The best experience for this work includes:
- Working across functional areas to coordinate product rollouts or perhaps negotiate the content of the next software release.
- Playing the translator role (“customer advocate”) between the customer and the company.
- Experience planning marketing with awareness of the advantages and limitations of a range of e-marketing applications and communications channels.
I have found that this experience was more often gained in software companies, because product managers and those spearheading alliances often had to participate in, or understand, the first two roles. A detailed understanding of the third role, e-marketing factors, is much harder to find. I have experience there only because I started a business of my own in 2002.