DevRelCon Tokyo 2021: Dev Rel and Dev Marketing - Breaking Down Silos

DevRelCon Tokyo 2021
Dev Rel & Dev Marketing

Breaking down silos to better serve your community
Carol Huang
@thisiscaroltoo
Agenda
1
What dev rel and dev marketing are at Stripe
2 Why dev rel + dev marketing should work closely together

3
How dev rel + dev marketing can work closely together
4
Use case: What this looks like in practice
2
About me
Carol Huang
Dev Marketing Manager

Grew up in Los Angeles, CA Live in New York, NY
@thisiscaroltoo
carol@stripe.com
3
Past roles
Community Marketing Manager Director of Marketing
Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF)

Liaison
4
About Stripe
● Stripe is a global technology

company
● We build the economic

infrastructure for the internet
● With the goal of increasing the

GDP of the internet
5
Payments infrastructure for the internet
Connect Billing Terminal Financial Services

Platforms & Marketplaces Subscriptions & SaaS Omnichannel Fintech
· Verification & KYC · Subscription mgmt · Readers & SDKs · Issuing
· Funds flows · Invoicing · Fleet management · Treasury
· Monetize Stripe products · Quote-to-cash · Unified omnichannel data · Capital for Platforms
Revenue management
CRM & ERP integrations · Revenue recognition · Advanced reporting (Sigma) · Corporate Card · Capital · Climate
Payments optimization
Fraud prevention (Radar) · Acceptance optimization (Adaptive Acceptance, Smart Retries, 3Ds) · Cost optimization
Payments
APIs & mobile SDKs · Payment forms & UI tools (Checkout, Elements) · Global payment methods & currencies · Fast payouts
Global payments & treasury network

Stripe’s cloud-based infrastructure for programmable money movement
6
● Make money movement as simple and borderless as

the internet is by
○ Optimizing how businesses accept payments
○ Providing financial services for growing

businesses
Global payments & treasury network
Stripe’s cloud-based infrastructure for programmable money movement
7
👋 Global developer community
8
Agenda
1

3
4
9
Dev Advocacy (Dev Rel) at Stripe
10
Dev Advocacy (Dev Rel) at Stripe

● Within Product & Engineering team → Product and Partner Platform →
Developer Advocacy
Team goals
● Advocate for developers internally
● Drive adoption of Stripe’s developer products through educational and

inspirational content
● Engage with the developer community and ecosystem through events

and outreach
11
What is dev advocacy at Stripe?

● Within Product & Engineering team → Product and Partner Platform →
Developer Advocacy
Team goals
● Advocate for developers internally
● Drive adoption of Stripe’s developer products through educational and

inspirational content
● Engage with the developer community and ecosystem through events

and outreach
12
Dev marketing at Stripe
13

● On Product Marketing team
Team goals
● Know our users and their needs
● Know our products and their features
● Connect the two
14

● On Product Marketing team
Team goals
● Connect the two
15
When your teams are in silos
Siloed teams have no alignment of goals

Dev advocacy Dev marketing
17

● Thinks dev marketing just wants ● Thinks DA is just doing things

to get leads rather than educate they think are cool rather than
what users need
18
Siloed teams have no trust or team building


what users need
● Thinks extra validation with user ● Thinks DA is just YOLO-ing
or market research is pointless
19
Siloed teams have no trust or team building


what users need
● Doesn’t ask for help ● Doesn’t ask for help
20
Siloed teams = poor experience for your devs


what users need
● Doesn’t ask for help ● Doesn’t ask for help
Users suffer as a result 🙁
21


what users need
22
Agenda
1

3
4
23
Our team goals are complementary
24

● Know our users
25

● Know our users ➡ so we can advocate for them internally
26

● Know our products
27

● Know our products ➡ to drive adoption through educational content
28

● Connect the two
29

● Connect the two ➡ through outreach like dev rel events
30

● Connect the two ➡ through dev rel events and outreach
🤝 Greater awareness and adoption 🤝
31
Provide everything your developers need to be

successful
32
Provide everything your developers need to be
successful without e-mail gating, sales convos,
or one-way development paths
33
You may not have a dedicated dev marketer
● No dedicated marketing person but 1 or more people with marketing skills
○ Project management
○ Communications/copywriting
○ Public relations
○ Empathy
● Many other colleagues who can contribute piecemeal what marketing

does
○ Data science
○ User experience research
○ Product managers
○ Events organizers
34
Recognize your shared goals and align them
35
Agenda
1

3
4
36
How dev rel and dev marketing can work closely together
● Embed and team build
● Build a foundation of trust
37
Embed and team build
38
What is an embed model?

