Hello again. It's been a while. If you're still subscribed to this newsletter after six months of silence, thank you! Let’s get into it.

I'm a big fan of Paul Graham's essays. His most recent essay, The Brand Age, was of particular interest to me. It covers the role of brand and marketing through the lens of the wristwatch category. It's well worth a read if you're a marketer.

The crux of the article is that over time, good product design converges on an optimal solution, and at that point brand becomes the primary way to differentiate a product. As Graham puts it:

That likely sounds familiar. Like many others, I've been observing the commoditization of software and the increasingly important role that brand and narrative plays in differentiation.

But there are a couple of points in Graham's essay that diverge from my thinking, and they have been nagging at me.

Branding vs design

Firstly, he describes the shift from design-led differentiation to brand-led differentiation as something close to a natural law. Technology makes the substantive differences between products disappear, and brand fills the vacuum. He frames this as an inevitability, and he frames it in negative terms. In his words:

He argues that branding is structurally opposed to good design, because good design converges on right answers while branding must diverge to be distinctive.

On this point, I think good marketing and powerful branding adds more colour and life to a category. I won't pretend marketing is art, but it can make us feel certain things and connect us to products in a way that design alone can't. I'm not just talking about consumer or B2C products either. It applies to community, events, nonprofit services and more.

The wristwatch is the outlier

Secondly, he treats this convergence as though it applies broadly, not just to watches.

I'd imagine product designers everywhere are shaking their fists. Graham conveniently uses the wristwatch to argue his case, when the wristwatch is truly an outlier category. Wristwatches tell the time. Time is a physical property that is immutable. Ironically, the wristwatch category might be the most timeless and static category that one could conceive.

Software is different. The optimal product design is the opposite of static. The user problems are constantly evolving, and designs must evolve with them. The problem itself is a moving target, which means design never converges long enough for brand to fully take over.

An example from the category I work in: social media management software.

The user wants to schedule posts to multiple social media platforms. There is an optimal design for the product today. But tomorrow, the social media platforms will introduce a new post format. Or another platform will launch. There are dozens of ways this problem might change in a short period of time.

This is what renders his underlying mechanism incomplete. The gravitational pull he describes, where design converges and brand takes over, simply doesn't have time to play out in software. The problem keeps moving before the design can settle.

Both Ages at once

Good branding and good design run in parallel and they have to, because the product is never finished. There quite simply isn’t a hand-off point.

I do think we're in a Brand Age and Graham is right about that. But we're also in a Design Age and I’d argue that design matters more now than it ever has. When two products have the exact same feature set but feel completely different to use — that feeling is usually design. And it's much harder to replicate than a feature list. If anything, the commoditization Graham describes should make us more invested in design, not less.

The hand-off Graham describes never actually arrives in software. Design doesn't get to retire and brand doesn't get to take the wheel. The companies that differentiate most effectively are the ones where both are working at the same time, on the same problems.

Thanks for reading.

Connect with me

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I write today from the hospital room while I sit next to my sleeping 3-year old, who has just had his tonsils surgically removed.

(He’s doing fine 😊)

It’s not exactly the writing retreat I had in mind but maybe it’s fitting. I’ve been in absentia from long-form writing recently while I focus on my work, parenting, and my health.

I do enjoy writing, however, and it does aid my work. Perhaps my parenting and health too, in some nonlinear way.

Thanks for bearing with me.

Strategists vs Operators

People tend to lean one way or the other.

Strategists dream up new ideas, find creative angles, and connect dots others don’t see. They love to zoom out, question assumptions, and imagine what’s possible. Their strengths lie in creativity, innovation, invention, and craft.

Operators thrive in motion. They make things happen. They set up systems, create structure, and ensure consistency. Their strengths are pace, diligence, process, and follow-through.

It’s a discussion we’ve been having at Buffer. At first, I thought I was an operator with a strategic bent. Then, in a 1:1 with my boss, we unpacked that a bit. Turns out I’m more of a strategist.

I’m not particularly organized. I prefer first-principle thinking to frameworks. Creativity over process.

Maybe you’re not surprised. This newsletter does claim to be about product marketing, branding, and strategy, after all.

