Reflections on my First Oktane

Earlier this month, Okta hosted Oktane, our annual event where we highlight trends in the world of Identity, shed a spotlight on customers, and, importantly, announce new products. One of our major announcements was the support of passkeys in our platform, which was my responsibility from a Product Marketing perspective.??

As a Product Marketer, it’s a luxury to have the platform of a marquee conference to announce the launch of a new product. Thousands of eyes and ears tune in with rapt attention, eager to hear how the latest offerings will help make their lives easier. It’s the perfect springboard to create momentum from a go-to-market (GTM) perspective.?

This post aims to capture key lessons from my time leading a launch at Oktane, with a few additional entries drawing from broader responsibilities I had.?

Start with the Press Release?

Whenever I take on a new project, I make a concerted effort to experiment with new ideas. It helps me stay curious and uncover new learnings as I continue building my toolkit as a Product Marketer (PMM). This time around, I decided to apply Amazon’s Working Backwards methodology.?

Notoriously known as “The Amazon Press Release,” it’s an approach Product Managers (PM) at Amazon follow as part of their product development. Before building a product, they draft a press release and distribute it internally to gauge interest. The idea is to iterate on the press release until there’s collective enthusiasm, at which point engineering begins building the product.?

The press release's goal for PMs is to determine market viability. But for PMMs, it’s a beneficial exercise that can help shape the launch narrative. By design, press releases are succinct. This alone acts as a forcing function to be hyper-intentional about the words you use, the description of the problem your product solves, and the customer value associated with it. As an added benefit, it helps you envision the end goal, which can be a powerful tool to rally the GTM team to take action.?

I spent nearly six weeks working on my version of the passkeys press release. It was a testing, keyboard-smashing, and draining exercise. However, it reaped downstream dividends, enabling me to create resonant messaging, align my GTM team with our objective, and, most importantly, give me an internal sense of confidence in knowing the launch would be impactful for Okta and its customers.??

For the record, some traces of my work can be found in the published press release.??

Use Research to Build Messaging??

PMMs are universally known for creating messaging. It’s also the skill I feel is my strongest Product Marketing attribute. With this combination in mind, imagine my mid-career crisis when I struggled to build the messaging for my launch.?

For context, passkeys are a nascent, evolving, and complex technology. At the time, it was unclear to me how they were differentiated from other solutions and, more importantly, why customers would care about them—two critical questions important to answer when creating a messaging document.?

After several days of questioning myself—which my manager can attest to—I decided to go back to basics with a primary research plan consisting of two phases:?

• Customer interviews?
• Analyst feedback?

The goal of the customer interviews was to explore the problem space with our hypothesized ideal customer profile. We had questions to uncover why passkeys were relevant to them, identify current solutions, and learn the potential benefits they’d experience by adopting the new technology. This enabled me to craft the first version of my messaging.?

Phase two was to garner feedback on my messaging from analysts from firms like Gartner and Forrester. Now, I’ll admit my ego was bruised because upon reviewing my document, one analyst provided over 100 points of feedback. Ouch.?

However, the one-two punch of customer discovery and analyst feedback gave me the market insight I needed to build the narrative for our launch. Starting from a place of curiosity as opposed to assumption helped me break through my mental barriers to craft messaging that has been well-received by our internal teams, customers, and the media.?

Approach Internal Communications with Intent, Specificity, and Brevity?

Much emphasis is placed on effective external communications (e.g. business to customer), but only a little is said about the importance of effective internal communication (e.g. employee to employee). Product Marketing is a highly cross-functional role; therefore, crisp internal communications are essential because it’s how you get things done as a team.?

This can be challenging, especially when you’re interacting with people who are smarter and more senior than you. Throughout my launch, there were several moments where I quickly learned my approach to communications with stakeholders was failing me. They’d either spark more questions or wouldn’t garner a response.?

In hindsight, I didn’t set myself up for success. Vague asks like, “Can you review this?” or chunky messages full of unnecessary context are easy to ignore. People have competing priorities, so you need to tailor your communications to make it easy for people to interact with you.?

This boils down to three criteria: intent, specificity, and brevity.?

• Intent is about communicating the why behind your message: why the message is important, why that person, or why something needs to be done?
• Specificity outlines what the message is: what needs to be done or what is the call to action?
• Brevity is about respecting your audience's time and crafting a message for them, not yourself: can the message be one sentence instead of two, do you need a paragraph of context, or is the most relevant information presented first?

It might sound obvious, but it was an important lesson, particularly when communicating with executives, whose time is even more precious. Simple changes incorporating intent, specificity, and brevity turned messages like “Can you review this?” into “Since you’re actively involved in the development of the product, I’d love your feedback on the technical accuracy of my messaging document. I’d like to incorporate your feedback by the launch call next week.” As expected, stakeholder engagement increased, responses were timeline, and my precious feelings were spared as I was no longer R-bombed.?

Executives Aren’t That Scary?

Growing up, I was always taught to respect my elders. It’s a common teaching, particularly in South Asian households, and it’s one that’s left an impression on me. In the workplace, this translates to respect—and if I’m being honest, a tinge of fear—toward individuals who hold a title senior to my own.?

So, I was understandably nervous when tasked with being a track chair for Oktane, where I collaborated with senior executives on sessions that would draw attendees to the conference.?

Whenever I received feedback on the material discussed in our early engagements, I’d incorporate it without question. However, after a few interactions, I noticed something changed. They were prodding me for my opinion. It was empowering to voice my thoughts, respectfully push back on their opinion, and feel heard.?

At this point, I realized I was working with them, not for them.?

In your head, it’s easy to create versions of people you’ve never worked with based solely on their hierarchy in the organization. In this situation, I quickly realized how collaborative, kind, and fun my execs were to work with. As a bonus, I also got to see how playful and sibling-like some of their relationships are.?

I’ve Got This?

My final takeaway is slightly different in that it’s personal. It’s not something tactical or strategic that you, as the reader, can use, but it’s essential for me to acknowledge for myself.?

Something many people don’t know about me is that I deal with a lot of self-doubt. I work hard not to let others see it, but I work through it regularly.?

Reflecting on my first Oktane experience, I’m incredibly proud of my accomplishments.?

• As a PMM, I owned a high-profile launch at Oktane for a product that will deliver value to our customers
• As a subject matter expert, I had one-on-one conversations with analysts to influence their position on Okta
• As a track chair, I built and collaborated on sessions to deliver a fantastic attendee experience?
• As a keynote participant, I worked with a team to deliver a concise and impactful demo to highlight the value of our products?
• And as a partner to PM, I delivered a breakout session on passkeys to show the world how beneficial the new capability is and why they should adopt it

Best of all, I accomplished it with grace, accuracy, and fun. I have more confidence in my abilities as a Product Marketer than ever before. I’m incredibly grateful for the amazing team I work with. And I can’t wait to tackle the next challenge.?

I’ve got this.