● You may be familiar with this in product teams
● Someone is “embedded when they organizationally sits in a different
team/org
● 👉 But you work together very closely
39
Embedded model in practice

● You may be familiar with this in product teams
● Someone is “embedded when they organizationally sits in a different
team/org
● 👉 But you work together very closely
In practice
● Attend all team meetings

● Participate in daily standups
● Meet bi-weekly with my team members
● Part of the private team channel
40
Team building
● Have monthly social “coffee chats”
☕🧋🫖🍷
41
Team building
☕🧋🫖🍷
○ No tactical work talk on projects
○ High-level brainstorming okay
○ Social chatter to stay connected
42
Team building
☕🧋🫖🍷
● Keep in touch through non-work
channels
43
Team building
☕🧋🫖🍷
● Keep in touch through non-work
channels
● Treat embedded team members
like members of the team for
org-wide events
44
Build a foundation of trust
45
What is trust (in the workplace)?

● You believe in each other’s skills and experience
● You believe in each other’s promises
● You believe you can ask for help and reliably get it
46
How do you build trust?
47

● To build trust, be trustworthy
48

● Make realistic promises about your deadlines and

capacity
49

● Make realistic promises about your deadlines and

capacity
● Make it clear how you can help each other out, and
offer your aid
○ Talk candidly about your skillset and what do
50
Failure modes of dev rel + dev marketing relationships
Marketing Dev Rel
● Focused on MQLs or sales leads ● Create content without a clear audience
● ● Focus too much on edge cases
51
How to work tightly together
Align on shared goals Embed and team build Build a foundation of trust
52
Agenda
1

3
4
53
Example project: Dev foundations video series
54
55
56
What does this look like in practice?
● Start early: Work closely as teammates from the planning stage
● Set clear goals: Clarify your audience and impact for GTM/launch
● Communicate: Keep an open exchange of information throughout
57
58
Work together from the planning stage

● Want to do a video series
● Idea: basic topics on how to get

started with our client libraries
● Unknown: is this a good idea?
59
Reminder: dev marketing

Team goals
● Connect the two
60

● Want to do a video series ● Has the user research
● Idea: basic topics on how to get

started with our client libraries
61

● Idea: basic topics on how to get ● ✅ Can validate this idea: We

started with our client libraries know junior developers struggle
with their integration experience
62

● Idea: basic topics on how to get ● ✅ Can validate this idea: We

started with our client libraries know junior developers struggle
with their integration experience
Technical knowledge + user research

= great developer advocacy
63
64
Clarify audience and impact early before GTM

● Before even starting work, all of our Dev Advocates fill out a checklist
With key questions like:
● Who is this content for?
● How will this content help your teammates?
65
What is a go-to-market (GTM) plan?

GTM plan encompasses:
● Audience: Who is it for

● Messaging: What you want to tell them about it
● Channels: How you’re going to tell them about it
● Timing: When are you going to tell them about it
So you can get your DA content out to the maximum number of appropriate
people at the right time
66

67


Junior developers
68


Junior developers who are just beginning to integrate with Stripe
69


70



Decrease support tickets from junior developers
71



Decrease support tickets from junior developers → fewer confused junior
developers
72



Decrease support tickets from junior developers → fewer confused junior
developers → greater adoption
73
What is a go-to-market (GTM) plan?