Repositioning Buffer: From Management Tool to Creator Platform

Since the last edition, I've primarily been working on a shift in positioning and messaging for Buffer. This stems from the "down and wide" strategy that we've been pursuing.

What does "down and wide" mean exactly?

Our finance team (who are refreshingly eloquent) put it best:

This is a true positioning strategy, much more than just a hero copy rewrite or a fancy competitive positioning matrix. It involves everyone in the company, from finance to support, and is driven by leadership.

(One of my “contrarian takes” is that positioning should come from the CEO, not product marketing)

My role then is to carry that strategy as far into the market as I can.

The Challenge: How Do We Go Broader?

Some product marketers might consider this their worst nightmare… "if you're everything to everyone, you're nothing to nobody"… "riches in the niches"… and all that.

I see it differently. You can’t be everything to everyone, but you can be something to everyone. That’s the beauty of brand-building.

Joel (our CEO) and I talk often about aligning our marketing with the down-and-wide strategy. In particular, becoming more community-focused and returning to the approachability and scale that defined Buffer in the early days.

Meanwhile, our product team has been exploring a new philosophy centered on calm productivity and helping creators build better habits and routines. Our head of content noted that productivity content performs best, and our director of growth pointed out that our website still looks and feels too B2B compared to consumer-oriented products.

After a few feedback rounds, I put together a positioning proposal for the broader team.

Here's the exact memo I shared:

For Buffer to keep growing, we need to move even further downmarket.

Today, many people still lump us in with “social media management tools” like Hootsuite, Sprout, or Later. Those products are primarily built for social media managers and businesses.

Our real opportunity is to be seen in the same stack as creator tools with broad reach, like Canva, CapCut, Linktree, Descript, Notion, and Loveable. These are the tools that everyday creators use to plan and make content. They’ve grown by serving a wide audience, from beginners to pros, and by framing their products as approachable, flexible, and inspiring.

To get there, we need to reframe how people see Buffer and broaden our appeal.

From a “management” tool to a “productivity” tool

Traditionally, Buffer has been described as a “social media management tool.” That made sense when we primarily targeted social media managers and businesses.

Reframing Buffer as a social media productivity tool or app broadens Buffer’s appeal to a much wider set of creators, with a particular focus on individuals. It puts us closer to Notion than to Hootsuite.

Importantly, this isn’t a departure from who we are. Productivity has always been part of Buffer’s DNA. Our very first product was about saving time on Twitter. Our blog built authority by publishing practical productivity advice. And “work smarter, not harder / 4DWW” remains a cornerstone of our culture. This repositioning brings us back to those roots, while opening the door to a larger, more diverse audience of creators.

Creator Mode vs Consumer Mode

As we push downmarket, the primary alternative to Buffer increasingly becomes the social platforms themselves. So how do we differentiate ourselves from them?

Social platforms are designed for consumption. Their feeds are optimized to keep people scrolling, refreshing, and reacting. Even creators who open the app with the intention to post often get pulled into distraction loops.

Buffer provides the opposite: it’s the switch that flips you into Creator Mode.

• A dedicated workspace to plan, publish, and engage without distraction.

• A calm environment that keeps you in the flow of creating, not consuming.

• A clear separation between when you’re working on content vs. when you’re enjoying it.

This gives creators a clear reason to use Buffer instead of posting natively without putting our platform partners in a negative light. And importantly, we’re not saying consumption is bad. There’s a time and place for it. We’re simply making the mode switch intentional: when it’s time to create, Buffer is where you go.

To illustrate the point, here’s one of many examples of creators struggling to find the time and energy to post consistently.

Serving all types of creators

A big question in this project was: who exactly are we for? Should we narrow down to a niche like “aspiring creators” or “small businesses”?

Our decision is to go broad: Buffer serves all creators.

A consumer brand analogy here is Nike. Nike serves every type of athlete, from casual runners to Olympic medalists. They use the excellence of the pros as inspiration, while making their products approachable for everyone.

Similarly, Buffer is for:

• The small business owner trying to post more regularly.

• The aspiring creator experimenting with their voice.

• The experienced creator who values productivity and calm.

• The agency freelancer seeking flexibility and value-first.

