Marketing Organization Structure 2.0

For the last decade or so I have successfully used the same marketing organization structure. With all the changes going on in marketing (e.g. new mediums, metrics driven evaluation, etc.) and the internationalization of my team, I've decided to spend some time analyzing and validating the structure.

I organize based on the following work breakdown structure:

Corporate / Group Marketing:

• Strategy
• Positioning
• Branding
• Website [including SEO]
• Metrics & Analytics
• Tools

Marcom / Communications:

• Public Relations
• Analyst Relations
• Online Exposure / Digital Outreach [this is a new responsibility and includes coordinating online feedback, blogging, message boards postings, viral exposure, directories etc.]

Field Marketing:

• Lead Generation Campaigns
• Advertising (online & offline)
• Marketing Campaigns (nurturing and upsell)
• Sales Team Support
• Events

Product Marketing:*

• Product Positioning
• Collateral Development [brochures, cutsheets, whitepapers, case studies, etc.]
• Sales Tools Development [ROI calculators, positioning sheets, presentations, etc.]
• Competitive Monitoring & G2

Product Management:*

• Product Roadmap
• Business Case Development
• Requirements Gathering
• Solution Validation
• Sales Expertise

* (Note: Product Marketing and Product Management responsibilities can often blur. Depending on the organization and resource capabilities, Product Management can shift from marketing into engineering or its own stand-alone group. With IQ, the Product Roadmap, Requirements Gathering and Solution Validation lie in either the engineering team or marketing team depending on the product and resources.)

So, I started out this posting to validate if my tested Marketing Structure has held-up, and it has. There are a couple of newer responsibilities in PR (online based), and Field Marketing has additional mediums (e.g. SEM) that are evolving very quickly, but all-in-all the structure works. Also, depending on the company size, these activities and responsibilities can either be assigned to individuals, or in larger organizations, spread across different teams. Does this structure apply to all organizations and industries? Nope -one size does not fit all- but it does work well for on-premise Software companies, SaaS providers and online information based services. I am sure that at some point I will evolve and change the structure, just not yet.