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I'd take it one step further - your VP of marketing should be an engineer. The fastest companies I know today have a ton of engineers dedicated to their market

I'd take it one step further - your VP of marketing should be an engineer. The fastest companies I know today have a ton of engineers dedicated to their marketing efforts. It's not enough to have the best product. You have to be able to find and acquire customers in a affordable and repeatable way. A non-technical marketer will say "I was thinking about it all night, and I like this wording the best". A technical marketer will say, "I tested 100 variations and these 3 performed the best. Let's try and optimize them even more." That's not to say there isn't a place for creativity and intuitive decision making, but a good marketer will always be seeking data to validate their hypothesis. If you don't have a technical VP of marketing, the engineers should report to the CTO and should treat the marketing team as their customer.

josephschmoe 12y ago
This sounds like we need a change in how marketing is approached - you don't need to be an engineer to do A/B testing. I would be more worried that there are simply very few great marketers with an engineering background, due to filtering - and the fact that engineers generally don't have any incentive to go into marketing.
- joshfraser 12y ago
  While it's true that analytical minds aren't exclusive to engineers, knowing how to code makes a big difference in this new world of marketing. Want to create customized ads for each zip code that link to similarly personalized landing pages? Want to track and analyze those results then retarget certain cohorts of users across the web? Understanding how the technology works and being able to implement it yourself will give you a huge advantage.
  - larrys 12y ago
    "makes a big difference in this new world of marketing." What world are you talking about? The startup world? There is a big big world of marketing that exists separate from startups, YC, and venture invested companies. Edit: AKA "the echo chamber"
  - hyperliner 12y ago
    This is true in general. Knowing "something else than what you are supposed to do" is an advantage. It applies to all functions: engineering, legal, marketing. I always appreciate an engineer who can think in terms if users and business and not just how to for(;p++=q++;); just to impress his or her friends.
larrys 12y ago
"A technical marketer will say, "I tested 100 variations and these 3 performed the best. Let's try and optimize them even more." I disagree with the idea that "your VP of marketing should be an engineer". An engineer may be able to test before or after the fact but a real marketer already has a framework to start from that gets you on the dartboard. All things equal sure it would be nice to have a marketing person who is creative but also an engineer. But the world is not perfect. And the best brain surgeon is rarely also going to specialize in performing heart operations. I think you are also discounting what I will call "get a law degree" effect. Sometimes the training than one has (or how your brain thinks that even allows you to pursue some profession) is contraindicated in another profession. With a lawyer this would be the tendency once trained like a lawyer to always think of problems as a lawyer would (and not be able to take appropriate chances that a non lawyer might). Engineers can be creative of course and they could be marketers. But as a generality I don't think the benefits of thinking everything has to be tested and optimized is so clear cut.
hyperliner 12y ago
Well, the VP of Marketing has to be a great marketer. If s/he is also an engineer that is great. Saying the VP of Marketing should be an engineer is like saying the VP of Engineering should be a marketer. I think we want to have leaders that scale their functions, are aware of their personal shortcomings, and hire for those. In the case of a VP of Marketing who is not an engineer and in which there is a need for technical investments in the marketing function, let's hope that that person can hire a great technical lead. It would be the same if we had a VP of engineering with no business foundation. I would hope that person would hire a great product management staff or that he leans on whoever is the business thinker in the company. I think in general we would hope companies hire for diversity of skills at the time those skills are needed depending on the lifecycle of the company.

josephschmoe 12y ago

This sounds like we need a change in how marketing is approached - you don't need to be an engineer to do A/B testing. I would be more worried that there are simply very few great marketers with an engineering background, due to filtering - and the fact that engineers generally don't have any incentive to go into marketing.

joshfraser 12y ago
While it's true that analytical minds aren't exclusive to engineers, knowing how to code makes a big difference in this new world of marketing. Want to create customized ads for each zip code that link to similarly personalized landing pages? Want to track and analyze those results then retarget certain cohorts of users across the web? Understanding how the technology works and being able to implement it yourself will give you a huge advantage.
- larrys 12y ago
  "makes a big difference in this new world of marketing." What world are you talking about? The startup world? There is a big big world of marketing that exists separate from startups, YC, and venture invested companies. Edit: AKA "the echo chamber"
- hyperliner 12y ago
  This is true in general. Knowing "something else than what you are supposed to do" is an advantage. It applies to all functions: engineering, legal, marketing. I always appreciate an engineer who can think in terms if users and business and not just how to for(;p++=q++;); just to impress his or her friends.

larrys 12y ago

"A technical marketer will say, "I tested 100 variations and these 3 performed the best. Let's try and optimize them even more." I disagree with the idea that "your VP of marketing should be an engineer". An engineer may be able to test before or after the fact but a real marketer already has a framework to start from that gets you on the dartboard. All things equal sure it would be nice to have a marketing person who is creative but also an engineer. But the world is not perfect. And the best brain surgeon is rarely also going to specialize in performing heart operations. I think you are also discounting what I will call "get a law degree" effect. Sometimes the training than one has (or how your brain thinks that even allows you to pursue some profession) is contraindicated in another profession. With a lawyer this would be the tendency once trained like a lawyer to always think of problems as a lawyer would (and not be able to take appropriate chances that a non lawyer might). Engineers can be creative of course and they could be marketers. But as a generality I don't think the benefits of thinking everything has to be tested and optimized is so clear cut.

hyperliner 12y ago

Well, the VP of Marketing has to be a great marketer. If s/he is also an engineer that is great. Saying the VP of Marketing should be an engineer is like saying the VP of Engineering should be a marketer. I think we want to have leaders that scale their functions, are aware of their personal shortcomings, and hire for those. In the case of a VP of Marketing who is not an engineer and in which there is a need for technical investments in the marketing function, let's hope that that person can hire a great technical lead. It would be the same if we had a VP of engineering with no business foundation. I would hope that person would hire a great product management staff or that he leans on whoever is the business thinker in the company. I think in general we would hope companies hire for diversity of skills at the time those skills are needed depending on the lifecycle of the company.