By leaning into this breadth, we avoid pigeonholing ourselves into a narrow niche and instead broaden Buffer’s relevance across the entire creator spectrum.

Our product promise

This positioning flows into four promises we’ll reinforce across campaigns and customer stories:

• Consistency without the busywork: Buffer guides your habits with gentle nudges and clear goals, while automating cross-posting, scheduling and analysis to save you time.

• Be uniquely you, with a little help: Find your voice with inspiration from real creators. Templates and examples spark ideas that feel authentic to you, so your content always feels like your own.

• Flexibility without friction: Buffer adapts to your workflow, whether you’re managing one account or many. Use AI on your terms, connect your favorite tools, and get started with a free plan packed with real value.

• Connect with your community. Buffer brings all your comments into one calm space so you can reply, connect, and build real relationships without getting lost in feeds.

What this means for Marketing

This positioning has practical implications for how we market Buffer:

• Category narrative: Help people see Buffer in the “creator tool” stack (Canva, CapCut, Linktree), not the “social media management tool” stack (Hootsuite, Later).

• Campaign framing: Lean into productivity and calm creation, not just channel management.

• Customer stories: Showcase a range of creators, from everyday voices to professionals, making success feel achievable.

• Competitive narrative: Highlight Buffer as the calm alternative to both the distraction of native posting and the complexity of enterprise tools.

Next steps

Thanks to everyone who’s been part of shaping this work. Positioning is never “done,” but this gives us a strong, shared starting point. With this clarity, we can tell more cohesive stories, launch with more confidence, and ultimately make Buffer feel indispensable to the everyday creators we serve.

Our product is still evolving to fully deliver on the promises outlined earlier, and our marketing will evolve alongside it. Over time, we will:

Refine our website messaging to reflect this new direction.

• Publish and share more case studies that show Buffer as a productivity tool for all types of creators.

• Lean into the “Creator Mode” metaphor — visually and textually — as the clearest articulation of calm productivity.

• Anchor upcoming launches in our product promises. By regularly beating the same drum, we’ll become known for enabling consistency, authenticity, flexibility, and value.

Let me know if this triggers and thoughts or questions and please bookmark the Product Marketing Hub as your source of truth for positioning and messaging!

I also plan on sharing more about it in next month’s All Hands.

Making It Real: The Product Marketing Hub

The product marketing hub is where I try to channel my inner operator. It’s a shared Notion workspace that anyone at Buffer can access — a single source of truth for how we talk about the product, what we’re launching, and who we’re serving.

It includes:

• What Buffer is, why it’s useful, and how it’s different. A shared foundation anyone can use when talking about Buffer.

• Our product promises. The commitments we want Buffer to live up to. I used to call them narratives, but “promise” feels stronger. Something you have to keep, not just marketing spin.

• A launch tracker. In a remote team, context scatters quickly. The tracker helps everyone see what’s shipping, when, and why — and quietly celebrates progress.

• A shared customer database. Stories, quotes, and proof points anyone can pull from.

The Strategist AND the Operator

Positioning work demands both.

The strategist in me loves the pivot to “productivity,” the Creator Mode concept, and the Nike analogy.

But the operator in me knows none of it matters without the less glamorous follow-through.

Thanks for reading.

It’s been a while since I last sent a newsletter and there’s a reason for that. A diversion: I’m about to begin treatment for testicular cancer.

Some background…

Three years ago, I was diagnosed with Stage 1 seminoma. It’s widely considered the “best” kind of cancer you can get if such a thing exists. It has an almost 100% survival rate.

In most cases, it’s managed with an orchidectomy (farewell, lefty) followed by routine surveillance. And so, surveil we did; until six weeks ago when a couple of unpleasant biopsies revealed the cancer had spread to two lymph nodes in my groin and pelvis. This is an unusual trajectory for testicular cancer, which typically metastasizes to abdominal nodes first, so the discovery caught both me and my oncologist by surprise.

The good news? The survival rate for Stage 2 seminoma remains very high; over 90%.

The bad news? I’ll be undergoing further treatment: likely a single dose of chemotherapy (carboplatin), followed by targeted radiotherapy to the affected lymph nodes.

