How I Work With the Team
A lean team wins on clear handoffs, not heroics.
Vertical market development touches Product Marketing, Sales, Customer Success, and Customer Marketing. Here's exactly who owns what, how I'd brief partner teams, and the standing protocol that keeps me and Sales rowing in the same direction.
Ownership
RACI matrix
The Marketing Manager is Accountable for vertical strategy end to end. Partner teams are Responsible for executing within their craft, Consulted where their expertise sharpens the work, and Informed everywhere else. R = Responsible · A = Accountable · C = Consulted · I = Informed.
| Activity | MM | Product Marketing | Sales | Customer Success | Customer Marketing |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vertical market research | A | C | C | I | I |
| Vertical positioning & messaging | A | R | C | I | I |
| Outbound campaign briefs | A | C | C | I | I |
| Customer stories & proof | A | C | I | C | R |
| Sales enablement assets | A | R | C | I | I |
| Pipeline targets by segment | A | I | R | I | I |
Handoff template
Customer Marketing brief
When I need a customer story or proof asset, Customer Marketing gets a complete brief — never a vague ask. This is the template I'd send.
CUSTOMER MARKETING BRIEF Vertical: [Community Colleges | K-12 | Healthcare | GRC] Asset requested: [case study | quote card | reference call | webinar guest] Strategic purpose: Why this proof point, for which buyer, at which funnel stage Target customer: [logo / segment / board size] The pain we solved: One sentence, in the buyer's own language Proof / outcome: Metric or before-after we can publish (cleared with the customer) Buyer it speaks to: [Economic Buyer | Champion | Blocker] Where it will run: [cold sequence | enablement deck | conference | association co-marketing] Deadline: [date] · tied to: [conference / campaign / launch] Approvals needed: [customer sign-off | legal | exec quote]
Working with Sales
Sales partnership protocol
Marketing and Sales succeed or fail together in a new vertical. Three standing commitments keep the loop tight.
Weekly pipeline review
A standing weekly review of pipeline by vertical: lead quality, what's converting, and where the message is landing. Sales' frontline feedback rewrites next week's outbound copy — the cadence makes this a loop, not a memo.
Vertical cheat sheets
Every vertical ships with a one-page cheat sheet for Sales: buyer language, the pain triggers, the decision-maker map, and the competitive wedge — so a rep walking into a community-college call sounds like they've worked the segment for years. Kept current as replies teach us what resonates.
Deal post-mortems
Wins and losses both get a short post-mortem: what trigger opened it, which message moved it, and where it stalled. The pattern feeds back into ICP scoring and the next round of briefs — turning anecdotes into a sharper target list.