● Audience: Who is it for

● Messaging: What you want to tell them about it
● Channels: How you’re going to tell them about it
● Timing: When are you going to tell them about it
So you can get your DA content out to the maximum number of appropriate
people at the right time
74
GTM plan example

● Audience: Junior developers who are just beginning to integrate with Stripe
● Messaging: We want to convey that it’s easy to get started with Stripe using our
client libraries
● Channels: Twitter (@StripeDev), Dev digest, DEV.to, individual Twitter accounts
● Timing: When are you going to tell them about it?
75
76
Keep an open exchange of information

● Transparent project management: Tracker, standups, sync meetings
77

● Talk about unexpected challenges (requires: trust!)
○ 9 topics: authentication, metadata, idempotency and retries,
pagination, webhook helpers, making requests, versioning, expand,
.env variables
○ 7 languages: Ruby, Python, Go, Java, PHP, Node, .NET
78

.env variables
○ Each DA owned a topic across all 7 languages for easier recording
79

.env variables
○ So we originally promoted by topic
80

.env variables
○ So we originally promoted by topic -- but that doesn’t make sense
for most users
81

.env variables
○ So we originally promoted by topic -- but that doesn’t make sense
for most users
↪ Back to the drawing board ↩
82

New plan:
● Even though it would mean a slower output of information,

organize and promote by language
83

New plan:
● Even though it would mean a slower output of information,

organize and promote by language
Biggest marketing lesson here:
● 📣 Workflow ≠ Marketing promotional schedule 📣

● Ship what makes sense for your developers, not what you’ve
finished
84
GTM plan example

● Audience: Junior developers who are just beginning to integrate with Stripe
● Messaging: We want to convey that it’s easy to get started with Stripe using
our client libraries
● Channels: Twitter (@StripeDev), Dev digest, DEV.to, individual Twitter accounts
● Timing: Promote by language and then in one big collection at the end
85
End product: Dev foundations video series

63 videos
Across 7 languages
On 9 topics
DEV.to/stripe for more 🎬

behind-the-scenes details
Subscribe at https://www.youtube.com/c/StripeDevelopers
😜
86
Summary
87
Summary
💪 Increase community reach together 🤝
88
Thank you!
Carol Huang
@thisiscaroltoo // carol@stripe.com
We’re hiring ;)
stripe.com/jobs
Questions?
Carol Huang
@thisiscaroltoo // carol@stripe.com

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DevRelCon Tokyo 2021

Dev Rel & Dev Marketing

2 Why dev rel + dev marketing should work closely together

Dev Marketing Manager

Community Marketing Manager Director of Marketing

Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF)

● Stripe is a global technology

● We build the economic

● With the goal of increasing the

Connect Billing Terminal Financial Services

Global payments & treasury network

● Make money movement as simple and borderless as

○ Optimizing how businesses accept payments

○ Providing ﬁnancial services for growing

👋 Global developer community

2 Why dev rel + dev marketing should work closely together

Dev Advocacy (Dev Rel) at Stripe

Dev Advocacy (Dev Rel) at Stripe

● Advocate for developers internally

● Drive adoption of Stripe’s developer products through educational and

● Engage with the developer community and ecosystem through events

What is dev advocacy at Stripe?

● Advocate for developers internally

● Drive adoption of Stripe’s developer products through educational and

● Engage with the developer community and ecosystem through events

Dev marketing at Stripe

Dev marketing at Stripe

● Know our users and their needs

● Know our products and their features

● Connect the two

Dev marketing at Stripe

● Know our users and their needs

● Know our products and their features

● Connect the two

Siloed teams have no alignment of goals

Siloed teams have no alignment of goals

● Thinks dev marketing just wants ● Thinks DA is just doing things

Siloed teams have no trust or team building

● Thinks dev marketing just wants ● Thinks DA is just doing things

Siloed teams have no trust or team building

● Thinks dev marketing just wants ● Thinks DA is just doing things

● Doesn’t ask for help ● Doesn’t ask for help

Siloed teams = poor experience for your devs

● Thinks dev marketing just wants ● Thinks DA is just doing things

● Doesn’t ask for help ● Doesn’t ask for help

Users suﬀer as a result 🙁

Siloed teams have no alignment of goals

● Thinks dev marketing just wants ● Thinks DA is just doing things

2 Why dev rel + dev marketing should work closely together

Our team goals are complementary

Our team goals are complementary

Our team goals are complementary

Our team goals are complementary

● Know our products

Our team goals are complementary

● Know our products ➡ to drive adoption through educational content

Our team goals are complementary

● Know our products ➡ to drive adoption through educational content

● Connect the two

Our team goals are complementary

● Know our products ➡ to drive adoption through educational content

● Connect the two ➡ through outreach like dev rel events

Our team goals are complementary

● Know our products ➡ to drive adoption through educational content