Since then, I’ve had nearly a dozen medical appointments. Add in twin babies, a rambunctious three-year-old, and a full-time job… well, you can understand how this newsletter naturally fell down the list of priorities.

Nevertheless.

I’ll be trying to extract some marketing wisdom from this unpleasant chapter and I hope you’ll stick with me as I navigate treatment, which begins in early May.

Finding purpose

“Purpose” is a big word in product marketing. Why does your product exist? Who is it for? That question underpins nearly everything a product marketer touches.

And, as you can imagine, this brush with mortality has me thinking more about purpose (and meaning) than usual.

I’ve come to believe the best marketing comes from a place of freedom.

Not the freedom to run wild campaigns or try every zany idea. I mean freedom in the deeper sense — the freedom to be yourself, to pursue the truth, to do the right thing, and to play the long game.

That kind of freedom is rare in marketing. But when you find it? It’s magic. Work becomes meaningful. Purpose becomes obvious. The stories write themselves and the results follow.

So, where do you find that kind of freedom?

In small companies. In independent businesses. Maybe even in starting something of your own.

I’ve noticed a lot of product marketers I admire going solo lately. I won’t pretend to know their reasons but I’d bet freedom and purpose have something to do with it.

Startups and small teams have a unique advantage: closeness. Closeness to the customer, to the product, and to the mission. That sense of connection tends to fade in bigger orgs.

So protect that closeness, and your freedom, at all costs.

Talk to your customers

As a solo PMM based on the other side of the world from most of my team, it can get lonely.

Whenever I feel jaded, frustrated, or adrift, I book a round of customer interviews. It doesn’t matter how busy I am. I just do it.

And it always helps.

I think it’s because talking to customers reconnects me with purpose. It’s easy to forget you’re building for real people when you’re buried in dashboards, sipping from your water bottle, half-listening to another Zoom call.

But then I talk to Marina — a Brazilian creator who advocates for people with disabilities and hear how Buffer helps her share her voice.

Or to the social media editor at The Spectator, figuring out how AI is reshaping his role and how Buffer fits into his strategy.

Or to the product manager-turned-catfluencer who built his own social network for pets.

After those calls, I feel grounded. Re-energized. More connected to the work — and armed with fresh insights to help guide my direction.

We’re going to Turkey

Thankfully, I’ll still be attending our annual company retreat later this month. It’s in Antalya, Turkey.

I’m a passionate advocate for remote work (health issues or not), but I also believe nothing replaces in-person connection.

Retreats are a rare chance to align on strategy, dream up big ideas, and build stronger bonds with the team. I can’t wait.

I’ll be sharing some behind-the-scenes moments from the retreat. If you’re curious, follow me on LinkedIn.

~

Thanks for reading and as always, hit reply if you have any feedback or questions. I love hearing from you!

Gamification

We recently launched a new feature in Buffer called “Streaks.” Your streak grows every week you post to social media. If you miss a week, your streak resets.

It’s very simple gamification.

When I first heard that we were adding it to our product, I was concerned.

Why add gamification when we have so many long-standing feature requests to tackle and other opportunities to pursue? Aren’t there more useful ways to retain users?

But as I learned more about it, I started to understand this wasn’t just a retention hack.

There’s good gamification and bad gamification. Good gamification helps people achieve their goals. Bad gamification distracts people from their goals.

We were heavily inspired by Duolingo and the way they’ve implemented good gamification. Streaks are a core feature of their product and help their users build positive learning habits.

One of the most common themes we hear from our users is, "I struggle to post consistently.” Having a motivator like Streaks aligns with their goal of posting regularly.

Understanding this pain point helped me position the feature as a “personal trainer for content creation” as opposed to a reward mechanism. It’s not quite as pushy as Duo but it’s not just a dopamine hit either.

If your product requires the formation of a new habit, then I’d encourage you to explore how gamification can help your users achieve their goals.

A new homepage

I briefly mentioned this in my last newsletter: Our new homepage is officially live. Check it out at buffer.com, and let me know what you think.

Buffer is a product-led company and our homepage plays a critical role. It must elegantly guide visitors from initial interest to that crucial first click of the signup button. It essentially functions as an entire sales team compressed into a single page.

