes live. The key is you can’t force it faster. You have to earn the trust first.
Starting a new PMM role? Let’s connect, always happy to talk through what’s working
