Lead Product Marketing Manager

<h2>The Team + The Role</h2> <p>Pendo’s product marketing team sits at the intersection of product strategy, go-to-market execution, and customer growth. As software development moves faster, the team is expanding how Pendo communicates the value of its platform to modern engineering, product, and technical builder audiences. This work matters because it shapes how new products enter the market, how customers understand the platform, and how commercial teams create traction.</p> <p>As Lead Product Marketing Manager, you will own go-to-market strategy across high-impact product launches, cross-portfolio expansion, and new initiatives. You will drive narrative, positioning, launch strategy, sales readiness, and commercial traction while building credibility with technical audiences. This is a hands-on GTM leadership role for someone who moves quickly, creates alignment, and turns emerging product opportunities into clear market motions.</p> <p>This is a remote role based in the United States. We have offices in San Francisco, CA, Raleigh, NC, or New York, NY.</p> <h2>What this looks like day-to-day</h2> <ul> <li><strong>Narrative and positioning:</strong> Own messaging frameworks, positioning, and category narratives across primary product initiatives. Write clear positioning documentation and talk tracks that keep product, sales, marketing, and leadership aligned as the market evolves.</li> <li><strong>End-to-end GTM ownership:</strong> Build and run the full go-to-market plan across audience targeting, channel strategy, campaign strategy, sales readiness, launch moments, product adoption, and success metrics. Own GTM outcomes and business impact directly rather than handing strategy off to parallel teams.</li> <li><strong>Top-of-funnel and conversion:</strong> Partner with revenue marketing to define the acquisition channel mix, run campaigns, and drive early-access signups. Connect demand activity to free-to-paid conversion and early commercial signals.</li> <li><strong>Community building:</strong> Establish a credible, authentic presence where technical users spend time. Earn trust with builder audiences who are naturally skeptical of traditional, pitch-heavy marketing.</li> <li><strong>PLG motion:</strong> Partner with product and growth teams to design self-serve onboarding and activation flows. Use data and feedback to improve how users discover, try, activate, and expand with Pendo.</li> <li><strong>Portfolio and platform alignment:</strong> Define how new products and capabilities fit within the broader platform narrative. Shape clear expansion and upgrade paths for customers as their organizational scale and technical complexity grow.</li> <li><strong>Sales and partner enablement:</strong> Translate complex technical capabilities into clear, value-oriented messaging, pitch decks, demo narratives, and battlecards. Build the proof points reps need to have credible, winning conversations with non-traditional buyers.</li> <li><strong>Metrics and commercial impact:</strong> Work with revenue marketing to define and track the metrics that connect PMM initiatives to pipeline and early revenue outcomes. Focus on activation, conversion, marketing-sourced ARR, and other signals that show whether the motion is working.</li> </ul> <h2>Who You Are</h2> <p>Beyond the qualifications, we hire through a specific lens. These aren't buzzwords; they're the things we'll actually look for in how you talk about your work.</p> <p>You're a builder, not a maintainer.</p> <p>You're most energized when there isn't a clear path yet, and you get to define it. You don't wait for direction; you identify gaps, shape solutions, and drive them forward. At Pendo, great Lead Product Marketing Managers don't just follow instructions; they operate as strategic advisors, influencing decisions, guiding stakeholders, and elevating how we work.</p> <p>You're AI-curious - genuinely.</p> <p>You're not using AI tools occasionally. You're rewiring how you work around them. You're faster, sharper, and more prolific because of it, and you bring that energy to everything — how you approach your work, how you prep, how you communicate, how you think. We want someone who sees AI as a multiplier, not a shortcut.</p> <h2>Must-haves</h2> <ul> <li>7+ years of marketing experience with real ownership of positioning and narrative for a product or category at the individual contributor level.</li> <li>Proven ability to drive a launch, repositioning, or category story end to end, including the writing and strategic thinking behind the work.</li> <li>Strong content instincts, with the ability to create crisp narratives, sharp positioning documents, and launch materials that audiences actually engage with.</li> <li>Active, practical fluency with AI tools such as Claude, ChatGPT, or similar, with evidence that AI has meaningfully changed how you work and what you ship.</li> <li>High bias to action, with a track record of shipping, gathering feedback, iterating, and filling gaps without waiting for perfect information.</li> <li>Ability to translate technical depth into clear, compelling messaging without oversimplifying a novel product.</li> <li>Strong cross-functional influence with product, sales, marketing, and leadership stakeholders, especially in environments where you need to drive alignment without direct authority.</li> <li>Credibility with developer or builder audiences, including an understanding of how technical users discover, evaluate, and build trust in new tools.</li> </ul> <h2>Nice-to-haves</h2> <ul> <li>Hands-on experience building community among developers or other technical builder audiences.</li> <li>Experience with both PLG and enterprise motions, including self-serve acquisition, freemium conversion, activation, or community-led distribution.</li> <li>Technical fluency from building software or working closely enough with product managers and engineering teams to understand codebases, pull requests, and deploy cycles.</li> <li>Experience in product analytics, instrumentation, observability, developer tools, open source, or AI coding tools.</li> </ul> <h2>About Pendo</h2> <p>Pendo was founded in 2013 by former product managers, who combined their heads and hearts to build something they wanted but never had as product managers: a simple way to understand and attack what truly drives product success. Our mission is to improve society's experience with software. Come join one of the fastest-growing startups, supported by best-in-class institutions like Battery Ventures, Salesforce Ventures, Spark Capital and Meritech.</p> <p><strong>Pendo Core Values:</strong> Bias to Act, Hone Your Craft, The Team is Pendo, and Maniacal Focus.</p> <p><strong>Location:</strong> We welcome remote candidates for this role! If you happen to live near one of our office hubs, you’re always welcome to join our hybrid team in person a few days a week, but living near an office is not required for this position.</p> <p><strong>Compensation:</strong> The expected salary range for this role to be performed in the United States is $196,300 - $249,000.</p> <p><strong>Benefits:</strong> Pendo offers highly competitive, employer-heavy coverage in the United States, including $0 premium options, strong 401(k) match, equity, and flexible time off.</p> <p><strong>EEOC:</strong> We are an equal opportunity employer and believe having diverse teams where everyone brings their whole self to Pendo is key to our success. We welcome all people of different backgrounds, experiences, abilities and perspectives.</p> <p><strong>Accessibility:</strong> Pendo is committed to working with, and providing access and reasonable accommodation to, applicants with mental and/or physical disabilities. If you think you may require an accommodation for any part of the recruitment process, please send a request to: accommodation@pendo.io. All requests for accommodations are treated discreetly and confidentially, as practical and permitted by law.</p>