Here are a few heuristics I used when working on the messaging.

Aim for clarity, not consensus.

There were plenty of stakeholders involved in the copy of the homepage, including:

• me

• our director of growth

• our head of brand and comms

• our marketing designer

• our senior design manager

But we did a good job of avoiding “copy by committee” and instead honing in on the right copy.

FWIW, I think five people is the absolute maximum number you’d want to work on copy. Two or three is ideal but not always realistic for high-profile marketing assets.

Sell the product and the outcome

Amazingly, this is a somewhat controversial approach.

You may have heard the phrase, “People don’t want a quarter-inch drill; they want a quarter-inch hole.” This decades-old quote from a Harvard Business School marketing professor was popularized among product marketers who latched on to the concept of selling outcomes instead of products. It became a product marketing faux pas to talk about features in your pitch.

The quote sounds clever but it’s also very context-dependent. Back then, software products were newer and the outcomes of using software were poorly understood. There was also less competition. It made more sense to talk about outcomes.

Today, nearly everyone knows that using software will save you time or money, or become better at your job. Customers don’t want generic platitudes, they want to know how your solution is different from the dozens of other options available.

Throughout the homepage, we tried to strike a nice balance that covers:

• What the product will help you achieve

• How it will help you achieve it

• Why it’s different to other solutions

Leverage data as social proof

Social proof is a staple of any SaaS homepage, often in the form of logos or testimonials. These have become so standard that I usually skip over them.

One point of differentiation Buffer has as an incumbent compared to the startups challenging us is the depth of our user base. We have hundreds of thousands of users sharing millions of posts every month.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. I believe that data can be too.

This also aligns with our down-and-wide strategy. We aren’t targeting Fortune 500 logos, we’re targeting small businesses and aspiring creators.

Feedback from LinkedIn

I shared a screenshot of the homepage to LinkedIn and asked for feedback. Here are some of the comments that I found interesting:

PMM tools

Buffer recently introduced a $250/year AI tooling stipend for all staff. This has me reflecting on my current marketing stack and whether I should explore other options – not just for AI tools, but for everything I use.

Here's my current toolkit, including company-wide tools at Buffer:

Content Creation & Design

• Canva: Social graphics

• CapCut: Social video editing

• Descript: Video transcription

• Epidemic Sound: Video music licensing

• Telestream: Advanced video editing

• Unsplash: Stock photography

• Viggle: Meme video creation

Analytics & Customer Insights

• Ahrefs: SEO and keyword research

• ChartMogul: Revenue analytics

• Mixpanel: Product analytics

• Typeform: User surveys

• FeatureOS: User feedback and changelog management

• Grain: Customer interview recordings

Communication & Collaboration

• Buffer: Social media scheduling

• Customer.io: Email and in-app messaging

• Figma: Design collaboration

• Notion: Asynchronous documentation

• Slack: Real-time communication

• Zoom: Video conferencing

AI Assistance

• Anthropic: AI writing and analysis

• OpenAI: AI content generation

I'm always looking to optimize my stack – if you have any tools you swear by, as always, I’d love to hear from you.

Life threw me a beautiful curveball in 2024.

In May, my wife and I welcomed twins, expanding our family from three to five overnight. We proudly joined the "three under three" club. You can spot us muttering to ourselves in a state of dishevelment in aisle five.

While I was adjusting to this new chapter at home, Buffer experienced remarkable growth. After a flat 2023 and two years of decline, we crossed $20M in revenue.

A true breakout year!

Buffer’s annual recurring revenue from 2022 to 2024.

You might wonder what drove this growth. It wasn't any single factor, but rather several key elements coming together:

1. A focused strategy: We committed to expanding down-market and embracing freemium

2. Revitalized marketing: We rebooted our acquisition flywheel and doubled down on content/SEO

3. Cultural transformation: We increased our pace, output, and customer focus

4. Market opportunities: We capitalized on emerging social networks

For a deeper dive into our operating principles and strategy, check out this shareholders letter from late 2023.

And you can see all of our metrics at https://buffer.com/metrics.

