What is a Growth Product Manager?
Growth product manager (GPM) is a role that focuses on metrics that are related to the success of a product. A person occupying this position – sometimes called a product growth manager – helps a company to identify growth opportunities and to steer efforts toward the achievement of such. They aim mainly at growing the company by getting rid of barriers to value and driving revenue.
These product professionals preferably work with a team of engineers, developers, designers, and analysts to prioritize initiatives. They give their attention more to those initiatives that deliver the best business outcomes.
Rising Demand for Growth Product Managers
There has been a considerable surge in interest in growth product managers over the past few years. More and more people are seeking to know what the role is about. An increasing number of organizations are assessing whether growth product management would help achieve their goals faster.
GPM is one of the emerging jobs that are often advertised on LinkedIn, with numerous thousands of openings across America. Also, a Google Trends analysis revealed a 425% rise in average monthly interest in the role over the previous five years.
So why is there an increasing demand for this role?
Increasingly, organizations seem to be embracing a product-led growth strategy. This is based on the idea that the value that the customer gets from a product would make them more likely to pay for it again. Growth product managers are critical to the successful executing of this business strategy.
Your company may have a wonderful product, but it might not still do well if the right users are lacking. Someone needs to see to the optimization of the product for business growth and success. GPMs are responsible for doing just that. They work to deliver appreciable business outcomes through short-term improvements.
What Does a Growth Product Manager Do?
The responsibilities of GPMs differ in many cases, depending on what organizations they work in. They may be responsible for managing the entire revenue tunnel – running experiments to improve metrics – in companies where product-led growth strategy has only just been adopted. Responsibilities may be different in companies that have been working with such for longer.
However, the common aspect in all cases is that growth product managers focus on business outcomes and revenue.
The major responsibilities of a GPM include:
Defining the company’s growth plan – The work of growth product managers starts from establishing the growth direction and goals of the organization. They attempt to identify gaps through research, analyses, and tests and what metrics to work on.
Promoting sustainable growth – GPMs are brought in to help organizations achieve sustainable growth. They are especially useful when a company has a great product that has yet to be optimized for growth. Expanding the customer base or breaking into new markets are parts of what this role is expected to promote. A growth product manager should improve customer lifetime value or the number of free users upgrading to paid plans.
Measuring and reporting progress – GPMs keep a tab on and improve on the progress being made toward growth goals. They track metrics to uncover inefficiencies and make necessary improvements. After picking metrics to monitor, they let everyone in the organization know how things are going based on their assessments. Growth product managers usually focus on some of the so-called “pirate metrics” – acquisition, activation, retention, referral, and revenue (AARRR) – which are tied to business growth.
Growth Product Manager vs. Traditional Product Manager
The role of a GPM mainly exists to reduce the barriers to value. This is how they are able to drive business and revenue growth. They make it easier for customers or users to see the value in an existing product.
Organizations depend on typical product managers to build great products. These professionals own the product and enable fresh use cases. They unlock new opportunities or “superpowers.”
Growth product managers, on the other hand, don’t really own the product the same way a traditional product manager does. They own the product’s business goals and growth metrics. They are concerned with finding the best ways to get new opportunities to customers or make them gain superpowers faster.
It may be said that a GPM focuses more on the business while a PM devotes their interest more to the customer. However, this doesn’t mean the former has no customer’s interest at heart; excellent user experience and customer satisfaction are top priorities for them.
What Growth Product Managers Must Have to Succeed
The responsibilities of a GPM may differ between organizations. However, certain skills and qualities are required for them to be successful, regardless of where they work. These include:
- A curious mind that seeks to dig deeper for answers
- Strong analytical skills and ability to test and measure ideas or outcomes
- Good understanding of the customer, including their needs and barriers to value
- Ability to identify initiatives that hold the most value for the business
- Good collaboration, negotiation, and communication skills
A good GPM is also someone creative enough to find new ways to continue driving business growth. Flexibility and excellent market knowledge are also part of what helps to succeed in the role.