While I was on parental leave during two major launches (Threads and Bluesky integrations), I watched proudly as our team knocked it out of the park.

But interestingly, our most impactful launch wasn't a flashy new feature, but the reinstatement of an existing one: Instagram Personal Profiles.

A good reminder, going into 2025, you don’t always have to chase shiny new things.

Here are my other ambitions for the year:

A homepage transformation

We're giving our marketing site a much-needed refresh. While there's no universal rule for how often to update a website, we knew it was time. Our design and copy had grown stale. We've already revamped several key pages, including pricing, and now we're tackling our homepage: the cornerstone of our marketing presence and a product marketer's most valuable asset.

Here’s the old hero:

Buffer.com hero section in 2024

In hindsight, the copy feels generic and bland. It reads like it was written by committee. I can’t quite remember but it probably was.

Here’s an unfinished sneak peek (don’t tell anyone!) of a new design, courtesy of our amazing designer Kate. I’ll share the hero copy and the thinking behind it in my next newsletter.

Channel mastery

The bar for content is only going to get higher in 2025. To stand out, you have to master one or two channels and go deep. It’s about quality, not quantity.

Think The Browser Company and its YouTube channel, Figma and its community, or Grammarly and its lifecycle emails.

Historically Buffer has had an incredible blog and Twitter presence. While our blog remains industry-leading, we're exploring new territories. Bluesky, where we were early movers, shows particular promise – especially with our new senior social media manager on board.

A memorable launch moment

While our standard launch playbook serves us well for regular product announcements, I'm aiming higher this year. I want to create a launch moment that genuinely moves the needle on industry conversation and word-of-mouth.

Creating a community of ambassadors

Inspired by my experience as a Dropbox Paper advocate in 2018, I'm exploring creating a Buffer ambassador program. The vision: offer early access, team interactions, and exclusive perks to passionate users who can provide valuable feedback and support our launches.

What are your goals for this year? Hit reply and let me know.

Connect with me 🤝

LinkedIn | Threads | Bluesky | X

Pricing and packaging are front and center for me right now, and we're having many discussions about it at Buffer. Simon, our Director of Growth Marketing, is leading the effort. You should follow him if you are interested in growth. He’s amazing.

I see packaging not only as a powerful growth lever but also as a way to stand out in a landscape where SaaS features are quickly replicated and products are increasingly commoditized.

With that in mind, let’s dive into this month’s newsletter.

A stroll down memory lane 🚶‍♂️

I thought it might be interesting to look back at how Buffer’s pricing and packaging have evolved over the past decade. I haven’t included every iteration or experiment - just the major updates.

2012: A SaaS product is born

This is Buffer’s pricing page in 2012. There are three plans, usage-based tiers, and an annual discount. These are still standard practices for SaaS products 12 years later.

Some additional context: Buffer was making about $200k per year in revenue with a team of less than five people. The “direct line to founder” on the Premium plan is an interesting touch.

2015: Enterprise enters the chat

As the company grew, so did the number of plans. I joined the company around this time. Buffer’s annual revenue was $10m with 50 employees.

Again, the plans are primarily differentiated by usage limits rather than feature-gating, but we see the introduction of two distinct target customers; individuals and teams. We also see the introduction of Enterprise, another staple move in the SaaS playbook.

Although I’m not sure what skateboarding had to do with anything!

2019: Multi-product mayhem

In 2019 we unbundled features into three distinct products, each sold separately. Our original publishing features were packaged together into three plans. We rebranded our engagement features and packaged them into a new product called Reply, with two plan options. And we rebuilt our analytics and sold them separately on a single “Premium” plan.

Sound confusing? It was. We also de-emphasized our Free plan.

It coincided with a big spike in revenue growth — all of a sudden, we were selling many SKUs at higher price points and diverting all signups onto paid plans. But it precipitated a steady decline in new user growth and ultimately revenue.

2021: Back to the future

Our multi-product strategy wasn’t working, for reasons that deserve their own post, so I won’t go into them here. In 2021, we rebundled everything into a single plan and reintroduced our Free plan.

We also added a differentiator—"per-channel" pricing. Unlike our competitors, who required users to purchase channel "bundles," we offered flexibility with individual channel options.

2023: Pick your perfect plan

Our recommitment to a freemium model with simpler value-based pricing was beginning to pay off. Average revenue per user remained flat but new user growth re-ignited. We started winning the lower end of the market again and today we are back to growth and profitability.

We made some adjustments to pricing, introducing a volume discount for our largest customers and adding a calculator to our pricing page. This was partly based on feedback from customer support that per-channel pricing was confusing some of our users.

Zags that helped Buffer grow 💪

SaaS pricing is usually fairly formulaic and for good reason. The primary goal is to turn prospects into customers and, above all, drive revenue. For growth practitioners, pricing pages are sacred, and packaging is one of the most complex, cross-functional, and challenging levers to adjust, let alone fully utilize.

But therein lies the opportunity.

I don’t think we ever broke serious new ground at Buffer, but I do believe we did some things that were considered unusual at the time and helped us stand out:

1. Transparent pricing. We made our pricing transparent and even broke down where your money goes when you purchase a Buffer subscription.

2. Strong freemium offering. Most of our largest competitors went upmarket and removed or restricted their free plans. We explored this path but ultimately found that we were uniquely suited to serving the lower end of the market through a freemium model. This coincided with the boom of the creator economy, enabling us to capture a large share of “entry-level” creators.

   

3. Per-channel pricing. Pricing that scales up and down based on usage isn’t unique but I believe we were the first to implement “channels” (aka integrations) as a scalable pricing dimension. We recognized that people don’t want to pay for integrations they don’t need. Others have since followed.

The next iteration 🔜 

For the next iteration of our pricing and packaging, we’re aiming to address three issues.

1. Users want a lighter-weight paid plan option. Our lowest paid tier is “too powerful”.

2. Our upgrade ladders are a bit random. Some features are completely gated, some are completely free, and others have usage limits.

3. Our packaging is too prescriptive. Our freemium strategy should enable any type of user to grow from the free plan up to the highest-paid plan. This means our plans should be less persona-based and differentiated by usage limits instead.

Instead of addressing each one individually, we’re taking a holistic approach and trying to rethink our pricing and packaging from first principles. It may take us a little longer this way, but ultimately it feels like the right thing to do.

I’ll report back with the results.

Chaos packaging? 🤯 

I often draw inspiration from FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) marketing, where brands have long mastered the art of capturing attention and building loyalty. Take a moment next time you're in the grocery aisle: when you reach for a specific protein bar or laundry detergent, consider why you chose that brand over the others. It’s likely no accident; everything from the color, design, and even the shape of the package has been meticulously crafted to draw you in.

But there’s one recent trend that I’m particularly enamored with. It’s called “chaos packaging”.

Twitter tweet

It’s a bold, ironic approach where brands intentionally mimic the packaging styles of entirely unrelated products. Think about it: tampons packaged like ice cream, coffee in toothpaste tubes, or sports drinks in handwash dispensers. These packaging zags do more than grab attention—they spark curiosity and encourage people to rethink familiar products, capturing valuable mindshare in otherwise crowded, commoditized categories.

There’s a lesson here for SaaS. How can we “merchandize” our software to stand out in a landscape where products look and feel the same? Could we borrow from the unexpected in FMCG, creating experiences or visuals that draw users in by breaking familiar patterns?

Thanks for reading.

Connect with me 🤝

LinkedIn | Threads | X | Bluesky | Mastodon

Hello and welcome to the first edition of Always Be Zagging.

On a quick personal note, I'm in my 16th and final week of family leave. My twins are nearly five months old, and my eldest is about to turn three. Life is chaotic but meaningful, and I’m finding pockets of time in the evenings to write.

There are three topics in today’s newsletter.

1. Who should product marketers report to?

2. Founder Brands

3. Launch fatigue

Who should product marketers report to?

In my experience, if you ask this question to three different product marketers you’ll get three different answers.

Until recently I reported to Buffer’s Director of Growth Marketing. Before that, it was our Chief Product Officer and before that, our VP of Marketing. Maybe this speaks to hazy definitions of product marketing, but I’m inclined to think it reflects shifting business priorities. In a startup, everyone does product marketing. As the company matures, product marketing becomes a subcategory of marketing that roams across the organization.

Does your business need more help with attracting or retaining users? If the former, your PMMs should sit with marketing; if the latter, they should be with the product team.

Currently, I’m on the marketing team but report to the CEO. This is the best spot for a product marketer.

Why?

My top priority is crafting industry-level narratives that differentiate Buffer from competing products. Notice I say "crafting" and not "creating." That’s because I can’t develop a narrative on my own — it must come from the company’s chief storyteller, typically the founder/CEO. My role is to connect that narrative to everything we bring to market.

Getting stuck in the weeds is easy when you’re a product marketer. There are always new features to announce, one-pagers to write, metrics to be tracked, and copy to be finessed. Reporting to the CEO pulls you out of those weeds and brings clarity to what truly matters.

For additional context, the org chart below shows my CEO’s direct reports. I’m the only product marketer on the team.

Founder Brands

Speaking of CEOs and storytelling, chances are that if you’re reading this newsletter you work in tech. And chances are that if you work in tech, you’re familiar with Paul Graham’s recent essay, “Founder Mode”.

I shared my thoughts on the topic to Threads but I wanted to touch on something related; Founder Brands.

Increasingly, I’m noticing CEO personalities superseding corporate brands. It’s a trend that aligns with the age of influencers. Generally, people don’t follow companies—they follow other people.

Mark Zuckerberg’s brand evolution is an interesting example. Portrayed as callous in The Social Network and criticized for his congressional appearances, he has recently repositioned himself as a lovable, if a little goofy, fashion icon.

Zuck poking fun at himself using Meta AI

The advantages of a strong founder brand are many:

• PR: Breaking into the news cycle is easier with a recognizable leader.

• Brand Affinity: People relate more to a person than a logo.

• Differentiation: Products can be copied, but people can’t.

• Culture: It’s clear to everyone what your company stands for.

The risk of a strong founder brand is that it might alienate your customers if they have a divisive personality.

Founder brands aren’t confined to big tech CEOs. If you’re a leader at a startup or smaller business, I highly recommend you develop your brand. It’ll make your marketing team’s job a lot easier. At Buffer, we’ve been intentional about our entire team building their brands on social media. The benefit for us is two-fold. It helps us empathise with our customers—many of whom are content creators—and it amplifies our reach in campaigns.

Here’s a curated list of our team on X.

(Hopefully Threads will implement a lists feature soon!)

Launch fatigue

At Buffer, we aim to deliver value quickly, often incrementally. By keeping product releases small in scope, we maintain a tighter feedback loop with our customers. Ship fast, learn, and iterate accordingly.

The upside, from a marketing perspective, is that there is a steady drumbeat of new releases or enhancements to share with customers. Delivering improvements consistently generates goodwill.

The downside is what I call 'launch fatigue.' Launches begin to feel like a grind rather than something to celebrate, and engagement with your announcements starts to wane. Imagine if you had a birthday every week instead of once a year—eventually, you'd stop caring.

Most product marketers have a tiering system for product launches to help navigate launch fatigue. I’ve attempted to implement various iterations myself. Here’s what I currently use:

The idea is to reserve major launch campaigns for Tier 1 products.

I’ve found these tiering systems to be both helpful and awkward. Helpful because they provide a framework for managing marketing resources and internal expectations. Awkward because the tiers are subjective and often applied retroactively. We try to fit features into tiers after they’ve hit the roadmap, rather than build the roadmap around tiers.

Another way software companies create Tier 1 moments is by bundling “smaller” releases together into one larger launch event. Shopify does this with Editions, and Zapier with ZapConnect.

Last month, we ran an experiment at Buffer called Collaboration Week. You can read about the experiment here. In short, it was an opportunity to discuss strategic topics fully asynchronously.

I used the opportunity to share a proposal about doing seasonal launch events. Here’s what I wrote:

I also shared a link to this post by Brex’s CEO about rethinking how they build products and go-to-market. Here’s an inspiring excerpt:

My goal for Buffer is to maintain our steady drumbeat of releases but add seasonal launch moments to which we can anchor our Tier 1 releases.

Thanks for reading.

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